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Toronto/Chicago comparisons

Just got back from a Chicago, second time there, stayed at the Omni on the Mag Mile. There is no debating how great their streets (North side, State St, etc) are compared to ours, and Millennium/Grant Park with the museums is an amazing site. As Taal said though, it's more touristy whereas ours is more for locals, each having it's pros and cons.

I will say I found their transit system to be just as lacking as ours. While their map looks impressive, they've only got two underground lines (blue and red) with the rest elevated. But those elevated lines are similar to our streetcars in that they are not that fast, and frequency is an issue in (was there Friday-Monday). I found it was easier to travel to certain places by bus than by train. The train cars themselves are also quite small and seem really old - are they due or an upgrade like we are going through?

Also, does anyone have a figure for their downtown population? It seems significantly less than ours, most streets are dead (not just the Loop), other than Michigan, after 6 pm.

Overall though a wonderful place to visit.
 
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TheTigerMaster said:
Skid Row in Los Angeles. The entire area is purely homeless people. Never seen anything like it before. I don't know how American cities end up with such economic segregation. You'll struggle to find anything like it here in Canada.
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Even Vancouver's Downtown Eastside?
 
CityPainter said:
I agree that Chicago's touristy waterfront area is very nice but as a whole, greater Chicago has social problems of a magnitude that is simply not present in Toronto. Between the downtown core and the suburbs there are numerous neighbourhoods in Chicago, such as the "South Side" that would be highly dangerous for tourists to visit: to the point that doing so at the wrong time might mean that you don't leave again. Toronto has no real equivalent to these neighbourhoods, as even the the most notorious areas like Regent Park or Jane & Finch are pretty safe to visit as a law-abiding citizen in daylight. The fact that both cities have almost exactly the same population yet Chicago had over 500 homicides last year versus Toronto's 54 is a telling stat. To put it in perspective, there was one weekend in Chicago last June where 41 people were shot. Imagine taking a full year of Toronto shootings and packing them into 3 days.

It's likely none of this happened in the areas where you've visited, though, just as you may have seen fewer "beggars" or less "social housing" (is that a good thing?) . What that really means that serious issues like poverty and racial inequality are being ignored or pushed into neighbourhoods where tourists don't typically visit. In Toronto, the poor and marginalized are more closely integrated into the rest of the population, for better or worse.

Of course I'm not saying Toronto is perfect or that we have nothing to learn from other cities like Chicago, which I also enjoyed visiting, but it's important to keep perspective and remember that sometimes what you see as a tourist is a bit calculated and doesn't reflect the whole picture. There's more to being a good city than just having a Disney-fied waterfront for tourists to visit, and pursuing that as as end goal in of itself might not be the best priority.
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TheTigerMaster said:
Skid Row in Los Angeles. The entire area is purely homeless people. Never seen anything like it before. I don't know how American cities end up with such economic segregation. You'll struggle to find anything like it here in Canada.
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/

Ok. Here's the thing. The fact that Jane/Finch, Six Points, Flemingdon, Lawrence, Markham/Lawrence(Galloway) are much less dangerous does not mean they aren't. And most people from the city don't hang around there to begin with. America has a larger poverty problem and it is exacerbated in large cities that have not seen gentrification or have been forgotten outside on or two things(Philadelphia). Chicago has a poverty problem, but when I go there I am not going to Humbolt Park or Austin, or South Shore. Just like if someone comes to Toronto they are not going to Jane/Sheppard or Malvern or Cresent Town or Jane/Weston (where I live).



Southcore said:
Just got back from a Chicago, second time there, stayed at the Omni on the Mag Mile. There is no debating how great their streets (North side, State St, etc) are compared to ours, and Millennium/Grant Park with the museums is an amazing site. As Taal said though, it's more touristy whereas ours is more for locals, each having it's pros and cons.

I will say I found their transit system to be just as lacking as ours. While their map looks impressive, they've only got two underground lines (blue and red) with the rest elevated. But those elevated lines are similar to our streetcars in that they are not that fast, and frequency is an issue in (was there Friday-Monday). I found it was easier to travel to certain places by bus than by train. The train cars themselves are also quite small and seem really old - are they due or an upgrade like we are going through?

Also, does anyone have a figure for their downtown population? It seems significantly less than ours, most streets are dead (not just the Loop), other than Michigan, after 6 pm.

Overall though a wonderful place to visit.
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Our downtown is much larger than the loop. But our city is a exactly a nighttime boon itself. Financial District is not really busy after 7. I think Chicago transit is better because it covers the whole city with RT, something that seems to be a foreign concept to Toronto.
 
