Dundasland

The Dundas Streetcar, with an average speed of 10 km/h, is more theme park tram than rapid transit.
Click the image to see it bigger (lots of detail in this sketch):

Toronto music critics agree

New Year’s Eve in my neighbourhood

We walked home from Parkdale along the surprisingly quiet streets. There were a few clusters of people ringing in the new year though.

Boy on a ledge

I wonder who this hopeful Portuguese boy in a 1980s suit is? Do I pass him everyday in my neighbourhood? Someone picked up the smashed and water-damaged little portrait and placed it neatly on the weathered sill of an abandoned storefront, where it smiled at the street for days.

Typographic Cornucopia on St. Clair

Lovers of 1970s typefaces should ride the streetcar to the Dairy Freeze at St. Clair West and Caledonia Road. Dairy Freeze’s pillar sign successfully mixes curlicues and san-serif fonts, an orange-and-yellow colour scheme, and an incandescent bulb arrow. Grab a milkshake and bask in its boldness.

 

 

Nuit Blanche 2011 – most provocative art projects

Couldn’t find the art at this year’s Nuit Blanche? Maybe you just didn’t know where to look.

Sex club gutted

There’s bedbugs, and then there’s bed bugs.

Queen Street West sex club Wicked was throwing out a heap of vinyl furniture on Tuesday night. I never get too close to garbage furniture in this bedbug-infested town, but there was something extra “ewwww” about Wicked’s cast-offs.

Word on the Street

Last Sunday, Queen’s Park was packed with books and the bookish for the annual Word on the Street book fair. Here’s a page of observations for your reading enjoyment (click the image to see it larger).

 

Backyard hydro

Before there were community consultations, before there were activists, before there were NIMBYS, Toronto operated in a looser fashion. If my observations are correct, the unspoken agreement went as follows: The City, utilities and companies built where they saw fit. In return, City Hall turned blind eye to residents building house additions any way they saw fit.

Getting Ready For Game Seven

This installment takes me to my hometown of Vancouver, where the city prepares itself for the final Stanley Cup match against the Boston Bruins. (Click on the image to see it large!).