Whoaccio
Senior Member
This is so bloody dumb. What kind of idiot councilor would intentionally reduce the capacity of daycare spaces in a family area? For all the downtown councilors like to paint downtown as a great place to raise kids, its this kind of idiotic crap that makes people move to the 'burbs or outer 416. What is the point of forcing developers to provide family units if you then just block daycare because a few NIMBYs bust out the "traffic will increase part" (has it ever occured to these Neanderthals that living in an urban area which is growing by about 250,000p/year may entail more people?). On the whole, this is the dumbest zoning decision I have heard since that case way out in the boonies where the town went after a single mother for providing her autistic son with a pony to ride on as per their therapy on the grounds that their house wasn't zoned for that.
What passes for urbanism here is so suburban it is unbelievable. Young entrepreneurs displaying creativity and daring in rejuvenating an area -bad. Government owned ehtnic food carts producing what tastes like curried wood- good. If a nuclear bomb went of in Toronto tomorrow and we had to rebuild, Kensington Market would get banned because of haphazard food safety standards, St. Lawrence market would get banned for being "Big Box" and attracting too much traffic to the area, UofT, Ryerson, & OCAD would get banned for drawing too many people to clubs/bars, the financial district would probably get banned because Maude Barlow types wouldn't like it and the entire city would end up looking like the Waterfront, sterile, boring and crap. Never mind a totally logical proposal like redeveloping our lane ways, that would be to Melbourne for us. A few years ago the Globe ran a series on urban design in Toronto. Will Alsop's comments were the most intriguing to me because they rejected the idea that the City itself should lead development.
Then there is the Ossington "Wild Wild West" boondoggle. At least City Council gave a reason beyond "traffic will increase," preferring the more cosmopolitan NIMBYism "noise will increase." How come every time people in this city do something good for their area and the economy, the City steps in to screw it up? Its almost like they like screwing organic development so that their mega-project on the water front looks like more of a success. Who wants independent restaurants when you could have a Subway?Tenille Bonoguore
From Saturday's Globe and Mail, Saturday, May. 30, 2009 03:50AM EDT
The man behind a High Park Avenue daycare centre will prepare to open it next month despite Toronto City Council dropping “the nuclear bomb of municipal regulations†to stop him.
Ward 13 Councillor Bill Saundercook introduced a one-year interim control bylaw in council on Wednesday, slapping a moratorium on new daycare centres along a three-block stretch of the residential street from Glenlake Avenue to Dundas Street West.
Mr. Saundercook said neighbouring residents had raised concerns about traffic and parking at the Teddy Bear Academy, a daycare centre being created in a house at 167 High Park Ave.
The councillor said that when he heard that another daycare application had been submitted for a house nearby, it “pushed us over the top.â€
But Teddy Bear Academy owner Holt Hunter said he's offering an essential service in the family-friendly community.
“We're going to finish [building], and then will be touring people,†he said. “I'm really committed to this.â€
When asked if he is seeking legal advice about the new bylaw, Mr. Hunter declined to comment.
Parents, however, had plenty to say as they gathered outside Mr. Saundercook's community office to protest against the bylaw yesterday afternoon.
“Daycares in the area are all full, the waiting lists are atrocious,†said Alison Gibbons, who is struggling to find local child care for her seven-month-old son.
According to data from the 2006 census, the area spanning High Park Avenue had 355 children aged four or younger.
The crucial problem is infant care. Children younger than 18 months require higher staffing levels, which makes daycare centres less inclined to offer it. (Ten of the 50 spaces at Mr. Hunter's Teddy Bear Academy are to be for infants.)
Women often join daycare waiting lists during pregnancy. Some are still waiting at the end of their one-year maternity leaves.
That forces them to hire nannies, rely on family, or simply give up their EI and job guarantees to stay at home.
In High Park and the Junction, a flood of young families is exacerbating the situation and increasing the stress on parents, Ms. Gibbons said.
“Toronto needs to embrace that families are staying in the city, not moving to the suburbs. In order to embrace that, we need to have daycares,†she said.
