Mississauga is Now an Avid Follower of the Vancouver Model

Does the phrase "towers on podiums" ring a bell to you?

The newest version of the "City of Glass" (termed famously by writer and Vancouverite Douglas Coupland) is emerging in this Toronto suburb as Vancouver-based developers are assisting staff at Mississauga City Hall in creating a mini-Vancouver out of the flat landscape surrounding Square One Mall, dominated by grand pedestrian-friendly boulevards. Even planners are dreaming of a central park once the mall becomes obsolete as a result of the changes in consumer taste in shopping along the streets!

I was in the area during the first ENVS 6101 Mississauga - Richmond Hill - Markham field trip, and I was amazed at how the ageless Mayor Hazel McCallion had a 180-degree turn (she had the not-so-prestigious title of "Sprawl Queen" by some of her critics) by approving strategies at intensifying the downtown area around Hurontario and Burnhamthorpe (for those of you who are not familiar with the geography of the region).

Downtown Mississauga should receive primary consideration (after the ill-planned Spadina extension to Vaughan Corporate Centre via York University - since VCC will not have the required density to support it) should funding for a subway expansion west of Kipling Station be available, since it has the potential to surpass the minimum population density to support a subway line.

Here is the much-talked-about Marilyn Monroe building (on the right-hand side of the picture below) and her male counterpart. Again notice the townhouses at the bottom serving as podiums to foster
Here is my take on Mississauga City Hall from the south side of the building on a sunny but cold and windy Saturday morning. The class even went to the deck section of the clock tower to have a glance at the development around the area. I felt like being in the freezer after standing there for only a few minutes!

Double Irony

There was an accident on the intersection of Victoria Park and Finch Avenues, and the Toronto Star decides to put this pic in front of the GTA section on today's newspaper.

The first irony, as the pic suggests, is having a police vehicle and a beer truck colliding with each other.

The second irony is that most people will link it to drunk driving as soon as they see the sheer amounts of booze that was on the truck. If you look at the title, it was actually the cruiser ramming into the truck instead of the other way around.


Anyway, I gotta hurry to the library again to work on my term papers. See ya later!

A Whirlwind Tour of the Old City of Toronto, Part III

(Continued from Part II)

After a short bus trip along Main St., we have finally arrived at the Beaches area. The area sort of reminds me of Vancouver's Kitsilano neighbourhood (nice, trendy but remarkably expensive - especially with tiny drizzles falling down during that day). This pic is taken along Queen St. E. looking west from Leuty Ave.

You want to become a part of the neighbourhood and ask questions to your profs easily*? If you don't have at least $1.2 million Canadian, sorry bud, you are out of luck... (that's not to mention that houses are selling like hot cakes despite the high price)

*There are quite a number of them living in the Beaches area.

Here is a perfect example of a waste of park space. Without proper support by adjacent areas, that is not to mention about the inaccessibility to the concert stage (right beside the smokestack in the pic), Woodbine Park is as lifeless and unattractive as it can be in one of the nicest neighbourhoods in Toronto. But it was time for the class to leave the Beaches area and catch a streetcar towards downtown.

Here I deliberately made the CN Tower look shorter than other buildings in the downtown Toronto area, since it always get the attention when one thinks about the city. From right to left: The Spire (an unfinished residential high-rise), Scotia Plaza, Commerce Court West, CN Tower, and Canada Trust Tower.

The corner of Jarvis and King St. Even though it is important to intensify and infill areas to support public transit, it is also important to create a pedestrian-friendly realm via the construction of 4-5 storey "podium" buildings. People will find it exciting to walk along areas such as this one. Taller buildings, meanwhile, should have a setback to provide some breathing space to both the street and the people.

When Paul Bedford and the late Jane Jacobs proposed changes to this area (King-Parliament as well as King-Spadina), the staff at the planning department were quickly up in arms. It is not surprising that who got the last laugh after seeing personally the results to these changes.

