STREETS & PATHS
• Google Street View gets Canpages competition [ Toronto Star ]
• Sharing the roads and sidewalks [ Toronto Star ]
• A bad week for bicycles: ‘We need to tell people, smarten up’ [ National Post ]
• City’s PATH needs better maps [ Toronto Star ]
• City removes well-intended but dangerous bollards [ Toronto Star ]
CITY HALL
• Mayor seeks stronger regulation of propane industry [ National Post ]
• Councillor pushes for trash study [ Toronto Sun ]
• Toronto mayor nixes new taxes, but not hikes [ National Post ]
DON JAIL
• Don Jail’s ‘open’ doors will slam shut again [ Toronto Star ]
• Legal issues keep tours, parties out of old Don Jail [ Globe & Mail ]
• No fun on the cellblock [ Toronto Sun ]
OTHER NEWS
• Making a pitch for cricket [ Globe & Mail ]
• Rename Yonge-Dundas Square to save us from possible communists [ National Post ]
• It’s time to close schools, TDSB chairman says [ National Post ]
• On this day [ National Post ]
• My near-death experience [ Globe & Mail ] *thanks to Stephen Otto
7 comments
Re: City removes well-intended but dangerous bollards
Some bollards where removed at the Boulevard Club and several other places on the Martin Goodman Trail last fall, presumably to make the snow clearing easier.
I’m not sure why people haven’t been talking about the opening of the new route of the Martin Goodman Trail past Ontario Place.
The fact is that the city’s revenue is relatively stable. Using the recession as an excuse for a revenue shortfall is just that, an excuse. How many times have we heard the lament that the city needs taxes that grow with the economy? Well the other side of the coin is that the city does have taxes (revenue) that do not shrink with the economy.
More of the same from city hall. Always somebody else’s fault.
Glen,
You make a valid point … but not so loud… visitors to this site are going to think you’re one of the right-wing whackos who should be posting on the Star’s comments section
Comedic Gold,
“In a street fight for the 21st century,* a Canadian company is taking aim at Google in a bid to beat the online behemoth in the digital battle for the boulevard.*”
*WTF!?
Re: Rename Yonge-Dundas Square to save us from possible communists
This is one of the most insanely idiotic things I have ever read. At no point in this rambling, incoherent editorial was the writer even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this room is now dumber for having read it. I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul.
(Joseph McCarthy would be like WTF at that piece)
Sun’s Sue-anne Levy is too often unreadable given the axe she’s always looking to grind. That said, she often highlights city council problems that other news outlets either ignore… or end up covering weeks later. Her latest column (on the City Ombudsman finding the City’s application of its tree policy as “inconsistent” and “unclear” yet outside the bounds of his defined role to comment on City Council decisions) raises some serious issues regarding what has to date been presented as a key piece in the City’s “accountability” framework. Once again, it looks like the Ombudsperson is there to help City Council look accountable, rather than actually hold City Council accountable. Here’s the link:
http://www.torontosun.com/comment/columnists/sueann_levy/2009/08/11/10421616-sun.html
Glen,
your point is very true. Just one thing, while the city’s revenue does not drop in bad time, its expense may grow a bit (more demand for welfare and other social services, etc.). That said, I think the key is not to have revenue source that’s linked with economy, because those source happen to dry up in bad times when the demand is higher. The city just needs to replenish its reserves at good times so that it has something to pull itself through the bad times.
Oh, BTW, I think the city actually does have income source that grows with economy, the provincial bailout 🙂