Streetscape
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PODCAST: Spacing Radio 082, Toronto’s political gridlock
This month, we respond to Doug Ford’s stated plan of banning new bike lanes in Ontario municipalities and building an underground highway from...
By Spacing Radio -
LORINC: The public space embarrassment that is College Park
When College Park (pictured above) formally re-opened, in 2019, the City of Toronto put out a rather breathless press release on what had been achieved in...
By John Lorinc -
LORINC: Booze in the corner store
Until the mid 1970s, you couldn’t buy lottery tickets in Ontario. Ontarians could go to the horse races and place bets; the ponies, after all, have...
By John Lorinc -
LORINC: The public space miracle of the moveable chair (redux)
In 1979, when the renowned American sociologist William (Holly) Whyte published The Social Life of Small Urban Spaces — which is, let’s face it, a...
By John Lorinc -
PODCAST: Spacing Radio 078, Bike Month
It’s Bike Month! It’s a time we celebrate cycle culture in Toronto and surrounding cities and towns. At least officially. Despite some...
By Spacing Radio -
Book launch of expanded and updated edition of Stroll: Psychogeographic Walking Tours of Toronto
Spacing’s senior editor and co-founder Shawn Micallef has expanded and updated his 2010 book Stroll: Psychogeographic Walking Tours of Toronto. The...
By Spacing -
PODCAST: Spacing Radio 077, Spring cleaning in Toronto
With the change of the seasons, we talk about different kinds of renewal. First, Senior Editor John Lorinc talks about the special Spacing investigation...
By Spacing Radio -
Anatomy of a bus shelter removal
During the week of December 2, 2023, the City of Toronto removed a TTC transit shelter at Dundas Street East and Sherbourne Street, in Moss Park. The...
By Daysha Loppie -
The debate about e-scooters on Toronto streets will speed up in 2024
Ontario’s first attempts to keep pedestrians safe on our roads began a century ago in 1923 with the passage of the Highway Traffic Act. Back then, the...
By Glenn Miller -
A year-end interview with Mayor Olivia Chow
With the final council session of the year now in the rear-view mirror, Mayor Olivia Chow is spending part of this week powering through year-end...
By John Lorinc -
I visited public toilet paradise and it was heaven – why can’t Canada do this?
I found public pee paradises and their names are Hong Kong and Japan. Public washrooms, or lack of by policy choice, in Canada has been my pet thing for a...
By Shawn Micallef -
A Perfect Fit: KOPS Records at its original Queen West location
Between 1995 and 2020, Canada’s oldest independent record retailer, KOPS Records, occupied an aged storefront at 229 Queen Street West, between Simcoe and...
By Peter MacCallum