The class then headed two blocks to the historic St. Lawrence Market to grab something to eat before heading to our next stop.

Not wasting valuable time, the class headed straight to the Harbourfront area to see some nice-looking condo developments that have sprung out in the last two decades. Here is a look at some of them on Concord City Place, developed by (you guessed it) the same developers that transformed False Creek North in Vancouver from a derelict district to a pedestrian mecca.

Unfortunately, the City of Toronto did not have much vision in terms of design standards, nor does it have an urban design panel similar to that of Vancouver. The result? Developers are sent back to the drawing board after witnessing the construction of a series of badly-designed buildings along the eastern edges of Spadina Ave.

I'll talk more about the Gardiner Expressway (the elevated highway on the foreground of the picture) a little later.

This is how condos and apartments should be built: a gradual rise in height from the harbourfront.







While it is nice to have nice, attractive condos and apartments in the Harbourfront area surrounded by a pleasant network of parks and trails, it is also crucial to have a mix of residents (single or married, and with or without children). This is how true vibrancy can be achieved in an area. And that is the reason why a community centre/elementary school is placed right next to an abandoned wheat elevator on the south side of Lakeshore Blvd W.

The NE intersection of Lakeshore Blvd W. and Bathurst St. With a streetcar line serving the area, better land use opportunities are available instead of having a parking that does nothing but to discourage the use of one of the most wonderful forms of public transportation Toronto has to offer. From here the class hopped on to a streetcar as it headed west.

The streetcar route terminates at the fairgrounds of the Canadian National Exhibition (CNE), with the ageless Ricoh Coliseum (home of the Toronto Marlies, the farm team of the Toronto Maple Leafs hockey team - the most hated in Canada outside of Southern Ontario) shown in the pic.








Ahh... Here is a good look at an elevated section of the mighty Gardiner Expressway. Is it worth the millions of dollars annually to repair a behemoth that cities around the world would otherwise have torn down a long time ago? Do we need a repeat of what happened on the Laval freeway overpass before policy-makers on Nathan Phillips Square will take a serious look at this problem? (Pic taken outside of Ricoh Coliseum)

What you are looking now is the future site of the Front Street Extension to link up with the hotly-contested Gardiner Expressway. Despite recommended by Paul Bedford and the Toronto Planning Department to be constructed after the demolition of Gardiner's Downtown section, politicians, in the name of traffic relief, wanted the project to go ahead no matter what. If the latter option goes through, this would spell disaster to the inner areas of Toronto.

The class then entered into the Liberty District immediately north of CNE. The left-hand side of the street house workshops and incubator companies that are important to the knowledge economy in the twenty-first century. Not surprisingly, the other side consists of residences that are once reserved for industrial uses.

A model of the development around Liberty Village, with two high-rise towers (centre-left of the picture) and low-rise townhouses immediately to the east. And we also have a suburban strip mall (centre) that seriously looks out of place in an urban and historical area such as here. Also a former toy factory (lower right) is in the process of being converted into live-work lofts.

The lowrise developments in the Liberty District, which bear the resemblance of barracks according to Paul Bedford. To those of you living in one of these units: You have a lack of taste by overpaying developers to move here.
Hey, Toronto has a Stanley Park too! (Pic taken while traveling on the King St. streetcar heading towards Spadina Ave.)






A nice little alley in the trendy Yorkville District in Uptown Toronto. This, like Yaletown in Vancouver, is a good star-gazing spot for those who follow closely on Hollywood and New York.











Yorkville has gone under a dramatic facelift recently as large-sized condos rose out of the ashes of old homes that are not under the official Toronto heritage registry. Prices are starting at a couple of million Canadian dollars.

(Well that is the end of the picture-narration series "A Whirlwind Tour of the Old City of Toronto." Thanks for spending your spare time looking at the meagre collection of photos, and I'll see you in December after submitting my term papers for this semester)

A Whirlwind Tour of the Old City of Toronto, Part II

(Continued from Part I)

A nice blend of the new and old, with the exception of the brownish colouring that is typical of buildings around Toronto.

