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In defense of Toronto, our city's strength is in its neighborhoods. Chicago has a glittering ribbon along Lake Michigan of art deco skyscrapers, the Magnificent Mile of Michigan Ave., Millenium Park, Navy Pier, even a beautiful public beach. They spared no expense in their downtown and cultural institutions like the Art Institute. Michigan Ave. even has a service road underneath it. Many of the streets that cross it run underneath it, so that the flow of the roadway remains unperturbed. However, Chicago has a very high homicide rate and some very dysfunctional housing projects. The problem with many U.S. cities is the "other side of the tracks" phenomenon. If you have money and live in the right areas, you've got it good. On the other side of the tracks it's a way of life we don't see too often in Toronto, though we have our pockets like Queen and Sherbourne, some of Regent Park and St. Jamestown, Jane and Finch...I think we could do much better with transit and streetscapes. Bathurst is a major north-south street in the core, quite wide south of Queen, yet it's rough. Queen, King, and College could all use street improvements, streetcar ROW's, public art, fountains, wider boulevards, greenery. The Gardiner is pathetic. Jarvis and Sherbourne used to be a couple of the city's wealthiest streets. They look down and out. The problem is that if the major streets in our neighbourhoods look rough, visitors won't venture into them and get to appreciate how fine areas like Cabbagetown, Corktown, or the Annex really are.
 
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Is that megatall in Chicago even a real proposal? I don't see any mention of it in the Chicago development forums on SSP.

Chicago does have a grander downtown, since it was planned and built up in a different era when big American cities at the time could get things like that done. Chicago now isn't really building much that is awe inspiring, as a matter of fact I would say that Toronto's current crop of new towers has produced more lookers than Chicago has over the last decade or so.

Grander looking downtown aside, Toronto's downtown is livelier, more people on the street, more eclectic retail offerings, more independent businesses, more diverse restaurant offerings (much more cheap, "ethnic" food), and of course downtown Toronto is building far more skyscrapers than downtown Chicago these days. Outside of downtown it's no contest, Toronto is a much better city with much better urban neighbourhoods. The TTC is also better then the CTA, a few more rapid transit lines does not a better overall transit system make.
 
Chicago spends a lot of money. When things are done, you're right, they're done realy well. The city is in debt, they hav extremely high taxes which is pushing people out of the city. Their population is going down. However there are condos going up and some of them are really nice. They're beautifying everywhere and theres a cohesiveness to the city. The city looks richer for some reason. Even though I'm told that toronto is just as rich. Everything is just grand over there.
I don't know if toronto will ever get there unless there's a huge shot of money into the city with th right people running the show.
 
Is that megatall in Chicago even a real proposal? I don't see any mention of it in the Chicago development forums on SSP.

Chicago does have a grander downtown, since it was planned and built up in a different era when big American cities at the time could get things like that done. Chicago now isn't really building much that is awe inspiring, as a matter of fact I would say that Toronto's current crop of new towers has produced more lookers than Chicago has over the last decade or so.

Grander looking downtown aside, Toronto's downtown is livelier, more people on the street, more eclectic retail offerings, more independent businesses, more diverse restaurant offerings (much more cheap, "ethnic" food), and of course downtown Toronto is building far more skyscrapers than downtown Chicago these days. Outside of downtown it's no contest, Toronto is a much better city with much better urban neighbourhoods. The TTC is also better then the CTA, a few more rapid transit lines does not a better overall transit system make.
The megatall proposal is a thing: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gateway_Tower_(Chicago)

Yes, Toronto's strength is its diversity, hence its motto.

Gentrification is a double-edged sword. It can beautify an area, yet can lead to unaffordable rents, causing the depopulation of those without much means (and they usually outnumber the affluent pre-gentrification).
 
I don't get this big deal with diversity. So what? Why is it a strength for a tourist. I travel because I wanna see pretty touristic things not because the city is diverse.
 
If a city offers diversity, that can be as magical as any other aspect of a city. It's most obvious strength is in the restaurant scene it fosters, while the more diverse and larger a city gets, the more it offers retail-wise as well.

I travel because I want to see what makes City X the way it is. Sure, pretty touristic things are a bonus, but I'd rather get to know a city than specifically just see pretty things.

