Shabby Public Realm

[Tewder]

Whether Toronto's public realm is all that functional is debatable. Narrow sidewalks, by and large, and broken streets cluttered with hydro poles etc. are not that functional for the pedestrian, especially in winter. The city certainly isn't that functional where it comes to cyclists and transit users...

The idea behind this thread is to advocate for improvements. Looking to other cities like Chicago as a way to point out what we do better is for a different thread, surely. Rather, look there and see what we could do better. It's far more constructive in this context.

... and if anyone wants to create a 'Why Toronto is the best city in the world thread' well be my guest. We can all contribute to that!

 

[maestro]

Our streets are too narrow. Our blocks are too long. We missed the opportunity to buried hydro at its onset and when we finally did start burying hydro lines in the 1950s onward they weren't in conduits . All those will have to be dug up.

Every few months is the same thing. These are all things that will take tens of billions and generations to complete. New developments provide wider sidewalks and mid block access points. Afterall, you can't remove all lanes of traffic. Electrical system upgrades are mostly buried now. At some point the TTC may consider burying their power distribution system too on these important corridors.

 

[MisterF]

Toronto. Is. A. Beautiful. City.

The Islands are beautiful. Queen's Park and the University of Toronto are beautiful. The ravines are beautiful (particularly Taylor Creek, IMHO.) The Beaches boardwalk is beautiful. High Park is beautiful. The iconic view of the CN Tower and SkyDome from the islands is beautiful. The AGO is beautiful. The Royal Alex is beautiful. The new L tower is beautiful. Union Station is beautiful. St. Lawrence Market (particularly the SE corner, due to the perfect juxtaposition of bagel, cream cheese, and smoked salmon purveyors) is beautiful. Sunnybrook Park is beautiful. The TD towers are beautiful. The real ales at C'est What? are beautiful. The girls parading on College and the fashionistas shopping Yorkville are beautiful. Yorkville Park is beautiful. Nathan Phillips Square is beautiful. Old City Hall is beautiful.

Y'all need to give your heads a shake. You spend so much time pissing & moaning about the things you don't like about Toronto that you fail to enjoy the beautiful parts of it.

As others have said, Toronto has beautiful areas, but few would describe the city as a whole as beautiful. The point is that if we did a better job with our public realm it would make the city look a lot better. To use your example of Old City Hall, yes it's beautiful but think of how much better it would look with proper landscaping, the paved area in front being made of something other than poured concrete, a redesigned intersection of Bay and Queen, and buried power lines. Old City Hall is one of Toronto's most prominent landmarks and symbols of the city yet the public realm surrounding it is atrocious.

Bellyache about overhead power lines on suburban streets.

Now you're refuting an argument that nobody is making. Almost nobody cares about overhead power lines in the suburbs, except for maybe a handful of streets in the centres of suburban downtowns.

The whole "Toronto has the worst public realm in the world" thing is wearing a little thin. Obviously MANY aspects could be improved but I question how many places some of these forumers have been to. I just got back from New Orleans which is an amazing city in many respects. But the public realm is shit. Aside from maybe Jackson Square the public realm is abhorrent. Sidewalks aren't level, tons of potholes and most public parks are beyond overgrown. This is in the nice areas too that were never even flooded out- the Lower Ninth Ward is another story entirely. And overhead power lines on every commercial street outside the French Quarter.

That aside I think people here focus too much on the aesthetics of the public realm. I know almost everyone will disagree but to me that is secondary. I'd love both, but Toronto's public realm is very functional. Take for instance, Chicago. Chicago has pretty much one great park system along the lake. The rest of the parks are disjointed and not too functional. The Boulevard areas are finally coming into their own but that's only due to gentrification. I'll take some unkempt grass in a useable park over that system any day.

Nobody is saying that Toronto has the worst public realm in the world. But to say that Toronto has one of the worst public realms among wealthy cities in the industrialized world wouldn't be much of a stretch. New Orleans is a poor city that has had a shrinking population for 50 years. Chicago also has its problems but most of its central neighbourhoods have a better public realm on their main streets than in Toronto. It tends to get worse as you move farther from downtown.

Tewder has a point. Hydro poles in the middle of a narrow sidewalk aren't functional.

Our streets are too narrow. Our blocks are too long. We missed the opportunity to buried hydro at its onset and when we finally did start burying hydro lines in the 1950s onward they weren't in conduits . All those will have to be dug up.

Every few months is the same thing. These are all things that will take tens of billions and generations to complete.

$15 billion for every power line in the city according to Toronto Hydro. But here's the thing - to focus only on the pedestrian oriented main streets would be much, much cheaper. Just doing a couple dozen main streets around the city would be a bargain. As for how long it would take, didn't Montreal bury most of its power lines on main streets in only a couple decades? It doesn't need to take generations.

