Shabby Toronto

[TrickyRicky]

I'm going to again resist the overwhelming desire to critic other people's city comparisons to add the following points:

-While the city is truly to blame for it's failures, most of the city including most of the physical space that dominates the environment as viewed from our public spaces is the realm of private owners. Hence it is their failure, of which I am one, that is as much to blame for the state of the city as our collective failures. I extend this blame further to residential and commercial tenants who, in my opinion, form the group with the least respect and take the least responsibility for their own actions and the state of the urban environment

-Cleanliness does not equate to unshabby. Infact discussing litter etc. is actually a distraction from the greater argument. The era of past greatness of this city is a myth an urban mirage that never existed. At best there once was a more shabby city that once had less absolute litter if not necessarily per capita

-Careful what you wish for. Some of the forces that will and are transforming the urban environment for the better in terms of cleaning up and enhancing the urban environment may also have other unintended consequences

 

[TKTKTK]

I think the city has a ton of pride, it just isn't particularly vain.

 

[Hydrogen]

-Careful what you wish for. Some of the forces that will and are transforming the urban environment for the better in terms of cleaning up and enhancing the urban environment may also have other unintended consequences

Could you elaborate?

I think it would be fair to point out the consequences when nothing is done. More people end up thinking that city looks shabby, think their tax dollars are going nowhere because it looks more shabby, don't want to continue living in a place that looks increasingly run down, and then potentially think about leaving. That would be an unintended consequence of doing nothing.

 

[nfitz]

Maybe Brooklyn and Queens are messy. I don't really know but Manhattan as a whole is quite tidy.

You should check out the Bronx. Less than 20% of the population of New York City lives in Manhattan. It's hardly representative of the city as a whole.

And personally, I've never smelled things in Toronto subway stations and exits, that I've smelled in Manhattan subway stations and exits.

 

[TrickyRicky]

"Could you elaborate?"

I don't believe these action reactions must occur but for example there does seem to be a correlation between lack of diversity both demographically and in terms of human activity and places praised for clean well maintained urban environments. Improvement may be a harbingers of greater stratification of society demographically and in terms of human activity. This is not to suggest that improvements should not be taken or even that stratification is bad.

A funny anecdote I heard recently can from a guy I know who was in Singapore with a teenager who was politely approached by a police officer to inform her that it was against the law to wear her hat skewed on her head. Since they were tourists he didn't issue a ticket but I find it funny that Singapore which is definately praise worthy for it's state of repair feels it necessary to go so far as to correct the angle of rotation of the hat on your head.

 

[PukeGreen]

While the city is truly to blame for it's failures, most of the city including most of the physical space that dominates the environment as viewed from our public spaces is the realm of private owners.

TrickyRicky is on to something there. While the city clearly needs to do more (isn't the fact that Toronto is hovering on the brink of bankruptcy at the core of these problems?) I also feel that many private businesses don't do their share to keep the streets clean and attractive.

The businesses on the ground floor of my condo in the St. Lawrence Market area are prime examples. The windows often remained smeared and dirty for months with nary a hint of windex. Signs break or peel and are not fixed or replaced. They tape up crooked paper and cardboard signs in their windows. The convenience store makes a profit selling candy, gum, and cigarettes, yet feels no responsibility to place a trash can outside their door where customers could place their wrappers, or to periodically pressure wash the sidewalk of the thousands of gum blotches, or to sweep up the piles of cigarette butts outside their door. The same goes with the coffee shop; 50% of the trash blowing around outside is coffee cups from their establishment. The single trash can on the block is provided by the City of Toronto, and it's nearly always overflowing with trash from businesses in the immediate vicinity. Why aren't these primarily take-out businesses obligated to take some responsibility for the trash they generate after it crosses their threshold? I sometimes feel these businesses take from the neighbourhood but do not give back.

I've traveled in countries like Morocco and Costa Rica where the average citizens have far less money than Canadians. Yet the proprietors of even the most humble shops and stalls take the utmost pride in their businesses. Early in the morning everyone is out front with a broom, carefully sweeping the area in front of their business, emptying trash cans, and even hosing down and scrubbing difficult stains. Why one of the most wealthy countries in the world can't do the same is a puzzle to me: perhaps people feel they are too important to take care of such mundane tasks as sweeping or wiping something down.

Oddly, it is often the much-maligned big chains that take the best care of their businesses. Starbucks and Tim Hortons often have employees clean their windows and doors daily. Many smaller businesses neglect this and don't seem to realize that people hesitate to visit a business (particularly food-related) that appears dirty and unkempt from the outside.

Often, it comes down to people simply not giving a shit; in some cases, I suspect people also do things in a "big city" like litter or vandalize that they wouldn't do elsewhere because they think they are more anonymous or nobody else cares. The classic "broken windows" theory also holds, with a bit of litter or vandalism leading to more in a never-ending vicious cycle.

 

[Mystic Point]

but that's not Mystic's point. Of course there is shabbiness in all cities, but take a walk along Dundas West in front of the AGO, or Yonge Street north or south of Dundas Square, or along any other major 'central' thoroughfare...even Bloor Street... and you will see pervasive shabbiness, including ugly hydro poles, broken sidewalks, asphalt patches, gum stains, dead trees, and so on... Shabbiness only passes for a messy urbanism when it is as a counter-balance to over-gentrification, imo, otherwise it just feels like a mess.

