Urban Affairs

by

The TTC As An Arbiter of Morality and Good Taste

Much has been made in the press recently about a certain Internet dating service that encourages people to have affairs.  They managed to get lots of free publicity with a proposed total wrap of streetcars, but the TTC’s advertising review panel (a subset of the full Commission) turned them down claiming that encouraging adultery is just plain wrong.

Whether the TTC likes it or not, adultery is legal as is the provision of a “dating service” to hook up would-be partners.  This would not be the first such service to advertise on the TTC.  LavaLife ran ads in subway cars, and there are dating service posters in some subway stations.  Somehow, I doubt that everyone using these services tells their spouse/partner what they are doing.

Subway ads are running right now for the movie “It’s Complicated” whose plot involves a love triangle between a woman, her ex, and her new boyfriend.  The posters include a tasteful view of Meryl Streep and Alec Baldwin in bed.  I don’t know whether their characters are married at the point in the film where this scene occurs, but that’s hardly the point.  If the TTC is going to start censoring ads based on behaviour that is legal, they will have to be consistent.

Many people feel that lottos and booze simply involve addictive, anti-social behaviour and encourage people to spend money they don’t have.  Should these ads be banned?

On the good taste front, anyone who has visited Bloor Station recently will know that the station identity is almost completely masked in large places by a campaign for Amex.  It’s an odd coincidence that the TTC will be considering a report about the proposed renaming of Dupont Station as “Casa Loma” which contains the following observation:

TTC subway stations are, first and foremost, transportation facilities, not advertising vehicles. As people travel through our system, they need to know where they are geographically, in the context of the roads and neighbourhoods within Toronto. The names of subway stations are selected to give the clearest possible information to customers as they travel on the TTC.

Someone at the TTC should tell their ad agency that disguising a subway station to the point it is unrecognizable is unacceptable.  Count this post as the first of five complaints needed to launch a review of Amex’s adverising.  Four more shouldn’t be hard to find, and mine might not even be the first.

Footnote:  If you are going to comment, do not use the words starting with “g” that refer to games of chance.  Your session will be blacklisted by the spam filter.

by

The Effect of Rapid Transit on Local Shopping

A few weeks ago, Stephen Rees Blog in Vancouver ran an interesting piece on the effect of the new Canada Line (the one connecting Vancouver Airport and Richmond to downtown) on local shopping neighbourhoods.  Since bus service on the former surface routes has been cut, merchants are concerned that they get less walk-in trade from bus passengers.

The comment thread following the article requires some knowledge of Vancouver’s neighbourhoods and geography, but includes a variety of viewpoints on this phenomenon.  One point comes right at the end of the thread in a comment about the reconstruction of Cambie Street, under which the Canada Line runs:

Cambie Street between 16th and King Ed was completely rebuilt at great tax payer expense. What an opportunity to create a “Great Street” and boost neighborhood identity!

Instead, the streetscape design is the worst possible for enhancing the Cambie Village experience. Six lanes of traffic without separating medians, with curb side parking taking up the outer two.

My favourite symbol of the lack of capacity shown in this area of design practice is the introduction of “park benches” on the sidewalks facing parked cars.

We hear a lot about urban design in Toronto and the improvements possible as an offshoot of the Transit City projects, and the Cambie experience should be a warning of what can happen.

Rees’ article talks about the problems of merchant pressure for parking taking precedence over transit, and this effect can be seen on St. Clair where parking was one of the car-oriented street functions that forced an uncomfortable design onto the street overall.

He makes an important point about transit, namely that it is part of a pedestrian experience:

Every transit trip is an interrupted walk. Transit stops and stations ought to be seen as key to retailing. Far too often in Greater Vancouver bus passengers are banished to remote, sterile areas like Phibbs Exchange, or the Ladner bus loop. Always this is forced by local merchants who have only contempt for what they see as the low income bus passenger, and who regard buses as noisy, smelly nuisances. Of course, transit’s selection of large diesel buses only confirms that view. We do have to learn from our experiences, and acknowledge our mistakes. Far too often, transit advocates are expected to be cheer leaders for a system which, sadly, often lets us down, and seems incapable of learning from its past mistakes. Let’s all learn from this when we design our next system change.

As one who is often expected to cheer for transit plans and hope that we will fix the design problems “later”, I can only say that the time for believing planners when they say “trust me” is long over.

by

The Mayor of Transit City

Yesterday, David Miller announced that he would not seek a third term as Mayor of Toronto so that he can devote his attention to his family rather than to political battles.  In his announcement speech, the Mayor spoke of his many accomplishments including those which improve public transit.  Indeed, in today’s Globe, when asked to name one of his greatest accomplishments, Miller replied:

One of the things I passionately believe, and one of the reasons I ran for elected office to begin with, was about public transit.

