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Superstar
Another EXCELLENT post; there really is no point in 'whining' here about problems if you do not also try to get them fixed by contacting 311, your Councillor, the mayor or you local BIA or neighbourhood association.
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- Thread starter junctionist
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Mystic Point
Active Member
Toronto’s moment is over.
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Superstar
Shit! So I missed it; I knew I should not have had a nap this afternoon!
evandyk
Senior Member
I'm not going to get into the back-and-forth, but I would say that living in St. Lawrence, there has been a certain amount of decline over the last two years. It has been tough on the neighbourhood, with some increased poverty, temporary shelters, etc. I went for a walk to a colleague's house near Avenue and Lawrence this week, and the difference is night and day. Everything is pristine up there.
But the drivers are insanely aggressive. They don't even wait for pedestrians at stop signs!
But the drivers are insanely aggressive. They don't even wait for pedestrians at stop signs!
JasonParis
Moderator
There's definitely a decline in St. Lawrence and Corktown these last few years. I've never lived in a neighbourhood before and watched it actually get worse, so this is new to me (and to a lot of others too). Between cars/business windows being smashed nightly, needles literally everywhere, and some very aggressive panhandling, I see why some can give up on voting progressive. Not saying I will, just that they are wedged into a box here and can't think outside of it.
Richard White
Senior Member
It does not help when you have endless pot shops and shelters in the area unfortunately.
Toronto as a whole is declining. I was in Rosedale recently and it is a shadow of its former self.
Towered
Superstar
How so?
Richard White
Senior Member
It just gives off the average toronto vibe.
When I was younger it was high class and old money. Now it doesn't feel any different than the Annex.
Northern Light
Superstar
Except for the 30M homes, that are often 10x the ft2 of what you would find in the Annex, right?
Does this say 'Annex' to you?
Or this:
Or this:
I know heritage lighting and red brick sidewalks along with this house, do not make me think of the Annex; nor do they leave the impression of Rosedale in decay.
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evandyk
Senior Member
Yeah, we bike up through Rosedale once in a while, and it doesn't seem to be declining at all.
yrt+viva=1system
Senior Member
I’ve been thinking about this for a while now. Does the City of Toronto have a lower standard of maintence than other municiplaties? What I’m trying to get here is that the city seems to have lower standards for quality of projects and maintence. Even for important streets the quality of work seems to be 50/50 when it comes to construction of new projects, repairs or maintence. For instance, the City seems to use native plants and grasses as an excuse to let weeds grow rampant without any maintenance. This is nice on paper but in reality it can easily turn a streetscape and landscape to look very shabby in no time (Nathan Phillips Square). Or even the finishing of sidewalks and curbs and roadways. If this was in York Region ( personal work experience in the industry), they would have their own personnel and a third party consultant overseeing every step of construction and mandating quality control test results.
Northern Light
Superstar
I can't compare to other municipalities instantly it would take me a bit of time to look up those standards.
I can say certain standards in respect of flower bed maintenance and grass cutting have indeed been lowered over the years.
Others have not been, but have accrued ....'execution problems' over the years due to changes in delivery.
As example. Boulevard lawn-mowing in Toronto used to be done by the Parks department. It was paid for by Parks in their budget, and it was the same crews who did parks.
At some point, it was decided that departments had to do charge-backs for services offered to other departments. In this case, Parks had to charge Transportation for mowing the boulevards.
Not long after that happened, the service was contracted out to save money.
Now here's what happens that's different. Previously (decades ago now)........if a constituent noticed that a section of boulevard was overgrown for any reason, they phoned their Councillor, and Parks immediately redirected staff to prioritize that bit and mow it, as soon as the next day. It was just done...
Now, however, what happens is that usually, an omission is the result of a mapping error in the contract tender.
So the contractor demands, understandably to be paid for doing the additional mowing. This takes time and requires approvals.
As a result, what was once a same-day/next-day fix, may now take weeks (or longer)...
Even worse, staff often don't actually fix the underlying mapping error/contract error, and so the same problem repeats year after year.
There is also one less mowing per year than when the City amalgamated.
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Horticulture (gardening) is also leaner than it used to be, with many beds converted to perennials vs annuals, and yes, that is done to lower on-going maintenance, sometimes with a measure of success, sometimes not.
Could you provide examples of this please. In my experience Toronto rarely, if ever, does native plant streetscapes. They do re-naturalize/forest areas of parks, which I fully support.
That's different.
But for streetscapes, most maintenance issues occur due to neglect of some form; sometimes in beds that are meant to be perennial, but not particularly native.
Example:
When Victoria Park Station was re-done, a landscape bed was put in on the west side of VP avenue, which looked like this:
That's some form of Juniper, I'm not sure which one they chose; it could be native, but is mostly likely a landscape cultivar, the plan was clearly for it to be the only plant in this display and to 'own' the planter.
Its a common choice in the landscape trade.
However, the City, so far as I can tell, neglected to ever assign any department to maintain this planter. Not Parks, not Transportation or the TTC.
As a result........you get this:
100% Dog-Strangling Vine, a non-native, invasive plant has completely over-run the planter.
Entirely preventable with 2x per year weeding/bed maintenance. In fact, if you were strategic with some landscape cloth and some mulch, maybe once a year would do. Sigh.
What section of NPS are you discussing here?
The Peace Gardens aren't pure native, but I think they've turned out decently, overall:
Nathan Phillips Square + Spirit Garden | ?m | ?s | City of Toronto
So I read that the wrapping will likely change in a year and they will keep using artists from the city to design all of them, I like that part.
The worst part of the NPS landscape are the out-of-date, uglier than all flower pots all over the place; and the trodden over sod along Queen.
A function of design choice and under-investment.
There is third-party quality control and/or City quality control on many, many projects. The quality of said control varies widely.
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Mystic Point
Active Member
Toronto is seen best from high up at night during the winter. Seen from 30 stories and in the dark you could be in Cincinnati, Kansas or St. Louis. It’s friendly flat Midwestern and generic.
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Superstar
You have very strong and rigid (and negative) opinions on Toronto - do you actually live here?
Mystic Point
Active Member
Yes I live here.
Downtown in fact.
If you do something creative Toronto is a great place.
There’s no reason to go out, the weather is awful and everything is delivered.
Fortunately because I write i’m “fully remote” and stopped going out years ago.
I have fond memories of city in the 70s and 80s, but after 1990 Toronto became directionless and receded into a state of violence, chaos and shabbiness.
Downtown in fact.
If you do something creative Toronto is a great place.
There’s no reason to go out, the weather is awful and everything is delivered.
Fortunately because I write i’m “fully remote” and stopped going out years ago.
I have fond memories of city in the 70s and 80s, but after 1990 Toronto became directionless and receded into a state of violence, chaos and shabbiness.