Curiosities
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40 in the shade: Toronto’s worst heatwave
For an excruciating week in July, 1936, Toronto, the province, and much of Canada burned. An unprecedented and deadly continent-wide heatwave...
By Chris Bateman -
How Toronto built the CN Tower
The CN Tower is one of the most important buildings ever constructed in Canada. Like it or loathe it, the absurd, 553-metre concrete tower, which opened...
By Chris Bateman -
How City Hall ended up on St. Clair Avenue
In the late 1940s, Toronto City Hall was bursting at the seams. Now known as Old City Hall, the building on the northeast corner of Queen and Bay streets...
By Chris Bateman -
Lost and found in the PATH: the case for new wayfinding
This summer, a pilot project will be launched to test a new wayfinding system in the PATH — Toronto’s subterranean navigation-slash-commercial network of...
By Kieran Delamont -
Who will save Toronto’s old streetcars?
Toronto’s outgoing fleet of streetcars could be the first not to get a second life in another city. Perhaps due to advanced decrepitude, the current...
By Chris Bateman -
Does Toronto hate marathons?
Toronto loves its sports teams; just head down to the square in front of the Air Canada Centre, or Nathan Phillips Square around playoff time for proof of...
By Kieran Delamont -
The Don Mills Safety Village taught kids to drive
1962 was a rough year for kids. In the 12 months between January and December, 20 young people under the age of 14 were killed on Toronto’s streets...
By Chris Bateman -
When Haileybury burned, Toronto sent streetcars
The town of Haileybury sits on the shore of Lake Timiskaming, a serpentine body of water on the northern reaches of the Ottawa River that marks the border...
By Chris Bateman -
The curious origin of the original low-floor streetcar
Toronto is in the (unexpectedly slow) process of getting new low-floor streetcars. The goal of these new cars is accessibility — they can be used by...
By Dylan Reid -
The half-built relics of nixed Toronto skyscrapers
In 1914, John Eaton, the third son of retail magnate Timothy Eaton, began preparing plans for a massive expansion of his family’s empire. Aged 38...
By Chris Bateman -
A history of developers and holdouts in Toronto
When the Imperial Oil company began assembling land for its new executive offices on St. Clair Ave. W. in 1952, it didn’t reckon on tangling with...
By Chris Bateman -
How Exhibition Place got the retro Dufferin Gate
You can tell a lot about a place by how it greets its visitors. The goofy lights at Honest Ed’s tell customers “there’s no place like...
By Chris Bateman