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If a city offers diversity, that can be as magical as any other aspect of a city. It's most obvious strength is in the restaurant scene it fosters, while the more diverse and larger a city gets, the more it offers retail-wise as well.

I travel because I want to see what makes City X the way it is. Sure, pretty touristic things are a bonus, but I'd rather get to know a city than specifically just see pretty things.

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Though truth be told, Toronto can use some pretty things - I'd rather not have to travel to see the superlative all the time - the city is clearly lacking in that regard.

AoD
 
Diversity probably has more appeal to those living in, or near, the city than to the tourist type. It takes a while to get to know a place like Toronto . I'm not at all sure what the " superlative " might be for Toronto. We have some pretty neat things developing in the east waterfront areas, but that hardly qualifies as a tourist attraction. We have major league sports and that definitely brings in tourism dollars. We have a variety of cultural and educational venues that rank with any other place of similar size that I can think of. Toronto is a creative place, as Richard Florida dared say a while back. All this makes the city a vibrant place to live and work, not so much a place to visit. It just seems Toronto wouldn't have it any other way.
 
And yet Toronto pulls more tourists than anywhere else in Canada, and the number has been growing lately. We are down on ourselves all the time, yet others who don't have such jaded eyes seem to enjoy the place, and even some of our architecture.

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Interchange42, I do agree. Toronto is the biggest city-region in the country and very diverse, which probably accounts for a sizeable amount of visits, though. This site allows some us to offer our arm-chair opinions on design and architecture, and to be pilloried for them often by those with a little more knowledge. It's a great forum. I think most of us love the city and just want it to be superlative. This shouldn't come across as being jaded so much.
 
I don't get this big deal with diversity. So what? Why is it a strength for a tourist. I travel because I wanna see pretty touristic things not because the city is diverse.

Well for one, diversity, whether you want to focus on racial, economic, or both, is a strength for Toronto in the sense that you don't have massive swaths of segregation and/or ridiculously high rates of crime a la Chicagoland. From a tourist's perspective, one could theoretically explore the vast majority of Toronto without fear of being mugged or even killed unlike various parts of Chicago.

If anything, diversity has allowed Toronto to develop into an eclectic, cosmopolitan city that is only now receiving much more global attention for its unique, touristic offerings.
 
Chicago spends a lot of money. When things are done, you're right, they're done realy well. The city is in debt, they hav extremely high taxes which is pushing people out of the city. Their population is going down. However there are condos going up and some of them are really nice. They're beautifying everywhere and theres a cohesiveness to the city. The city looks richer for some reason. Even though I'm told that toronto is just as rich. Everything is just grand over there.
I don't know if toronto will ever get there unless there's a huge shot of money into the city with th right people running the show.

this is an important observation. chicago has far higher crime, far worse governance, and a worse financial position. but it's also a grand old(ish) city, with great public transit (toronto's is an international humiliation, btw), and just feels a lot more substantial, consequential and wealthy. over the past 20 years, toronto has undergone a construction boom unrivaled anywhere in north america, but chicago still has a lot more buildings and they've a pretty impressive boom there too.

a second point that i think is really important is that americans are just generally a lot more entrepreneurial than canadians. chain shops and restaurants are well-known as being american, but in the cities chains are relatively rare. the sort of formula retail market penetration you have in canada is unheard of until you get to lower tiered cities like omaha or whatever. beyond taxes and regulations and the american spirit, the major reason for the difference in entrepreneurship, imo, is that retail space in canadian cities just costs a lot more than it does in american cities of equivalent mean income. you must have serious resources to open a restaurant in the true north, relative to here. that difference in the percent of small business makes a city like chicago feel psychically different - your neighborhood feels more yours, your downtowns and high streets feel more yours, etc. and over years and decades, that feeling compounds and reinforces the integrity of neighborhoods in a way that is relatively rare in toronto, even in the annex or on the danforth. i have a broader theory about the link between this sort of investment in the community, a broader civic engagement and how that translates into the built form (i guess sort of jacobian) but it's enough here just to say that it's something that i see almost no consideration of in toronto, and it's something that would strike a chicagoan as obviously worth considering.
 