The traffic and parking concerns that Mr. Saundercook cited are baseless, Pippa Van Dam said. Most parents would walk their children to the centre en route to the subway, she said.
And the street has plenty of room, Ms. Van Dam added. “It's one of the widest streets in the entire neighbourhood,†she said. “It's not some lazy, quiet road. It has a bus route running along it. It has several traffic lights.â€
The bylaw proposal came at the end of the council meeting on Wednesday, when 21 councillors were absent. It was passed 19-5, despite strongly worded protests from neighbouring ward councillor Gord Perks.
“It's a terrible, terrible, terrible mistake. I am profoundly upset that a majority of my colleagues went the other way,†Mr. Perks said yesterday.
Such bylaws are introduced quietly and dealt with quickly to stave off property speculation and last-minute development applications, said Mr. Perks, who made the nuclear bomb analogy.
“I'm concerned about the precedent,†he said of the daycare ban. “[Residential daycare] is the kind of use we should be protecting. This should be easy to do.
“We need to remember that human beings have different needs at different stages in their life. A healthy, thriving neighbourhood provides for all of those needs.â€
“The city says there is that there is too much going on at once. Is that really so bad in a recession?†says Anthony Siniscalco of the soon-to-open Gallery supper club. “We're pumping money into the city. We're adding to this community. Five years ago there were gun shots here. Now look at it. People walking down the street. Guys investing.â€
He has a point. The upside of letting the strip develop is obvious and the worries overblown. It is just fear-mongering to suggest, as Mr. Pantalone does, that the strip could become another entertainment district like the one farther east, around Richmond and John, with its thousands of rowdy club goers and crime problem. Most of the buildings on the strip are much too small to house cavernous dance halls and existing zoning already prohibits night clubs in any case.
As for noise, city bylaw officers say they are patrolling regularly to monitor noise levels and prosecuting places that break the rules. Enforce the law, fine, but don't stifle change. The strip is a marvel of spontaneous urban evolution: unplanned, unexpected, organic, changing by the month – the very thing a city needs to stay vibrant and alive. Let's cheer it, not freeze it.
What passes for urbanism here is so suburban it is unbelievable. Young entrepreneurs displaying creativity and daring in rejuvenating an area -bad. Government owned ehtnic food carts producing what tastes like curried wood- good. If a nuclear bomb went of in Toronto tomorrow and we had to rebuild, Kensington Market would get banned because of haphazard food safety standards, St. Lawrence market would get banned for being "Big Box" and attracting too much traffic to the area, UofT, Ryerson, & OCAD would get banned for drawing too many people to clubs/bars, the financial district would probably get banned because Maude Barlow types wouldn't like it and the entire city would end up looking like the Waterfront, sterile, boring and crap. Never mind a totally logical proposal like redeveloping our lane ways, that would be to Melbourne for us. A few years ago the Globe ran a series on urban design in Toronto. Will Alsop's comments were the most intriguing to me because they rejected the idea that the City itself should lead development.
When Mr. Alsop was asked how we might make wider changes to Toronto's often scruffy urban fabric, he delivered something characteristically different. His confection of coloured geometry, with buildings growing out of the landscape – and seemingly each other – is what might happen, he suggests, if Toronto were to fling off its corset of planners, politicians and bureaucrats and live a little, removing all the planning rules and letting residents and developers rebuild at their pleasure. The fanciful picture sends the message that organic growth is more interesting than urban planning. In Mr. Alsop's words, “A carefully planned place usually lacks soul and results in people behaving badly.â€
Mr. Alsop calls his concept a “no-planning†zone. Here, market forces take over and there is a rush to maximize the potential for lake views. Buildings appear that dip their toes in the water. Among them are some that are lifted above the ground, allowing public access to the water's edge. Others emerge north of the first ones, but are built higher, also to achieve lake views. The increase in density persuades the city to locate a new museum in the area. The architect decides to raise the building as a 3-D Mobius strip. Bars, restaurants and street markets appear in what Mr. Alsop calls a “useful terrestrial grge.†This, he adds, “is the part where people really want to be.â€