Pic taken south of the Yonge-St. Clair intersection.










Apparently developers try to add a little Parisien flavour onto the streets of Toronto.

Taken a few blocks north of the Summerhill subway station.












Here is an attempt to provide an artistic look to residents along Yonge St. The water on the lens has blurred the picture a littlebit.





This LCBO* joint south of Summerhill subway station was once a passenger train station (North Toronto) before Canadian Pacific pulled out of the business a long time ago. Here, you can find an expanse selection of all sorts of alcohol from around the world. Certainly I will visit this place during the semester break when I explore the sights and sounds Toronto has to offer.

Unfortunately, some of the class were refrained from taking pictures of the architecture inside for commercial reasons. That's too bad.

*LCBO (Liquor Control Board of Ontario) is the chain of liquor stores run by the Ontario Provincial Government. Sadly, it can only sell beer in half-dozens or less. On the other hand, the Beer Store, a private chain of outlets that only sells beer as its name suggests, is able to offer alcohol-hungry customers the choice of purchasing booze in large quantities.

Thankfully, permits for suburban-style commercial uses such as the Starbucks pictured here along Yonge St. (which is a total waste of space and can be intensified) is no longer allowed.

What you are seeing right here on Yonge St. north of Rosedale subway station is not a complex of converted residential buildings. This is actually one single house bought by the owner of an architectural firm. My memories are fading in terms of how did this happen, so let's move on...

A weird-looking mixed-use building on Yonge St. north of Bloor St. that was built in the 1970s., with office space at the bottom and retirement homes on top. After a lunch stop at one of the many Starbucks/Tim Hortons in Toronto, it was time to say so long to Yonge after spending a couple of hours walking and riding the subway along the longest street in the world.





After a lengthy subway ride from Yonge-Bloor station, we see some better maintained public housing units on the SE corner of Danforth Ave. and Main Street. According to Mike who lives around the area, this space can become packed with people during summer days.

Well... What else can I say about this tasteless ad?
(Pic taken at the same intersection - just south of the Main Street subway station)

(To be continued)

A Whirlwind Tour of the Old City of Toronto, Part I

Since it's paper-writing time. I am simply going to upload the pics from the whirlwind trip on the final day of my ENVS 6101 class (yes the weather was really windy and rainy on Saturday, October 28, 2006) around old Toronto.

The route was roughly the following:

Eglinton subway station --> Davisville subway station (by foot along Yonge St.) --> St. Clair subway station (by subway) --> Bloor subway station (by foot along Yonge St. again) --> Main Street subway station (by subway) --> Queen Street E./The Beaches District (by foot and bus) --> St. Lawrence Market (by foot and streetcar) --> Toronto Island Airport and surrounding residential area (by foot and streetcar) --> Liberty District (by foot and streetcar) --> Yorkville (by foot and streetcar)

Yonge Street South of Eglinton Avenue












The class before we head off. (Thank you Paul Bedford -- instructor and former Director of Planning for Toronto -- for taking the pic)

I am located in the first row, third from right.


Yonge-Eglinton intersection. The mix of ownership of the NE corner (seen in the pic) effectively prevents any multi-story development on a prime location such as this one.


Yonge and Davisville. The blue building was converted from commercial to residential use in the early 1990s as a result of reduced demand for office space.




Intersection of Yonge and St. Clair. Notice the construction of the streetcar right of way. This has been the subject of great debate between the two mayoral candidates in the Toronto municipal election.

(To be continued)

A Good Article by Christopher Hume on Toronto's High-Rise Phobia

In the light of the Higher Learning Symposium on Thursday, October 19, 2006, Toronto Star urban issues columnist Christopher Hume published a good article on the ignorant and NIMBY (not-in-my-backyard) attitutdes by some representatives of Toronto's inner-city neighbourhoods. Take a look.

Link to Article

"What can be said of a city that fears growing up?" Hume asks.

