Obligatory waterfront post

[sabotabby]

Have you missed my Honourable Wife-Beating, Drunk-Driving Mayor posts?

This one's actually about Brother Doug (thank you, Toronto Star, both for your commendable journalism as of late and also for nicknaming the buffoons on City Council so that I don't have to), and his waterfront plan. It's...interesting.

For those of you who don't live in Toronto, we do have a waterfront. It sucks a lot compared to other cities with waterfronts. There's all kinds of urban myths about why it sucks, my favourite being that there was a fear back in the day that Fenians would invade from the other side of the lake, and thus the city had to be built away from the water, unlike practically every other city anywhere.

So there is all this land, and the questions of development and waterfront accessibility have always been a big deal. There has, for years, been a pretty good plan to develop it, and the environmental assessment has been done, so everyone just assumed it would happen eventually.

But despite years of planning and consultation, Doug Ford thinks he can do one better. His plan is not to build a waterfront for Torontonians to enjoy, but a tourist destination for people with no taste.

The most mock-worthy features? A shopping mall, a hotel, a GIANT FERRIS WHEEL, and a monorail.

Here's a map of the planned monstrosity:



For comparison, Waterfront Toronto's page, including community housing, and one of the original plans*:



The glaring difference to me is that Doug Ford doesn't understand what a city is or the sorts of people who live in it. I think he sees it as an extension of suburbia, instead of viewing suburbia as a tumour on cities. There are malls in Toronto, of course, and many people like to shop at them, but I don't think a single person who actually lives here feels that what the city is lacking is more malls. Especially not when there are local, independent businesses that we can support. People in the suburbs go to malls all the time because there's nothing else to do. People in the city have a plethora of entertainment opportunities. Malls are private space, though in suburban areas, they serve as a substitute public space because there's nowhere else for young people to congregate.

The Waterfront Toronto plan has urban residents, not tourists, in mind. People who live downtown do so because we want to live in a community, not a commuter town. We ride bikes and take transit (transit that goes somewhere, not transit-as-entertainment), we prefer mixed-use neighbourhoods, we crave green space, not strip malls. We are pretty much fine with the amount of sports crap in the city and don't need more stadiums. We all kind of just laughed at the Ferris wheel thing.

Not to mention the cost. The initial environmental assessment cost $19 million. If Dougie changes the plan now, that money is wasted and we're going to have to spend even more money. Because the Ford Bros are all about respect for the taxpayer, don't ya know? Why is it that supposed conservative austerity measures always seem to end up costing more money?

But, of course, this isn't about money. This is all about a grudge that the Fords and their suburban base hold against a perceived snobby urban elite, with our effete ways and our sushi and champagne, and conversely, a perceived dangerous mob of the poor, immigrants, and other undesirables. It's about building a playground for the 905, rubbing a bloody monorail in our faces while Scarborough and Don Mills go without desperately needed light-rail transit. It's about building a culture of atomization and isolation, a policy of physical, literal divide-and-conquer.

On the plus side, I do think Toronto has woken up from its moment of madness, and even the people who voted for the Honourable Wife-Beater think this is stupid. We're pretty much due for a left-wing swing of the pendulum (the latest provincial election polls look promising, with Hudak's support slipping) and I have substantial faith in the community-based resistance that's emerging. Also, Mammoliti is headed for a nervous breakdown. We saw the first cracks in the Ford Bloc this summer during Pride, when even his loyalists agreed that he was being a moron, and this plan is likely to drive another wedge in the Wacko Consensus.

Incidentally, Mexico City, located in a Third World country with a corrupt government, managed to build 16 new metro stations in two years. Necessity is a powerful motivator.

* If anyone can find a more detailed one, please let me know. I'm quite sure it exists but I can't find it.

Comments

[curgoth]

"For the downtown core, really there's only one place to shop right now, and that's the Eaton Centre. And studies show that we need more opportunities to get out there and shop and start stirring the economy. Don't tell my wife that, and my four girls, because they shop enough, Matt."

Oh, women - they love to shop amirite!?!?

But as everyone knows, you can only shop at a place with a parking lot so's you can park yer SUV. Therefore, no shopping occurs anywhere in Toronto except the Eaton Centre.

[sabotabby]

Yeah. No one ever goes to the Eaton Centre. I mean, yeah, you would have to take transit to get there, or bike or walk. That's clearly why it's empty all the time.

[misslynx.livejournal.com]

I think what he was actually saying was that no one shops anywhere downtown except the Eaton Centre, because it is the only mall there, and you cannot shop anywhere that is not a mall. (Also, the Eaton Centre does have a big indoor parking garage, so suburbanites can park there. Which is probably another reason why they think it is the only place it is possible to shop.)

[lokilokust.livejournal.com]

i recall walking through it a few times, but never to actually stop anywhere inside it.

[sabotabby]

You're not missing anything.

[sabotabby]

LOLS

He does know we have winter, right? Ferris wheel season is kind of short here.

[lienne.livejournal.com]

hserdtrseadsfdghfffffffffff I hate these cockmonkeys so much.