Indeed, improving public transit to make Toronto a “World Class City” was part of Miller’s first, unsuccessful, bid for a Council seat in 1991.  The next election, in 1994, brought Miller to the old Metro Council.

(There are many articles in all media about Miller’s decision, and I leave it to readers to track them down.  A news compendium is available the spacing.ca website as of September 28.)

Continue reading →

by

Landmarks Vanish! Tourists Mystified!! (Update 2)

Updated September 22 at 9:50 pm:  According to this evening’s Global news, the TTC will pull the offending maps tonight from all stations.  Now may be your last chance to photograph your favourite blunder.  Mind you, considering how fast the TTC is at taking down out-of-date notices, I suspect the “bad” maps will be around for awhile.

It will also be intriguing to see if, when the new maps are installed, they actually do update all of them in every station.  I found four of elderly vintage without looking very hard yesterday.

Meanwhile, the Star managed to publish an annotated version of the St. Andrew map which shows City Hall where Osgoode Hall actually is, and the CN Tower at the corner of John and Front, north of the rail corridor.  I suppose a paper with its offices in the 905 can’t be expected to know much about downtown Toronto any more.

Finally, I strongly urge that the TTC circulate the new maps for comment to ward Councillors’ offices who might actually know where things are in their respective neighbourhoods.  Even better, as some have suggested in the comments here, put them online so that the vastly better-informed transit amateurs can help out with the project.

Continue reading →

by

The Discovery of a Transit Agenda

The Toronto Board of Trade recently issued a press release calling for a permanent national transit funding strategy.  Included in the release is a list of Ottawa’s spending promises in the GTA, although notable by its absence is comparable information for Provincial or Municipal shares in these projects.

As regular readers here will know, I have my doubts about the viability of a national funding scheme specifically because of this unpredictability and the inevitable three-way fights that arise over funding and eligibility.  If Ottawa is to be part of transit funding, I agree that this needs to be on a permanent basis and with a formula that transit agencies can rely upon to plan their long-range budgets.  Project-based funding is at the whim of day-to-day policy and politics.

Later this month, the Board of Trade has a session about Vancouver’s Transit Revolution and the wonders that innovative financing can bring.  For a more jaundiced view of the Vancouver situation, visit Stephen Rees’ blog.

Meanwhile, the Canadian Urban Institute will present Designing Transit Cities on November 19-20, 2009.  This will include a free public session in City Council Chamber on the evening of November 19, and a number of paid-entry sessions on November 20.

This program is co-sponsored by the City of Toronto, the Toronto Society of Architects, the Cities Centre at UofT, the TTC and Metrolinx.

Oddly, these “Canadian” organizations have assembled guest speakers all from the United States.  What does this say about their perception of Canadian planning?

There is supposed to be a separate website at www.transitcities.org, but it leads right back to the main CUI page with no additional info.

With two major organizations publicising the importance of transit to urban areas, I can’t help wondering how their programs, not to mention those of would-be mayoral candidates, would differ from and improve on transit plans already in place.

by

Ask Not …

This morning, I was waiting for a steetcar on Queen Street after brunch at one of my favourite hangouts, Bonjour Brioche.  On the carstop sign, I noticed a sticker had been added saying “My Toronto Does Nothing For Me”.

This seems to be a prevailing sentiment among people who have lots to complain about, usually in relation to their perceived right to have the City and its agencies (and everyone else’s taxes) give them ideal services with nothing in return.

To those who would have the CUPE strike ended yesterday with whatever Draconian consequences (usually something slow and painful) for the public workers, I have little sympathy.  Everyone focuses on the garbage collectors, but they are a small part of the total civic workforce.  Many other services come from dedicated staff who perform a myriad of duties for us, the broader public.

I say this as someone recently retired from a public career as an IT Manager at the Toronto District School Board.  Most of my staff were CUPE members, and they were dedicated to keeping our systems running as well as possible for hundreds of thousands of students, teachers and staff.  Whenever we attempted to hire from outside, job applications were overwhelmingly of less than stellar quality even though the IT market is supposedly depressed.  This says something about the competitiveness of our wage levels.

Following the 1998 shotgun weddings of the cities and school boards in Toronto, both the City and Board staff went through immense upheaval as services were consolidated.  Board IT staffing was cut by over half even though the number of students and schools remained the same, and the demand for networked services grew immensely.

Early retirement buyouts took the cream of the organization, the people who actually knew how it worked and how to get things done, in every department, out of the shop.  We saved the taxpayers millions, but only on paper, and lost years of knowledge.  Informal relationships between departments that greased the wheels in every part of the Board vanished only to be replaced by the sort of cumbersome bureaucracy so-often complained of in large agencies.