...Toronto views the tall building with fear and loathing — make that self-loathing. Truly, this is a city that doesn't want to be a city, that likes the amenities urbanity offers but would rather remain a small town.

Seeing Brent Toderian in Person...

(Nov 2010: Revised many grammatical errors. This just shows how tipsy I was after returning from the main event and the bar session afterwards.)

My first impression of him, who replaced Larry Beasley as the new Director of Planning for the City of Vancouver, at the evening session of the Higher Learning Symposium yesterday (October 19, 2006) was, "Man, he is very young." I am guessing he is between the ages of 30-35. His appointment shows that decision-makers at Cambie and 12th want a young, energetic leader who is open to different ideas and options. With his background on densifying suburban Calgary, it is expected that similar endeavors will be taken in the "suburban" areas of Vancouver such as Victoria and 41st, the Kingsway Corridor, and Kerrisdale. In fact, intensification efforts can be seen at the intersection of Kingsway and Knight St. before Beasley retired. Planners in City Hall and developers need to look for opportunities outside the prized downtown area, even though land is still available in adjacent areas to the east (namely Downtown Eastside, Chinatown, Strathcona, and the False Creek Flats). It will be interesting to see how Brent can emerge out of the shadows of his predecessor, who in my opinion is highly influential in turning the Downtown Peninsula into the livable, pedestrian-oriented mecca we see today.

With that aside, the evening session on tall buildings in Downtown Toronto was informative and eye-opening. Being a person who is very new to the city, I was surprised to see the high levels of opposition to towers in Toronto in the name of neighbourhood conservation. I disagreed with our faculty's former director of the planning program, who was one of the panelists, when she suggested that high-rises resemble nothing but erect penises soaring out of nowhere. (What should we do to counter this "bad" trend? Building lots of buildings that look like vaginas?)

I also have to disagree with the speaker for the development community she claimed that the sector will not profit if it doesn't construct tall buildings. Fortunately, this comment was quickly countered by Paul Katz, a well-known architect on mega-structures, saying that medium-rise buildings are needed to create a gradual increase in building height (and therefore creating an attractive urban skyline).

Here is my take on this issue in Toronto. Before the advent of the modern transportation systems, the now-inner-city areas such as Rosedale, Queen West, Cabbagetown, etc. were originally viewed as the edges of the city. The craze for cars and freeways after the end of WWII redefined the traditional urban boundaries. When the problems of sprawl began to be taken seriously, the talk centred around the need to concentrate people and jobs once again at city centres (ie, a return to inner-cities). Regrettably, we are seeing opposition from these traditional neighbourhoods (with a streetcar system that is saved from destruction and envied by cities across North America). The residents must realize that, despite the equal importance of retaining neighbourhood integrity, they will have to accept densification measures in order to combat suburban sprawl. They cannot simply look at the issue through the lens of their immediate surroundings; they have to also view it as a region-wide issue. It doesn't hurt to have a mixed stock of housing in terms of age and height, similar to Vancouver's West End neighbourhood.

The Urban Voyeur Strikes the GTA!

Hello everyone!

In fact, I have been lurking the streets of GTA for two months! I am still doing what I have been doing for all the time back in the streets of Greater Vancouver, that is, quietly observing how the city functions (don't get yourself wrong by thinking that I am some Peeping Tom -- since the original meaning of the word simply means "the one who sees" according to Merriam-Webster). Nonetheless, I do get satisfaction when the city or area in front of my eyes is lively, diverse and tolerant; a place that I enjoy over and over and like to become a part of.

The pic above (looking west from the southside of Front Street, just east of the Jarvis Street intersection) was taken during my ENVS 5121 class field trip to the East End of Downtown Toronto (Thursday, October 12, 2006), one block away from the famous (and now gentrified) St. Lawrence Market.

Hopefully I will have the time to provide you with the sights and sounds of this wonderful place that is also the financial hub of Canada. Stay Tuned!