[sabotabby]

Cockmonkeys is exactly the right word.

[lienne.livejournal.com]

also ass-deserts

[poetic-pixie-13.livejournal.com]

Dear Ford and Ford,

Stop.

No love,
A socialist queer feminist immigrant

[sabotabby]

I want them to go away. Forever. Like they can build a new mall in the 905 and stick the Fords in the cement foundation.

[chickenfeet2003.livejournal.com]

The good news is that it's taken twenty years of jurisdictional wrangling to get to the point where, this year, at last, we have access to the waterfront east of Yonge and ground has been broken east of Cherry Street. At the pace waterfront projects roceed the Fords would need to get re-elected several times before there would be any chance of their idiotic scheme being built.

[twiin.livejournal.com]

Isn't the bad news that now that the wrangling has been done, anyone can screw it up?

[chickenfeet2003.livejournal.com]

The wrangling has hardly started for the area south of the Shipping Channel which is what Doug is after.

[sabotabby]

We are so screwed.

[twiin.livejournal.com]

Monorails: Finally, public transit good enough for rich white people.

[sabotabby]

Transit is fine if it's just like a ride. Transit that gets poor people places is bad.

[misslynx.livejournal.com]

My first thought on seeing the map was actually that it wasn't quite as bad as I'd thought - yes, the mall, ferris wheel and monorail are insanely stupid ideas, but I was surprised that they'd kept the naturalization of the Don, and at least some housing... Doesn't redeem the more idiotic features of the plan, but at least it's something, I guess.

On the cost thing, from what I've read, they somehow expect that the private sector is going to pay for absolutely everything so it won't cost the city a cent. I think we can all guess what the odds of that actually happening are, in the midst of a recession...

But really, I doubt the plan was drafted with the intent of it ever actually being implemented. I think this is another bait-and-switch like the new subways and physically-separated bike lanes. Scrap a necessary, sensible, already-partially-paid-for project that the previous administration had begun in favour of some grandiose, ridiculously expensive plan (at the same time as cutting revenue), allowing the promised new plan to distract attention of the scrapping of the old one - then wait a bit, maybe hire some more consultants, and eventually say "Oops, sorry, the economy's worse than we thought, guess we can't afford it after all! Or at least not yet. Maybe if you re-elect me..." While of course blaming the lack of money on the previous administration's spending rather than the current one's revenue-cutting. It's just a sleazy way to scrap community projects and services while pissing people off less than if they'd just come right out and said "OK, no more bike lanes, no more transit improvements, and no waterfront revitalization."

[sabotabby]

I think you're right. I mean, that seems to be what happened with the subway. It's not even particularly subtle.

[fengi.livejournal.com]

I just imagine John Ford's brother singing "MONORAIL MONORAIL!"

The second plan it appears to involve a lot of green space. Wouldn't a budget conscious mayor want to go with the cheapest plan involving the least construction, i.e. a park?

Ah, I forgot limited spending doesn't count when there's land to be developed and sold off to someone.

[lokilokust.livejournal.com]

yes.

[sabotabby]

The far-right only pretends to care about budget. They actually are acutely malicious.

[terry-terrible.livejournal.com]

I'm actually kinda surprised about the Monorail. I mean, it could potentially transport a poor person somewhere, thereby aiding them in some fashion. I'm sure the possibility of that would give Ford fits.

Maybe his sociopathy operates on some kind of ratio fashion, if he helps a 100 rich people as supposed to not fucking over one poor person then he can justify it through the numbers?

[sabotabby]

I think that must be it.

[misslynx.livejournal.com]

Well, there's always the option of making it so expensive that only tourists use it, not actual city residents who need to get somewhere...

[cannibal-x.livejournal.com]

They probably aren't planning a mall because they have bad taste, they're probably planning one so some businesspeople in their circle can get rich. That's usually why right-wing governments do things, isn't it?

[sabotabby]

But aren't mall stores mostly franchises? Though I guess there's the construction contracts. That's probably it.

[cannibal-x.livejournal.com]

I don't really know how malls work either, but I gather that the franchise owners you encounter at the ground level are not the bigshots in this domain... nor the kind of people who would get invited to a conservative luncheon, I expect..

[pofflewomp.livejournal.com]

Sounds like our South Bank, which I can't stand. It has a ferris wheel (not been on it as scared of heights), but no shopping mall. It has lots of 1950s huge concrete grey buildings housing the National Theatre, National Film Theatre, concert halls and stuff. And miles of concrete walkway with occasional overpriced pubs, some local London government buildings and a battleship, tourist boat trips and some very nice bridges and oh the Tate Modern, which I don't like either. But then the London waterfront goes on for many miles as it is a river going all the way to the far away sea and has palaces and a castle and stuff too.

Shopping mall UGH. At least ours has social housing co-operatives in and around listed buildings and poncey restaurants.

[sabotabby]

That still sounds a gazillion times better than what's being planned here. I mean, theatre and concerts are good! We could probably use a few more venues.