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denfromoakvillemilton said:
Our downtown is much larger than the loop. But our city is a exactly a nighttime boon itself. Financial District is not really busy after 7. I think Chicago transit is better because it covers the whole city with RT, something that seems to be a foreign concept to Toronto.
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When I was first working downtown in the early '90s, the Financial District emptied out at night. That is not at all the case any more, with the ACC and Rogers hosting the concerts and sports events that used go to up to College and many, many more bars and patios (as well as the huge number of people who are now walking home.)
 
Riverdale Rink Rat said:
When I was first working downtown in the early '90s, the Financial District emptied out at night. That is not at all the case any more, with the ACC and Rogers hosting the concerts and sports events that used go to up to College and many, many more bars and patios (as well as the huge number of people who are now walking home.)
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Good Point. I would like the see more bars and the drinking laws relaxed.
 
Moreover, "not what it used to be", Chicago has been undergoing many changes like Toronto, for the better ... more people living around the core (on a lesser scale then here) ... anyway, no clue what that comment implies ...
 
Hmmm? Really?....You actually require longitudinal studies to determine if we can learn anything from Chicago? Just go visit, take a look at their waterfront, the Goldcoast, Michigan Mile, Millenium Park, Navy Pier, take a look at their stunning architecture. Sure they have their issues but that doesn't make it an undesirable city. Why do you let your hatred for the Ford's blind you from seeing that Chicago is a beautiful city and that we CAN learn a lot from that city? Just as Chicago can learn a lot from Toronto.
 
toronto_the_good said:
Hmmm? Really?....You actually require longitudinal studies to determine if we can learn anything from Chicago? Just go visit, take a look at their waterfront, the Goldcoast, Michigan Mile, Millenium Park, Navy Pier, take a look at their stunning architecture. Sure they have their issues but that doesn't make it an undesirable city. Why do you let your hatred for the Ford's blind you from seeing that Chicago is a beautiful city and that we CAN learn a lot from that city? Just as Chicago can learn a lot from Toronto.
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What do the Ford's have anything to do with it ? Chicago acquired a lot of its great assets by spending a lot of money (Millennium Park is just one example of this), how does this resemble anything Ford would argue ? btw Chicago has a ton of issues in terms of balancing its budgets more so then Toronto ... just making sure you don't rebut with "Chicago could / can afford such things" ... no more so then Toronto can afford to spend on such things.
 
Please read from the beginning of the thread. It began with an anti-Ford comment from another commenter that stated we could learn nothing from Chicago. I'm just stating that that is not true and that we could learn quite a few things from Chicago. I didn't mention anything about spending, budgets, blah, blah, blah, nor did I write anything pro-Ford. I'm stating aesthetically that Chicago is a kick ass city and we could learn a lot about architecture and building a waterfront from Chicago. BTW...relax, not everything has to be a Ford bashing session, I'm not a fan either.
 
I don't think it's a matter of learning *nothing* from Chicago, but, honestly...your points are banal and uninspired, as far as pro-Chicago goes.
 
adma said:
I don't think it's a matter of learning *nothing* from Chicago, but, honestly...your points are banal and uninspired, as far as pro-Chicago goes.
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Don't be so hoity-toity. My comments were in response to K.W. Lis who basically stated that there was very little we could learn from Chicago. (I guess by me forgetting to add their quote makes it difficult to know what I was referring to). I'm just stating the obvious, there is something we can learn from every major city in the world. I wasn't trying to get into a huge debate about the pros and cons and all the fine details that would fit your standard of not being "banal and uninspired."
 
I agree with adma,

Detroit also had pockets of revitalization and gentrification in its downtown core, it won't be enough to save Chicago. Toronto has already learned all the lessons it can from that city and is actively building the means to achieve them. Chicago meanwhile is on a death spiral, it has an A3 credit rating with a negative outlook and the state of Illinois also has an A3 Moody's credit rating (the lowest credit rating of all US states, even lower than Michigan!). Several ratings agencies signalled their intention to cut the rating further. Crime (which has started to enter the Chicago Loop) and population decline are destroying revenue and the state unfunded pension liabilities are in the $300 billion zone (city unfunded liabilities are around $30 billion, similar to Detroit's bankruptcy inducing level). Expect a Detroit style death spiral in Chicago within 10 years if it hasn't already begun.

Meanwhile, Ontario has a AA2 credit rating and Toronto an AA1 rating (a notch below AAA, the highest).
 
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