[URBAN NOTE] Ten Toronto links

• The vicious homophobia exhibited by TCDSB trustee Mike Del Grande is, IMHO, another reason to defund public Catholic education in Ontario. Global News reports.
• The CCLV streetcars of the TTC are set to be pulled by the end of November. Global News reports.
• The Scarborough Bluffs are set to see some worthwhile investment. blogTO reports.
• CBC notes growth in food bank usage in Toronto and Mississauga.
• Presto users are being mischarged based on GPS mistakes. CBC reports.
• Renovictions have spiked 300% over the past four years. blogTO reports.
• The cost of rent continues to grow in Toronto. blogTO reports.
• A new project hopes to make Yonge and Eglinton less congested. The Toronto Star reports.
• New regulations about Airbnb should make the real estate market easier for renters. NOW Toronto reports.
• Owing to family request, a new street in Etobicoke will not be named after former Toronto mayor Rob Ford. Global News reports.

[URBAN NOTE] Six Toronto links

• The Pilot, in Yorkville, celebrates its 75th anniversary as a venue. Global News reports.
• Some immigrant businesspeople recently bought an old Toronto Hydro building in the north of the city as a shelter for immigrants. Global News reports.
• The backlash against the proposed condo tower at Yonge and Eglinton branded by Pharrell Williams has been swift. blogTO reports.
• Urban Toronto notes that a 13-story mixed-use building has been proposed for 888 Dupont Street, at the corner of Dupont and Ossington.
• A TV crew in North York last week cancelled its shoot in North York, near the site of last year’s ramming attack on Yonge Street. CTV News reports.
• A poster on r/Toronto noted last week the six-year anniversary of the admission of then-mayor Rob Ford that he smoked crack.

[URBAN NOTE] Five Toronto links; transit, Jane-Finch, Rob Ford, Riverdale Park East, beaches

• The federal government will provide a billion dollars in funding to Toronto transit, including to Bloor-Yonge station and GO Transit. CBC reports.
• The Jane-Finch anti-violence barbecue has celebrated its tenth anniversary. CBC reports.
• blogTO notes that people in Toronto can vote for–or against–naming a new street in Etobicoke’s Six Points after Rob Ford.
• blogTO reports on the joys of Riverdale Park East.
• Shawn Micallef writes at the Toronto Star about what the city can do to make it easier for Torontonians to get to their city’s beaches.

[URBAN NOTE] Five Toronto links: TTC fare, Bathurst Street, express buses, murder, #FordNation

• The TTC would like to increase fares by 10 cents a ride in the coming year, to help finance basic repairs and services. CityNews reports.
• Facing public furor, Metrolinx has decided not to try to close off Bathurst Street at Eglinton for seven months to try to speed Eglinton Crosstown construction. Global News reports.
• Steve Munro is critical of the TTC’s new express buses running on many major arteries, seeing them as mainly cosmetic in effect.
• Wendy Gillis at the Toronto Star writes about the reactions, one year later, to the murders committed by the Church and Wellesley killer.
• Richard Florida at CityLab summarizes the factors leading to the success of populist Ford Nation, first in Toronto and then in Ontario.

[URBAN NOTE] Five Toronto links: walking on Yonge, Ford Country, Doug Ford, Finch West, Airbnb

• John Lorinc considers walking in Toronto, on Yonge Street, in the wake of the van attack, over at Spacing.
• This classic Toronto Life tour of “Ford Country”, the Toronto landmarks in the career of the Ford brothers, is quite relevant in this election year.
• Royson James is quite right to note the limit of Rob Ford’s outreach towards black and other minority youth, over at the Toronto Star.
• blogTO reports on the start of construction of the Finch West LRT line. I sincerely hope it won’t be disrupted by election year change in the way the Eglinton subway was by the Harris government.
• Sean Grisdale at Spacing notes the highly concentrated, and negative, impact of Airbnb on housing in downtown Toronto neighbourhoods.

