[URBAN NOTE] Seven Toronto links: “Crane Girl”, stores, rent, King street, Eglinton, Etobicoke, more

• The story of Toronto’s “Crane Girl”, photographed stuck on a crane high above Wellesley Street, has come to an end with an absolute discharge. The National Post reports.
• Alternative Thinking is unique among the stores once sheltered around Honest Ed’s in continuing to hang on. The Toronto Star reports.
• Toronto has desperate need of affordable rental housing for the masses. Torontoist takes a look at the NIMBYs opposing one much-needed project.
• Steve Munro at Torontoist takes an extended look at the data from the King Street pilot streetcar project. Some metrics seem encouraging, but more data–and a longer period of testing–is needed.
• I look forward to seeing the various public art projects which will be decorating the stations of the Eglinton Crosstown line. The Toronto Star reports.
• The suggestion of Peter Apswoude at NOW Toronto that Etobicoke is trending towards more denser development, including an actual downtown, is encouraging for the evolution of that Toronto area.
• CBC’s Matthew Braga takes a look at the implications of the involvement of Sidewalk Labs, of Google, in the development of Quayside for privacy rights. How much data will be given up, exactly?

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[PHOTO] Three photos from last night in Toronto as the snow fell

The snow that was falling over Toronto last night as I returned home was beautiful, at Chechalk Lane near Yonge and Wellesley, at Bloor and Dufferin as the 29 bus came in, and on Dupont Street as I reached my home.

[PHOTO] Paul Kane House among the condo towers

With plans for a mixed-use condo tower more than forty stories high on the northwest corner of Church and Wellesley, Paul Kane House will be completely surrounded by high-rise towers. This space, with its grassy lawn, will become that much more important, as an exception to the high-density downtown.

[PHOTO] Twenty photos of Yonge Street during Open Streets (#openstreetsto)

Sunday saw Open Streets Toronto come into play for the second time, closing off huge chunks of Yonge Street (and Bloor to the west and east of Yonge, too). Sunday afternoon was bright and blue, a perfect day for people to promenade down from Bloor to College, looking at the streetscape and taking in the day’s activities.

[PHOTO] Eleven photos of Eliot’s Bookshop, Toronto

Eliot’s Bookshop, located the intersection of Yonge and Wellesley at 584 Yonge Street. Since my first visit to Toronto in 2002, and long before then for others, Eliot’s has been a centrepiece of Toronto’s used book market, the three stories of the building being packed with used books of all kinds spilling off their shelves. How sad, then, that rising property taxes on Yonge mean that Eliot’s will have to close up shop, the owner of the building and the bookstore hoping to find a more profitable business to take over his lease.

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[PHOTO] Fourteen photos from Church Street during Pride Toronto (#pridetoronto)

I spent yesterday evening down with a friend taking in Pride Toronto down at Church and Wellesley, wandering up and down the streets dense with people and vendors and venturing over into Barbara Hall Park and the AIDS Memorial. It was a lovely evening, made all the more so by a late evening sky coloured in rainbow pastels.

[PHOTO] Colour on wall, Church and Wellesley

This pattern painted on the brick wall by Michael’s Barber Shop is part of a wider mural painted on the south-facing side of the large brick building on the northwest corner of Church and Wellesley.