...but as an exercise in response to your allegation, what would be comparing Toronto's 'best' to another city's 'best' then?

This is pretty much what I mean by " shabby. " Thanks Tewder.

 

[Glen]

The convenience store makes a profit selling candy, gum, and cigarettes, yet feels no responsibility to place a trash can outside their door where customers could place their wrappers, or to periodically pressure wash the sidewalk of the thousands of gum blotches, or to sweep up the piles of cigarette butts outside their door. The same goes with the coffee shop; 50% of the trash blowing around outside is coffee cups from their establishment. The single trash can on the block is provided by the City of Toronto, and it's nearly always overflowing with trash from businesses in the immediate vicinity. Why aren't these primarily take-out businesses obligated to take some responsibility for the trash they generate after it crosses their threshold? I sometimes feel these businesses take from the neighbourhood but do not give back.

Perhaps the issue of businesses having to pay $3.00 a bag for trash has something to do with it? Furthermore, that little conveince store is probably paying $15,000.00 per year in property tax while receiving very little in return from the city. Maybe the owners think that for how much property tax they pay the city could provide more public trash cans.

 

[ducati0000]

The small business is the heart and soul of the downtown core,but they seem to be the ones that has to be pay for the mishandling of tax payers money.You should see how Singapore runs a huge city.That place is spotless and the police enforce all laws,from littering to graffiti,to beggers.They know how to run a city with a reasonable budget without influence by the special interest groups or pet projects.You can go out at 3:00am and feel safe.Try that in Toronto.This city was never a "world class city" but it was safe and clean,now we look like New York in the early 70/80s

 

[junctionist]

The small business is the heart and soul of the downtown core,but they seem to be the ones that has to be pay for the mishandling of tax payers money.You should see how Singapore runs a huge city.That place is spotless and the police enforce all laws,from littering to graffiti,to beggers.They know how to run a city with a reasonable budget without influence by the special interest groups or pet projects.You can go out at 3:00am and feel safe.Try that in Toronto.This city was never a "world class city" but it was safe and clean,now we look like New York in the early 70/80s

I haven't read worse exaggeration in awhile, if ever on the board. Do you know what New York was like back then? The racial tension was high, the subway crime and graffiti levels are notorious to this day in the early 1980s. A city wide blackout resulted in looting and arson. This city had risen to world prominence but the crime was talked about internationally.

How does Singapore run the city? If we copy what they're doing, will everything work? Isn't this just another random city used to make Toronto look bad. I don't live downtown so I don't have that much experience, but there are many areas where I bet wouldn't feel unsafe at night based off the occasional experiences.

 

[theman23]

Singapore? Lets not go overboard. There are far more reasonable ways of going about fixing the shabbiness in Toronto than becoming an authoritarian state.

This city was never a "world class city" but it was safe and clean,now we look like New York in the early 70/80s

I think you'd be surprised to see pictures of parts of New York in the 70s and 80s.

 

[lordmandeep]

Toronto will never ever reach such dark times as NY in the 70's...


I don't think any Major NA city will for some time...

 

[Earlscourt_Lad]

Detroit. That's worse than NY in the 70/80s.

 

[Hipster Duck]

I don't believe these action reactions must occur but for example there does seem to be a correlation between lack of diversity both demographically and in terms of human activity and places praised for clean well maintained urban environments. Improvement may be a harbingers of greater stratification of society demographically and in terms of human activity. This is not to suggest that improvements should not be taken or even that stratification is bad.

I think that correlation is tenuous. The cleanest, most orderly cities I've been to were all in places with a high GINI coefficient - higher, even, than Canada. At the same time, there are cities that are much larger (Tokyo), culturally edgy (Berlin), socially liberal (Amsterdam), more densely populated (anywhere) or more reliant on the success of small business owners to prop up the civic realm (Taipei) that succeed in maintaining a public realm that offers more than drunken telephone poles, broken concrete planters and plywood window boxes.

I think Toronto's shabbiness speaks to the twin Canadian problems of being a) cheap, and, b) a general contempt toward aesthetic considerations as a 'frill'.

A funny anecdote I heard recently can from a guy I know who was in Singapore with a teenager who was politely approached by a police officer to inform her that it was against the law to wear her hat skewed on her head. Since they were tourists he didn't issue a ticket but I find it funny that Singapore which is definately praise worthy for it's state of repair feels it necessary to go so far as to correct the angle of rotation of the hat on your head.

We can scoff at that but Toronto has more in common with authoritarian Singapore than it does with a Western European city. Just look at our draconian liquor laws that prohibit people from drinking outside unless you sit behind a permanent fence. However, shabbiness is not endemic to Amsterdam or Copenhagen.

 

[Mystic Point]

" I think Toronto's shabbiness speaks to the twin Canadian problems of being a) cheap, and, b) a general contempt toward aesthetic considerations as a 'frill'. "

I agree.