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I find a lot of people in Toronto are pretty clueless about places in Ontario. It's like they don't travel outside the GTA bubble. I had a family cottage in Port Elgin, I'm amazed the amount of people I have encountered, that have no idea where Port Elgin is or what lake it's on. Same with the people who go to Niagara Falls all the time, but never set foot in Niagara On The Lake.

Ontario is a big province with lots to discover.
To be fair, Port Elgin is a village of 8k people. And there are a lot of port this-or-thats in Ontario. Not knowing about one of the largest cities in North America is less excusable. That's like us not knowing about Mexico City.
 
I find a lot of people in Toronto are pretty clueless about places in Ontario. It's like they don't travel outside the GTA bubble. I had a family cottage in Port Elgin, I'm amazed the amount of people I have encountered, that have no idea where Port Elgin is or what lake it's on. Same with the people who go to Niagara Falls all the time, but never set foot in Niagara On The Lake.

Ontario is a big province with lots to discover.

I was born in Toronto and have lived here my whole life. I have traveled extensively across Europe many times, and been to many places within Ontario. I'm also a geography whiz.

I have never heard of Port Elgin.
 
I was born in Toronto and have lived here my whole life. I have traveled extensively across Europe many times, and been to many places within Ontario. I'm also a geography whiz.

I have never heard of Port Elgin.

I wish more people from Toronto were like you. Real estate prices are crazy there now. It was nice a place for a cottage. I regret not taking over the family cottage in 2013.
 
I wish more people from Toronto were like you. Real estate prices are crazy there now. It was nice a place for a cottage. I regret not taking over the family cottage in 2013.

Port Elgin, Kincardine, Point Clark and other nearby areas have the Bruce Power effect for housing pricing. When Bruce is doing well prices climb as 1/4th the population is employed by them (directly or indirectly). The $13B refurbishment (much of that $13B is contractor wages) to extend the life of the site through 2064 was also made in 2015. Active construction started in 2020.

All of which is to say I'm not convinced Toronto remote-work expats is the primary driver of Port Elgin housing prices.
 
As per The Star article linked below MZOs have been issued in furtherance of 2 major new studio complexes in the burbs.

Bottega Studios in Mississauga, and in Markam, a complex by SOW Capital that also includes a hotel and apparently, a hospital............

 
The U.S. upfronts were this week..........and a worthy note for the Canadian production scene is that Global's Family Law has been picked up the CW.

While the former is set in Vancouver; the key for Toronto is that an openly Canadian produced, acted, set show is being picked up by a U.S. network.

NBC picked up CTV's transplant in recent years and the CW previously became the U.S. home of CBC's Coroner, so every Canadian Major has now had at least one show picked up by U.S.
network TV. A promising sign.

 
Cinespace out with a press release this morning announcing a significant expansion of their Portlands facilities.


Rendering:

1664289786671.png


From the above:

Cinespace Studios (Cinespace), a global platform of production facilities, announced today the expansion of its Marine Terminal Studio Hub with the signing of a second long-term lease with PortsToronto. The lease comes at the conclusion of an open, multi-year Request for Interest (RFI) process and a subsequent Request for Proposal process that commenced in 2019. Located in Toronto's Port Lands, the redevelopment of Marine Terminal 52 will create three production stages and support spaces totaling 130,000 square feet to welcome world-class productions in 2023. Global architecture, design and planning firm Gensler has been selected to design the studio.
 
A couple of odds n' ends to tack on to this thread.

The first is the announcement of the enlarged First Studio City concept in Markham:


This project has a dedicated UT thread:


The second is arguably not appropriate to this thread, but I'll mention it anyway w/an explainer.

The Canadian TV show Heartland is now the 13th most popular show streaming, of any type, in the U.S.


While this doesn't fit in this thread in that the show is shot in Alberta; it does fit, I would argue, because that kind of achievement for Canadian Television as an industry (even if the show is not my taste) has a spillover effect which will likely positively impact Toronto.
 
Well, the CW is doing something pretty grand for Canada, though not necessarily as a 'gift'..........

It has just picked up a raft of Canadian scripted shows, which will have it, this summer and next fall running more weekly hours of original, Canadian scripted TV than CTV, Global and City combined!

CBC's Son of a Critch is headed to CW as is Run the Burbs, and Moonshine, CTV's Spencer Sisters has also been picked up for summer. So 3 hours of original Can-Con every week.

CTV's Sullivan's Crossing has been picked up for the fall schedule, as has Global's Family Law.

***

As a secondary note, CW has also picked up British and Australian shows for fall.

This is likely illustrative of the ongoing writers strike in the U.S. right now, which if it runs beyond mid-July will impair the ability of U.S. networks to air U.S. produced original shows this fall.

CW being a first-mover to try to make sure it has some original fare in the bank.

Be interesting to see what if anything comes out of the other U.S. upfronts in the next 2 weeks or so.

 
Kind of surprising to see how much sound stage activity is happening in Mississauga.
 

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