Perhaps you think that I’m engaging in cynical hyperbole but I assure you that I’m not: City Hall is going to demolish the most iconic section of Yonge Street in downtown Toronto. Sure, they plan to rebuild it again afterwards but it’ll look and feel much different — the old Yonge Street of today will be gone.

The push for this started back in the summer of 2011. At the time it was considered a long shot since the concept was mainly just a pedestrian-friendly facelift put forward by gay, lefty-pinko junior Councillor Kristyn Wong-Tam and Pride-avoiding, right wing, penny-pinching, newly-elected businessman Rob Ford (remember him?) who, it may surprise you to learn, wasn’t really a big fan of walking or running, wasn’t onboard. So the idea simmered on the back burner for about a decade.

At some point it was determined that a length of Yonge would need century-old water mains replaced and, since this requires wrecking and rebuilding the street anyhow, the proposal resurfaced, congealing early in 2021 into something called yongeTOmorrow. I don’t know to what extent the Wong-Tam’s plan has morphed over the years but right now City Hall is eyeing the portion between Queen Street and College/Carlton for the first phase of a Yonge makeover.

As of 2024, the most current design by engineering firm Parsons splits up the initial stretch into three themed sections.

Each of these sections are clustered around what the project calls Anchors, defined as “existing landmarks that contribute towards the identity of Yonge Street.”

While the “Green Gateway” is indeed quite green and the “Performance/Retail” portion is also aptly named, I’m hesitant to use the word “Innovation” for its designated section simply because of that area’s proximity to Ryerson/Metro University. Some of their innovations are dubious if you ask me.

Nevertheless, the practical result of the current plan would be the reduction of the street to one lane in each direction, to be shared by both motor vehicles and bikes. The design includes “Designated Short-Term Areas”, presumably short bits where the road flares out to two lanes for drop-offs/pick-ups. Along with this there’s a speed limit reduction to 30 km/h.

The resulting space will be used to widen sidewalks and include strips with greenery and street furniture, sort of like permanent curb lane cafés à la CaféTO. How much of these strips will be for public use and how much will be designated for adjoining businesses (i.e. private, à la CaféTO), remains to be seen.

Tenders for the construction are expected to begin in 2030 and construction itself is expected to take about 5 years — with the proviso that this is dependent on the progress of Doug Ford’s unspoken tribute to his late brother Rob, the Ontario Line.

If the timelines of something like Union Station Revitalization or the new St. Lawrence North Market are anything to go by, it’ll be a miracle if any projected costs haven’t at least doubled by the time shovels are in the ground, or whatever futuristic digging implements will be in use at the time, which will likely be 2040 at the earliest.

That gives us at least 14 years to experience and capture the downtown Yonge Street of future yesteryear.

The design is still undergoing public review and there’s a scheduled public drop-in event next Tuesday at the central YMCA that, “will provide an opportunity to view the project information panels and speak with members of the project team one-on-one.” In other words, if you want to meet some of the people who will eventually be responsible for astronomical cost overruns, extensive delays, and assorted disruptions to the surrounding community, this might be the event for you.

Maybe I’m just trafficking in hyperbolic cynicism. Maybe they’ll have coffee and doughnuts. Whatever the case, a “pt.2” is inevitable.

11 Dundonald Street

A large swath of Yonge Street is in the process of being demolished to make way for sterile, corporate homogeneity. Most of the businesses along the lengthy strip didn’t leave by choice.

You might be tempted to think it was the government-imposed 100% — i.e. double — tax increase (with more planned), that drove so many businesses either out of the area or into bankruptcy but “think tanks” like the C.D. Howe Institute beg to differ; Toronto has very “competitive” property tax rates, they say, it’s just that they’re difficult to estimate because of complexity, obscurity, and lack of transparency.

You may think that taxing property “owners” twice — i.e. double — for simply living on a piece of land throughout the city would be similarly problematic but the eminent Ryerson University along with some councilors believe that the city could easily squeeze another 20% from taxpayers who have the audacity to live in a home that they “own”.

Bloody “free” market strikes again!

362 Yonge Street

476 Yonge Street

85 Yonge Street

https://goo.gl/maps/noHQEF8BUPU2

…the wide open boulevards of our fair city this pleasant afternoon with my girl.

… Continue Reading

I received a funny email this morning:

Hi,
There is an Internet Webpage that has my address showing right under the Webpage. Could you please remove my address from seemingly being associated with the wall collapsing as I want to put my property up for sale.

My address is XXXXXXXXXXXX

I guess the cache has to have the content removed according to Google, and then the Google crawler can delete it from the Internet. If you Google my address, you’ll be able to more clearly see what I mean. I do thank you and appreciate it if you could do this.
Please email me back.
Sincerely,
S

What S is referring to is an old post on AllVoices that shows the wall collapse above the old Salad King location on Yonge and Gould; entirely unrelated to her address except that AllVoices, at some point in the past, included a “related” video that mentioned her address at the bottom of the page (along with numerous other links which, I guess, are now tainted).

I replied:

Hello S,

The cached page you sent me below has the address mentioned in a completely separate video link (“Video Source: xml. truveo.com”) – which is neither edited, controlled nor maintained by me (nor does it even appear below my post any longer – have a look at the non-cached version). I suggest you contact Google and AllVoices with this issue and inquire why these two pieces of information are being conflated in the search results; if it’s happening here, chances are very good you’ll see it again with some other random post.

My photos make no mention of your address either directly or indirectly  and I furthermore have no control over Google’s cached pages or how AllVoices chooses to combine what they deem to be related content on their pages. And, to be quite blunt, I’m not in the habit of removing things just because some third-party site may incidentally decide to include them alongside something else that may affect your resale. To put it into perspective, my name appears in the search results along with a millinery and a high school in Thunder Bay — should I ask them to remove their sites because they might be misleading when I go looking for a job? After all, I don’t live in Thunder Bay and I’ve never made a hat in my life, yet these appear right next to my name in Google’s search results.

Should potential buyers express reservations based on the link you sent me, feel free to refer them to http://www.google.ca/search?q=interwebs+for+n00bs

Best of luck,
Patrick