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Chinatown

What is now Chinatown used to be in the Jewish district of Toronto. Maybe some day Chinatown will be about as Chinese as it is Jewish but I don't see that happening any time soon.

Then again there's a very notable trend of Jews moving downtown, often to areas left by their parents and grandparents years ago.
 
not many families moving back into Chinatown area...mostly college kids renting and grand parents...I dont see any young families in our area moving in(Trinity).Its a shame because before you see a lot of kids on the streets at nite with the parents now you mostly see drunk students staggering back to their rental apartments.Rental apartments does not make a neighborhood better it makes it worst.More noise,more garbage more headaches.
 
Census data on ethnicity will be out tomorrow so we'll be able to see whether the proportion of Chinese in the area is declining. Perhaps we'll be able to see it at the tract level for Chinatown, and perhaps the ward profiles will be updated soon.
 
The City of Toronto defines Kensington-Chinatown as census tracts 36, 37, 38 and 39, which encompasses the area of College to Queen, University to Bathurst. Here are the population figures:

36 (University/Spadina, Dundas/Queen) - 1580/4505 = 35.1%
37 (University/Spadina, College/Dundas) - 1830/4270 = 42.9%
38 (Spadina/Bathurst, College/Dundas) - 1660/3670 = 45.2%
39 (Spadina/Bathurst, Dundas/Queen) - 1985/4305 = 46.1%
Totals - 7055/16750 = 42.1%

This is roughly the same % as in 2001. Chinatown remains an important immigrant reception area.
 
Well there ain't much new going on.
Oh wait.. there is..
There's a new bubble tea place that's set up shop on Spadina in the building on the northeast corner. It's more Hong Kong/China-esque in that it doesn't have any seating and it's just a step-up-order-grab-and-go type of place.

And there's no way you'll miss it right now. They set up a robotic life-sized waving Santa (in April, to boot) to publicize their opening alongside the traditional bouquets and flower arrangements. Chinese tack to its finest :p
 
I was in Chinatown the other day, I LOVE going there, I can get a better price on oranges than I can at no frills and they are juicy and just delicious, I also like getting my shopping buggy from Chinatown , I've been to the little one on Gerrard, but I prefer Spadina, I love riding the streetcar and getting off wherever I want and smelling good food, I've tried many new things here, and I keep going back...
The people seem to be awed by a whitecane toting legally blind person, sometimes, they give me the funniest looks! lol.
 
Despite me being Chinese I skip the Spadina Chinatown and head for Kensington Market, with its grittyness. Then it's over to the new Chinatowns of Markham and Scarborough.
 
Chinatown is still pretty vibrant and in "greater" Chinatown stretching roughly from Bay to Bathurst along Dundas is still over 40% Chinese. Some streets close to Dundas between Spadina and Beverley are in the 70-80% range.

One interesting thing is that the census tracts are so broad - the ones that run east off Spadina - that it captures much more than "Chinatown" per se - also OCAD, the Grange, apartments and condos just north of Queen West, etc. If one is affiliated with a university you can look at "dissemination areas" which capture smaller areas within a tract. As a general rule, the further away from Spadina and Dundas, the less Chinese and more affluent it gets.
 
I lived in Chinatown during university, and it was awesome! It was a really neat experience walking into supermarkets and not knowing what any signs meant. However I stopped buying groceries there once I discovered that for an extra 5 cents per apple, you could go to Kensington Market which was cleaner and less congested.
 
There are those afternoons where getting caught up in the hubbub of Chinatown is the best fun of the day.
 
the problem is in this neighborhood there is very little kids in this area,most are rentals to students and illegal rooming houses.This is getting long time residence really mad since the tenants are causing more problems(noise,garbage).A house built for a small family is now a 7 room rental property.
 
This seems to be true. A walk down Sullivan or Grange shows renos cheek n jowl with rooming houses. I don't know if there is a solution, or even if one is desirable. This area has a decades long history of providing cheap rooms for OCA and Univ. of Toronto students.
 
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