this is an important observation. chicago has far higher crime, far worse governance, and a worse financial position. but it's also a grand old(ish) city, with great public transit (toronto's is an international humiliation, btw), and just feels a lot more substantial, consequential and wealthy. over the past 20 years, toronto has undergone a construction boom unrivaled anywhere in north america, but chicago still has a lot more buildings and they've a pretty impressive boom there too.

a second point that i think is really important is that americans are just generally a lot more entrepreneurial than canadians. chain shops and restaurants are well-known as being american, but in the cities chains are relatively rare. the sort of formula retail market penetration you have in canada is unheard of until you get to lower tiered cities like omaha or whatever. beyond taxes and regulations and the american spirit, the major reason for the difference in entrepreneurship, imo, is that retail space in canadian cities just costs a lot more than it does in american cities of equivalent mean income. you must have serious resources to open a restaurant in the true north, relative to here. that difference in the percent of small business makes a city like chicago feel psychically different - your neighborhood feels more yours, your downtowns and high streets feel more yours, etc. and over years and decades, that feeling compounds and reinforces the integrity of neighborhoods in a way that is relatively rare in toronto, even in the annex or on the danforth. i have a broader theory about the link between this sort of investment in the community, a broader civic engagement and how that translates into the built form (i guess sort of jacobian) but it's enough here just to say that it's something that i see almost no consideration of in toronto, and it's something that would strike a chicagoan as obviously worth considering.

I think what you point out here, could in many ways be summed up by the 'Canadian way' as I see it. Which is one of compromise and meet-in-the-middle ism. That is neither a knock, nor praise, but rather an observation.

Canadian businesses concede more space to their competitors w/whom they are less fierce on the whole; they in turn, tend to accept a lower profit that might otherwise be possible; but are all but guaranteed a higher profit than might otherwise befall them.

Anyone who grocery shops w/regularly will have seen someone in a suit, not a uniform, wandering the aisles (formerly with a clip board, now usually a tablet) noting prices.

These are staff of the competition. That would rarely, if ever, be tolerated in the US, here.....I see the store manager call that competitor's staff by name and offer to grab them a coffee.

***

This approach to doing business or government has its detractions. It tends to result in higher prices, lower rate of innovation, and less promotion by merit. But it also tends to result in fewer dumb risks and lower bankruptcy.

(comm. bankruptcy in recent years tends to be close to 40,000 in the US, but only about 3,000 in CA)

This same effect exists in business regulation which impacts ease of innovation/start-up. Canada, tends to impose higher barriers to entry and compliance on business, benefits/wages, etc. Those are easier to fulfill as a large business than as a new entrant.

I support more innovation and independent business; but I also support thoughtful regulation and labour standards. Striking the best balance is no easy task.
 
^ yeah, there are obviously reasons for all of it, and those reasons could be good. but there's an aggregate result that maybe many people interested in cities and culture should feel very ill at ease with. the high barriers to entry in toronto mean that trends will tend to be set in america, then move into toronto once they've achieved a degree of adoption that makes a move north look profitable. this is bad because it's not local and doesn't support a local economy at the highest level, the value implicit in the business are often extrinsic to torontonian culture, and there's just a sense in which, over time, people learn to see the businesses near them not as treasured caretakers of community and memory, but as capitalist enterprises from america. (or equally bad, they take pride in the canadian chains as an alternative to a local chain, because they're so indoctrinated into the system).

and my theory is that this eventually filters down into the built form. i'm not a genius who can tell you the extent to which the american-level of entrepreneurialism is distinct from a broader ethos that also means they have higher crime and the rest. but i can point you to immigrant communities that don't share native-born canadians' thinking in re such things. like, literally, on this site, people debate whether a quiznos or an a&w would be a better fit for a space, like they're brainwashed into thinking that american chain retail/restaurant is the natural default, instead of waiting to see if someone local has an interesting idea for the space. and maybe it is based on cost and zoning, but many california cities restrict or outright ban formula retail, and the result is, guess what? pushing the chain players out of the markets and decreasing demand for retail spaces does lower the cost of starting a business. visit san francisco (or, again, chicago) and tell me toronto can't learn something.

at it's most basic, the truth is that people form attachments to unique spaces in communities that feel unique to them, not the local iteration of tim horton's.

and again, my theory is this redounds to the built form.
 

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