It’s June 2nd — not even officially summer — and we’re just 5 days short of reaching the total number of smog advisory days there were in total in 2006. Not that it’s hard to tell the air is filthy these days — the fact that the CN Tower is a vague suggestion from anywherecontinue reading
Toronto Archives
Zero Yonge Street
I can’t get all that upset about the condos slotted for the Pier 27 site at the foot of Yonge St. (link, link, link), though perhaps that’s a sign that I’ve lowered my expectations to the point where anything in that area other than windswept parking lots, mothballed party boats, random examples of ‘70s Brutalismcontinue reading
Delivery delays
The general idea here seems worth considering, but the hours strike me as very impractical. Fresh food gets delivered in the morning, and is it reasonable or desirable to expect everyone to be there to receive it before 7 am? The idea that 7-8 am is actually rush hour *downtown* also strikes me as hyperbolic.continue reading
Lower Don plan design winner
… announced tonight. Details here. Who knows what it will look like if and when it’s actually built. Lots to discuss. The designer (see p6 of the .pdf) seems to want to run an LRT down Queen’s Quay, then Commissioners, as far as I can tell. There is going to have to be a Queen’scontinue reading
The Window Lawyer is officially not an urban legend
From the Mope&Wail’s business pages, discussing the closure of Goodman and Carr LLP: Previously, the biggest law firm to shut down was Toronto-based Holden Day Wilson LLP in 1996. Holden Day at its peak had 90 lawyers after a merger in 1990, but the firm was devastated in 1993 by a fatal accident involving popularcontinue reading
urbantoronto.ca
The urbantoronto.ca discussion board’s organizers have abandoned EZBoard, the dreadful system they were using earlier, and have relaunched in a much more user-friendly format while as far as I can tell keeping their archives. This has always been a potentially very useful resource, but hobbled by EZBoard – I’m surprised that as many people putcontinue reading
Sunset
I’m no fan of the Sun chain and all its works, but I’m sort of fascinated by the Toronto Sun Family blog, which specializes in bring-out-your-dead-style daily casualty lists of editorial employees fired, resigned or laid off that day as the chain collapses. The latest casualty is John Downing, who as an editor closed thecontinue reading
Ew
"Mobile calling" ad Originally uploaded by morecoffeeplease. So here’s a picture of a Rogers Video calling ad which is now in the subway. There’s a picture of a smiling girl on the phone, which is being held in a man’s left hand; in the background is a slightly rumpled bed with nighttime lighting. First therecontinue reading
Almaty, architectural inspiration
I’m all for a tall building at Yonge and Bloor, the undistinguished centre of our city. It’s just… has anyone looked at modern Kazakh architecture?
The sushi Nazis are coming!
This is so silly. I am going to go over there and complain about their sad excuse for kimchi! http://www.thestar.com/article/199067 Mr. Hashimoto explains that, in true Japanese cooking, the rice has to come from Japan. “It makes a difference,” he says. “There, people can eat the rice by itself because it’s so much more flavourfulcontinue reading