[URBAN NOTE] Five Toronto links: Rob Ford, decolonizing art, Humber Bay bus, Don Valley art, crime

• The National Post notes that Toronto city council voted against naming a stadium after the late Rob Ford.
• blogTO notes that Humber Bay Shores wants to run a private neighbourhood bus service, for want of a TTC presence.
• Andrew Hunter, former Canadian curator at the AGO, calls for a decolonization of art galleries across Canada.
• Joanna Lavoie describes the concrete sculptures of Duane Linklater newly installed across the Don valley.
• At Torontoist, Dennis Duffy reports on the 19th century criminal gangs once populating the Don Valley. Seriously.

[URBAN NOTE] Five Toronto links: Videoflicks, ghost service, Rob Ford football, parks, real estate

• blogTO notes that video rental store Videoflicks, on Avenue Road, is set to close down.
• The TTC, blogTO notes, has begun “ghost service” on its half-dozen new subway stations.
• Edward Keenan thinks that we may as well name a football stadium after Rob Ford. Why not? If it makes Ford Nation feel better …
• Spacing Toronto features John Lorinc looking at how community parks organizations, like at Ramsden, can exclude outsiders.
• VICE notes on recent study suggesting the real estate market of Toronto is the most overvalued of world cities.

[URBAN NOTE] Four Toronto links: Doug Ford, marijuana, Airbnb, Lower Don Trail

• Doug Ford is running for mayor in 2018, hoping to continue Rob’s legacy. (Doug was the more functional of the two.)
• Toronto has cracked down successfully on a property owner in Cabbagetown using their buildings for Airbnb.
• The Lower Don Trail is scheduled to reopen later this month, one year later than originally scheduled.
• The LCBO will be the authorized seller of marijuana in Ontario. I think I largely support this: regulation matters.

[BLOG] Some Thursday links

• Centauri Dreams looks at the complex prebiotic chemistry in the system of young triple IRAS 16293-2422.
• Language Hat looks at the central role played by Kyrgzystan writer Chinghiz Aitmatov in shaping Kyrgyz identity.
• The Map Room Blog shares Baltimore’s new transit map.
• Steve Munro examines the Ford family’s various issues with TTC streetcars.
• The Russian Demographics Blog reports on the latest UN report on the Donbas and the conflict there.
• Window on Eurasia notes that the number of ethnic Russians in the former Soviet Union has fallen sharply through demographic change including assimilation.

[URBAN NOTE] “Doug Ford leads protest against Tory’s budget and hints he might run for mayor”

David Rider’s Toronto Star article is terribly worrisome, especially since Doug Ford is the political genius of the current generation of Fords. Rob, in truth, was but a puppet of his more functional brother.

I would like to believe that, with the memory of Rob Ford’s one term and with the very negative example of Trump to our south, Doug Ford would have no chance of being elected to the mayoralty of Toronto. I would like to believe this, but I cannot: Populism is really popular nowadays, especially if you have–as you do in the outer neighbourhoods of Toronto–populations which are relatively deprived and feel themselves to be disenfranchised. If we cannot offer better alternatives, I really can imagine a Mayor Doug Ford.

Several hundred people packed a Finch Ave. banquet hall to accuse Mayor John Tory of pushing a tax-heavy proposed 2017 budget.

The Monday night “budget consultation” on Finch Ave. W. was organized by Councillor Giorgio Mammoliti.

He told the crowd his often-outrageous antics are mostly to draw attention to city spending run amok.

“I’ll continue to take the blows (from other councillors) and yes, I am somewhat of a lone wolf at city hall because Doug (Ford) isn’t there,” he told the crowd.

Ford, the ex-councillor who lost to Tory in 2014 and says he might be up for a rematch in next year’s mayoral election, told the crowd: “The gravy train is in full swing down at city hall again.”

He repeated a discredited claim that his late brother Rob’s mayoral administration saved Toronto taxpayers “more than a billion dollars.”