[URBAN NOTE] Five city links: Hamilton, Montréal, Lorain, Buenos Aires, Jakarta

• Tensions between the LGBTQ communities of Hamilton and the police remain high. Global News reports.
• The federal government will be providing funding for the new Great West Park of Montréal. CTV News reports.
• CityLab looks at the hometown of Toni Morrison, the Ohio community of Lorain, here.
• Guardian Cities looks at the question of how, or whether, a Buenos Aires slum should become an official neighbourhood, here.
• Guardian Cities reports on a small neighbourhood, Cosmo Park, built on top of a shopping mall in Jakarta, here.

[PHOTO] Three photos from Saturday evening at the Galleria Mall

Dipping into the Galleria Mall last night around 6:30 for some errands, I could see the clean warm lines of the central concourse more clearly than ever before. Though the independent shops which lined this space are not gone, closed or relocated (St. Clair Avenue West seemed a popular address), I still felt a certain warmth to this agora for all of its 70s tiled colour scheme.

[PHOTO] Looking west in the emptying main concourse, Galleria Mall

[PHOTO] Inside the closing Galleria Mall

I dashed into the Galleria Mall last night to pick up some supplies, and saw, outside of the FreshCo grocery store and the Rexall and the Dollarama and then the Planet Fitness at the far end, little sign of life. All of the independent shops that once characterized this centre have left.

[PHOTO] Fifteen photos of the Galleria Mall near its end

As the Galleria Mall winds down, many of its smaller independent stores still remaining planning to shut down and perhaps relocate this weekend, I thought I would visit this neighbourhood icon on this busy Saturday afternoon. The massive redevelopment planned may yet eradicate all physical traces of this build with its many arches and its orange-green colour scheme from the 1970s, but our memories of this space both personal and digital may yet survive the Galleria Mall’s end.

[URBAN NOTE] Four city links: global distribution, smaller cities, AI in cities, shopping mall music

• Marginal Revolution links to a paper suggesting that whereas cities in developed countries tend to be spread evenly across resource-rich agricultural areas, cities in developing countries tend to cluster near coasts where transport is easier.
• At In Medias Res, Russell Arben Fox responds to Krugman in considering what role there is for smaller cities and towns in the 21st century.
• Tracey Lauriault at Policy Options argues that, in projects like Google’s involvement in Toronto’s Quayside, the underlying values of the AI systems used should always be thoughtfully considered. What do they represent?
• Dangerous Minds shares the oddly haunting YouTube videos of a man who plays classic 1980s pop songs in deserted shopping malls.

[URBAN NOTE] Five city links: small cities, repurposed shopping malls, rent, design, networks

• Paul Krugman notes the exceptional fragility of small cities, depending on small industries which can easily go under, over at The New York Times.
• This feature examining how shopping mall space in American cities has been reused for new purposes is interesting, over at The Atlantic.
• How can the poor be helped most effectively in dealing with rising rent costs? Bloomberg considers.
• Atlas Obscura considers the many small design features that can be used to make cities feel a little more inhospitable.
• Shawn Micallef points out how Toronto, like all cities, is really formed of innumerable individual networks, overlapping and sometimes only rarely intersecting, over at the Toronto Star.

[URBAN NOTE] “Yorkville’s old school malls are about to disappear”

blogTO’s Derek Flack looks at old malls in Yorkville, like Cumberland Terrace and the Village Arcade, that are set to come down as redevelopment beckons. Plenty of nice photos are included.

Yorkville is in the midst of a paradigm shift, the scale of which hasn’t been witnessed since it transformed from a hippie hub in the 1960s to a high end shopping destination in the decade that followed.

The Yorkville that’s slipping away today can be traced back to the 1970s. While historic elements dating much further back can been seen in the converted Victorian houses that still house retail on Cumberland St., many of the neighbourhood’s larger buildings date back to this decade.

Of these, the most significant is surely Cumberland Terrace, a multi-level mall that runs adjacent to the street from which it takes its name. Opened in 1974, when you pay a visit these days, it’s like stepping into a time machine.

Picture the Galleria Mall, but nicer. There are payphones and brown tile everywhere, an eclectic mix of vendors you’d never find in a newer mall, and wayfinding signage that dates back to the first days of operation here.

[PHOTO] “Dufferin Mall, really”

The catchphrase “Dufferin Mall, really” belongs to the west-end Dufferin Mall, a shopping complex that–contrary to stereotypes, and expectations–has actually done a pretty good job of connecting with its local community and of attracting a good mix of stores. (They have a Dollarama and a H&M!)

[PHOTO] Hanging out at the Galleria

Visiting the Galleria Shopping Mall at Dupont and Dufferin last night to pick up some groceries, I snapped this picture as an addenum to the set I posted already. The main hall, looking past the small in-mall restaurant towards the Zellers anchor store, does indeed look–as a Flickr commenter suggests–as if the Galleria’s designers had sought inspiration for the mall’s design in the street. “The 1970s idea of returning to traditional streets for interior design is really evident in this photo with the cafe seating on a brick-like floor. Just Photoshop away the walls and ceilings, and add a Victorian streetscape and the sky, and it’ll become clear.” The problem with this is that apart from the lack of scenery, there’s simply too much space; it’s cavernous.