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Reconnecting with the Waterfront: Bentway Design Competition Winners
Two major intersections on Lake Shore Boulevard under the Gardiner Expressway will be looking quite different very soon, as the Bentway’s Waterfront ReConnect design competition has recently announced...
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LORINC: NIMBYs vs Garden Suites, Season 2
Here’s an odd little mystery about a freshly filed appeal by a residents association coalition of council’s new “garden suites” bylaw, which was approved by council in February. Last week, a group of...
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36 Questions that Lead to Loving TO
What do you love most about Toronto? Which places in the city would you like to share? A new exhibit in downtown Toronto, 36 Questions that Lead to Loving TO, invites you to give your answers to...
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From Sunlight Park to East Harbour, Part 2 of 2
This second part of my feature on Lever Brothers soap and detergent manufacturing in the lower Don Valley will examine the eight-decade history of Plant No. 1, known as the Sunlight Soap Works within...
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LORINC: Holding an easily re-electable Mayor John Tory accountable
Elections matter, as the old rule of thumb goes, but maybe some matter less than others? It certainly seems, at this point, that Toronto’s 2022 mayoral race will be a going-through-the-motions kind of...
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Book Review: The Women Who Changed Architecture
Foreword by Beverly Willis, Introduction by Amale Andraos, Edited by Jan Cigliano Hartman, Princeton Architectural Press, 2022 The Women Who Changed Architecture establishes a comprehensive and...
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Why we must stop the ‘urbicide’— the killing of cities
The 21st century was supposed to be the “century of the city.” As of 2007, 50% of the world’s population lives in cities, and the United Nations has estimated that by 2050, that figure will rise to...
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Finding the Missing Middle in Unexpected Places: Cornwall, Ontario’s...
Urbanist discourse of recent years has commonly turned to reviving the Missing Middle as one means of remedying the skyrocketing cost of housing in Canada and beyond. The Missing Middle refers to...
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LORINC: Unspooling the rhetoric about ‘red tape’ and urban planning
There are few things more certain about political rhetoric than the appearance of conservative shibboleths about “red tape” come election time. So it’s not surprising that Doug Ford’s Tories, fixated...
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PODCAST: Spacing Radio 065, Cities for Youth
Urban designers and placemakers often struggle to create cities that work for everyone, including youth. But the youth themselves are often left out of planning and engagement, or aren’t being invited...
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From Seeds to Saplings: New outreach to help promote growth of native trees
It started as an ordinary walk through a downtown ravine. Five years later, we are running around the city, doling out thousands of acorns to schools through “Seeds to Saplings,” an outreach program of...
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OP-ED: Ontario Housing Affordability Task Force pushes for private sector...
Written on behalf of The Architecture Lobby Toronto/Tkaronto (TAL-TO). TAL-TO is a volunteer-run collective working to improve the current state of architectural advocacy in Canada by promoting...
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LORINC: The horrible lies of Pierre Poilievre’s real estate lessons
Why do we have a housing crisis? Let me count the ways: Low interest rates, restrictive zoning, permissive zoning, contractor shortages, building material costs, over-reliance on markets,...
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OP-ED: Look to co-op housing to address Canada’s affordability crisis
The cost of housing doesn’t have to be exorbitant, but it will stay that way as long as the government continues to stimulate the private market rather than creating alternatives to it. Policies...
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LORINC: Doug Ford’s electrification plan is actually a gas-powered climate...
It being election season (and Earth Day), the Ontario government news releases are arriving a dime a dozen right now, and many seem to feature the electrification of mobility, a future that’s...
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REID: Shadows and light – a longstanding debate
It’s an argument, it turns out, that has been going on for centuries. When new tall or mid-rise buildings are discussed, one of the issues that always seems to come up is the degree to which they will...
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LORINC: The back-channel lobbying of residents’ associations
Should residents’ associations be required to register as lobbyists? This loaded question, as it turns out, was canvassed, sort of, by council about six years ago, when the city was pondering changes...
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The Power of Place: Artists as City Builders
Art by Okuda. Produced by StreetARToronto in Partnership with The STEPS Initiative. Welcome to The Power of Place: Artists as City Builders. This series emerged out of my strong interest to share with...
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The Power of Place: Artists as City Builders
Welcome to The Power of Place: Artists as City Builders. This series emerged out of my strong interest to share with you the incredible work that is happening across the city by artists supported by...
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NEW ISSUE: Rain
I’ll place a bet that you cursed rain sometime this season. Spring is rainy, but it’s not yet warm enough for the rain to be a relief from drought or heat. Instead, it’s wet and grey and still a bit...
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