 

[Armour]

As others have said, Toronto has beautiful areas, but few would describe the city as a whole as beautiful. The point is that if we did a better job with our public realm it would make the city look a lot better. To use your example of Old City Hall, yes it's beautiful but think of how much better it would look with proper landscaping, the paved area in front being made of something other than poured concrete, a redesigned intersection of Bay and Queen, and buried power lines. Old City Hall is one of Toronto's most prominent landmarks and symbols of the city yet the public realm surrounding it is atrocious.

Now you're refuting an argument that nobody is making. Almost nobody cares about overhead power lines in the suburbs, except for maybe a handful of streets in the centres of suburban downtowns.


Nobody is saying that Toronto has the worst public realm in the world. But to say that Toronto has one of the worst public realms among wealthy cities in the industrialized world wouldn't be much of a stretch. New Orleans is a poor city that has had a shrinking population for 50 years. Chicago also has its problems but most of its central neighbourhoods have a better public realm on their main streets than in Toronto. It tends to get worse as you move farther from downtown.

Tewder has a point. Hydro poles in the middle of a narrow sidewalk aren't functional.


$15 billion for every power line in the city according to Toronto Hydro. But here's the thing - to focus only on the pedestrian oriented main streets would be much, much cheaper. Just doing a couple dozen main streets around the city would be a bargain. As for how long it would take, didn't Montreal bury most of its power lines on main streets in only a couple decades? It doesn't need to take generations.

I care about overhead power lines in the suburbs, but I'm clearly a very small minority. The suburbs should not be overlooked just because they aren't cultural destinations, to the same degree as downtown. The entire city should look a lot better than it does.

 

[CodeMonkey]

Toronto. Is. A. Beautiful. City.

The Islands are beautiful. Queen's Park and the University of Toronto are beautiful. The ravines are beautiful (particularly Taylor Creek, IMHO.) The Beaches boardwalk is beautiful. High Park is beautiful. The iconic view of the CN Tower and SkyDome from the islands is beautiful. The AGO is beautiful. The Royal Alex is beautiful. The new L tower is beautiful. Union Station is beautiful. St. Lawrence Market (particularly the SE corner, due to the perfect juxtaposition of bagel, cream cheese, and smoked salmon purveyors) is beautiful. Sunnybrook Park is beautiful. The TD towers are beautiful. The real ales at C'est What? are beautiful. The girls parading on College and the fashionistas shopping Yorkville are beautiful. Yorkville Park is beautiful. Nathan Phillips Square is beautiful. Old City Hall is beautiful.

Y'all need to give your heads a shake. You spend so much time pissing & moaning about the things you don't like about Toronto that you fail to enjoy the beautiful parts of it.

Now, y'all can go ahead and say, well, UofT would be great if they didn't have utility cuts in the sidewalks and ignore the Pharmacy building. Whinge about the streetlights on University rather than enjoying the architecture of Queen's Park. Kvetch about the mottled colouring of the ROM Crystal. Bellyache about overhead power lines on suburban streets. But all or most of your complaints are minor items. They really, really are.

The problem is Old Toronto is beautiful, as evident in your post, but bad planning in the old municipalities around Toronto have made it into the shabby public realm that New Toronto is now.

 

[Forgotten]

The idea behind this thread is to advocate for improvements. Looking to other cities like Chicago as a way to point out what we do better is for a different thread, surely. Rather, look there and see what we could do better. It's far more constructive in this context.

This advocacy you speak of makes no home in this thread. Where might I find it? I don't see any campaigns being formed, letters to the editor, organized protests, or community meetings. It's all "worst in the world" bawling as far as the unbiased critical eye can see. Absolutely nothing silences this thread quicker than suggesting real political action.

 

[Armour]

I agree that action needs to be taken, but how do we go about it? I don't think anything like this will ever gain enough traction, through whatever medium, because there's just not enough of an appetite to be bothered. Anytime improvements are made to the public realm, the predictable: 'Think of what this money could have been spent on'; 'We've got constant gridlock and our politicians want to blow money on fancy umbrellas?'; type of comments ensue. Our politicians probably don't want to risk their jobs by supporting too many "pet projects" (as if only some get to benefit from such endeavours); or they're just completely disinterested in public space improvements. And the citizens that are passionate about improving our image are probably too jaded to try to bring about the change they envision, because they believe their efforts will fall flat from lack of support. Without political and civic aid, it's next to impossible for things to change. People aren't going to be able to gather enough money from crowdfunding to execute really big projects. What solutions are there that don't rely on development, BIAs, etc. to provide money?