A few rotten apples were, with some effort, removed, but they were exceptions among skilled, hard-working staff.  Such people will be found in any organization.  Meanwhile, senior management ranks filled with many whose ambitions overreached their abilities.  Try getting rid of people like that without a handsome payout, assuming the organization even recognizes it has a problem.

When I look at the current civic workers’ strike in Toronto, I am disappointed that it happened, and that it’s not yet over.  I am not going to debate the merits of each side’s position here because that would turn a transit blog into a repository for anti-union, anti-public service and, yes, anti-Miller bilge that has quite enough play elsewhere.  In brief, I think the City’s position is reasonable, and those playing politics would do well to consider how they might handle the situation otherwise.

Toronto does a lot for me personally by permitting a rich varied lifestyle and a broad menu of diversions.  In return, I work to advance public services, especially those provided by the transit system, even when my advocacy runs headlong into pig-headed politicians and professional staff.  Many other advocates, some well-known, some only members of a small neighbourhood association, make their marks on Toronto.  A small army of civic staff through many agencies deliver the services we all work so hard to attain.

The strike needs to end, and soon, so that we can all concentrate on the betterment of the city.  Part of that betterment is the spirit of involvement in civic affairs at the political and community level that is the real strength of Toronto.  Many citizens care about their city, about their Toronto.  That inclusive, plural voice is the heart of “my” city, a city where people ask what they can do to make it a better place everywhere from the posh waterfront to the poor suburbs.

by

Second Exits, Second Entrances

In response to modern fire safety codes, the TTC has an ongoing program to add secondary exits at many subway stations.  Note that these must be completely separate paths out of the station.  Two stairways leading to a common mezzanine count as one exit because a fire in the common area could block access to the surface from platform level.

As an example, the new exits at Broadview take a path up to the bus and streetcar loop that is not connected to the original path up to the main entrance.

Planning for most of the new exits had assumed that they would be “exit only” facilities as this makes them cheaper to build.  However, access to stations is improved if these exits can also be entrances.  To that end, changes are proposed for five stations.

  • College Station’s original proposed second exit was at Granby Street, one south of Carlton, east of Yonge.  The primary entrance for the station is constrained by existing buildings and cannot be made accessible with elevators.  Therefore, the second exit will be converted to a full entrance including elevators.  An alternative scheme involving connection to College Park is also under study.
  • Museum Station’s original proposal would have surfaced in Queen’s Park, but there is now a proposal for a connection to a new UofT Faculty of Law campus on the northwest corner of Queen’s Park.
  • Dundas Station will have an automatic entrance connection to the new Ryerson University development.
  • Dundas West Station has a rather odd history.  There has been a design for a full connection to GO Transit at this location for years, but for some reason, the TTC had scaled this back to an exit only arrangement.  Given the service GO (and the Air Rail Link) will run in this corridor, it deserves a proper subway connection.  The project is now in Metrolinx’ hands.
  • Wellesley Station will get a new entrance at Dundonald Street (one north of Wellesley).  The population density here is high enough to support two entrances, and this configuration will avoid passengers having to walk through a laneway to reach Wellesley’s main entrance from Dundonald Street and areas to the north.

Frankly, I can’t see why the TTC wouldn’t design second entrances (not just exits) right from the outset, and I hope that this will be the standard from now on.

by

When Is A Park Not A Park?

Those of you who know Broadview Station will remember the years of construction we who live nearby suffered through as the station gained new streetcar platforms, elevators, an enlarged lobby, a lot of fixes to leaky ceilings, and now roof repairs.  Through much of this the triangle of land between the streetcar loop and sidewalk was transformed from a park to a construction staging area and then, miraculously, our park came back, somewhat gentrified, last year.

That property had been held by the TTC for years in anticipation of, yes, redevelopment, although everyone nearby thought it was a park.  It wasn’t.

Until now.  This week, the TTC will officially declare the land surplus to its needs, and set in motion a transfer to the City Parks Department.  I’m not sure that there will be dancing in the streets, but at last our park is safe from being turned into a rather oddly shaped condo.

by

The Shape of the Suburbs

John Sewell’s new book The Shape of the Suburbs: Understanding Toronto’s Sprawl provides the jumping off point for a panel discussion on how the suburbs developed as they did and where we might go from here.

Where:  The Gladstone Hotel (Queen & Gladstone, accessed via 501 Queen and 29 Dufferin or whatever your favourite form of transport might be).

When:  Tuesday, April 21.  Doors open at 7, panel discussion begins at 7:30.

Cost:  $5, or free if you buy the book.

Who:  John Sewell (moderator), Mayor Rob Burton (Oakville), Deputy Mayor Jack Heath (Markham), Mayor Steve Parrish (Ajax), Kim Storey (architect, urban designer, partner in Brown & Storey Architects)

This event is part of Pages Books’ This Is Not A Reading Series.