 

[Tewder]

This advocacy you speak of makes no home in this thread. Where might I find it? I don't see any campaigns being formed, letters to the editor, organized protests, or community meetings. It's all "worst in the world" bawling as far as the unbiased critical eye can see. Absolutely nothing silences this thread quicker than suggesting real political action.

You may be seeking a 'Norma Rae/made for tv moment' but advocacy is partly about raising awareness, which this thread attempts to do. You're new here but those of us who've been in the hood for a while remember arguing for a DRL when hardly anybody knew what it was. UT contributes to the urban discourse in our city.

I do agree that some are over the top. Ignore them. Many here criticize the public realm because they believe it will make a positive difference to a city that's already amazing.

 

[P23]

Our streets are too narrow. Our blocks are too long. We missed the opportunity to buried hydro at its onset and when we finally did start burying hydro lines in the 1950s onward they weren't in conduits . All those will have to be dug up.

Every few months is the same thing. These are all things that will take tens of billions and generations to complete. New developments provide wider sidewalks and mid block access points. Afterall, you can't remove all lanes of traffic. Electrical system upgrades are mostly buried now. At some point the TTC may consider burying their power distribution system too on these important corridors.

Our streets aren't as narrow as in Tokyo, our blocks aren't as long as NYC. Tokyo also has plenty of hydro poles around. None of this is preventing Toronto from becoming a more attractive city, it's just that Canadians are generally 'thrifty' and aren't concerned with grand gestures in the public realm.

That being said, you can already see many little improvements. When I first moved here there were almost no streets with nice paving. A few years on we have Queen's Quay, Bloor, Yorkville Ave and a few others.

 

[Tewder]

None of this is preventing Toronto from becoming a more attractive city, it's just that Canadians are generally 'thrifty' and aren't concerned with grand gestures in the public realm.

I'm not sure I agree. Other parts of Canada are quite well maintained, even within Ontario outside of Toronto... and take a quick look at any existing heritage infrastructure and building stock and you realize that previous generations did indeed care about aesthetics and the built form they lived in.

The state of Toronto's public realm is a direct result of political forces. Ignored by the feds and province for years (the liberals knew the votes were sewn up and the conservatives knew they had no prayer) and gridlocked due to polarization at the local level the end result is that no governing body saw any politically expedient reason to invest in Toronto. These dynamics are shifting though - fortunately - which may in part explain why we've been seeing more funding coming our way. Market forces are playing a big role now too, i.e at the BIA level.

 

[maestro]

Our streets aren't as narrow as in Tokyo, our blocks aren't as long as NYC. Tokyo also has plenty of hydro poles around. None of this is preventing Toronto from becoming a more attractive city, it's just that Canadians are generally 'thrifty' and aren't concerned with grand gestures in the public realm.

That being said, you can already see many little improvements. When I first moved here there were almost no streets with nice paving. A few years on we have Queen's Quay, Bloor, Yorkville Ave and a few others.

This thread has been largely for people to vent about things which is hardly constructive. There's been an incredible amount of physical improvements being made and success from establishing BIAs to manage these improvements. The future is looking bright compared to the dark days of the 1990s. Think the fairly new BIA in the office core will eventually deliver too. Canadians are somewhat thrifty but, a bigger impact is the economics are different from centuries ago and the postwar European rebuild and we are also building at an incredible pace. There are dozens of capital improvements to fund.

There is this prevailing attitude among Torontonians that they can't do anything about it and also the city is some omnipotent force that sees all but, choose to ignore it. I've witness too many time intelligent people venting for years about some minor issue like a pothole, a hoarder for a neighbour. etc. and they haven't even taking a few minutes of their time to contact the city and get work orders drawn up.

 

[christiesplits]

Absolutely no political (or bureaucratic) will.

Don Peat ‏@reporterdonpeat
Cllr Kristyn Wong-Tam asking about burying hydro lines on major roads like King St., etc. Toronto Hydro says no plan to do that #TOpoli

 

[TheTigerMaster]

How much would that cost?

 

[salsa]

How much would that cost?

Is that you Denzil Minnan Wong?

 

[CDL.TO]

Passed through Toronto this past weekend after months away and I've got to say... Toronto really is ugly (but I still love it).

One thing that left me scratching my head after many months in Amsterdam was asphalt being used where utility work had been done under brick sidewalks. Isn't one of the benefits of brick that you pull them up, do your work, then put them back again?

It's a weird bizzaro thing. In Toronto when they dig up a brick surface they temporarily patch it with asphalt. In Amsterdam when they dig up an asphalt surface they temporarily patch it with bricks.