Putting Parks First
A River Runs Through Crawford
Drake You Ho This Is All Your Fault
Fringe 2009: First Class Baggage
Hello, Gooby
Masthead
Editors-in-Chief Associate Editor Contributing Editors Karen Aagaard |
Copy Editors Jennifer Alexopoulos Urban Planners Alison Horn |
Contributors | |
Todd Aalgaard |
Nick Kozak
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Editors-in-Chief
David Topping |
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Called a "gadfly" by the Globe and compared to Don Quixote by the Post, David Topping probably falls somewhere between relentless nuisance and hopeless idealist. Born in the quiet west end and transplanted downtown to attend the University of Toronto, he has had ample time to develop a lot of love, a bit of hate, and several lifetimes worth of ambivalence for his city. He is probably most famous for taking photos of TTC stations, which he hopes isn't still the case by the time he dies. |
Marc Lostracco |
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Blown into Toronto from smalltown Ontario, Marc is more tolerant of the smells emanating from a horse than those arising from a city sewer. Still, he loves this city like a fat kid loves cake, except less so in the winter. Marc left Torontoist in 2008 to concentrate on adopting a kid (it happened) but got sucked back in à la Al Pacino in Godfather III, despite the discovery that parenthood totally screws up one's priorities. When he’s not blogging, he’s working on hippie stuff like film, TV, design, and photography. |
Associate Editors
Hamutal Dotan |
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Hamutal is a recovering grad student currently living in the west end. After a stint studying with rabbis in Jerusalem (brief, apocalyptic) and another studying with philosophers in Pittsburgh (protracted, angst-y), she has returned to her hometown to see what life outside the ivory tower might hold. Hamutal is equally compelled to write about architecture, farmers' markets, and city council meetings, which makes her either a Renaissance woman or a dilettante, depending on your point of view. Tutorials on the pronunciation of her name are gladly provided upon request. |
Contributing Editors
Karen Aagaard |
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Karen Aagaard has a wild imagination. Case in point: when she was four years old, she mistook her sister for a Glo Worm. (Karen’s mother spotted her squeezing her sister, saying, “Glow! Glow?”) After spending the majority of her adolescent life in the 905 (she attended the Toronto Waldorf School in Thornhill), Karen moved to Halifax to study journalism and philosophy at the University of King’s College. When she returned to Ontario, Karen worked as an Associate Editor at Post City Magazines. Karen is currently indulging her wild imagination (and working on an MA) in the Graduate Program in Communication and Culture at Ryerson and York. |
Jamie Bradburn |
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Jamie Bradburn was born in the deep southwest of Ontario, moving to Toronto just before the turn of the century (though he forgets if it was 1899 or 1999). He figures exploring the city and its past is a way to know his surroundings better and justify his history minor in university. He has also discovered his camera has fused itself to his hand, which is great for snapping pictures but lousy for most physical tasks. Online, you'll find Jamie hanging out at JB's Warehouse and Curio Emporium and his Flickr. |
Val Dodge |
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Val is a lifelong east ender who has believed since the age of ten that the west end begins at Yonge St. He started talking to strangers at the same age and discovered that it was the best way to learn about Toronto. Val's habit of wandering aimlessly throughout the city allows him to spend a lot of time looking up at his surroundings, to the constant annoyance of the people he bumps into and curbs he trips over. The most important lesson he's learned in life is that it doesn't hurt to ask. |
Jerad Gallinger |
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Jerad Gallinger was born in Alberta, raised in Nova Scotia, and currently lives and writes in the west end. After studying philosophy at Dalhousie University in Halifax, he travelled the Maritimes as a recruiter for his alma mater before spending a year teaching English in the substantially warmer clime of Yokohama, Japan. A news junkie and policy wonk since his high school days, his passion for Parliament most recently manifested itself in the form of a year-long stint as a speechwriter and legislative adviser to a Toronto-area MP. When he's not covering politics for Torontoist, Jerad spends an inordinate amount of time pontificating at j-rad.ca. |
Jonathan Goldsbie |
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Jonathan was born in Toronto. So were both of his parents and all four of his grandparents, which is very unusual for someone who is not Protestant or even Christian at all (he's Jewish). His passion for all things Toronto—something which drives his younger brother crazy—manifests itself in the fact that his entire life is dedicated to organizations with "Toronto" in their names: he is a campaign coordinator with the Toronto Public Space Committee; a student at the University of Toronto; a daily rider of the Toronto Transit Commission; a flâneur with the Toronto Psychogeography Society; and now he also writes for Torontoist. |
Mathew Kumar |
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Mathew Kumar wasn't born and raised in Toronto…he wasn't even born and raised in Canada. Which means he's probably going to get kicked out of the country at some point, or something. So why on earth should you trust this perhaps-illegal immigrant with your favorite Toronto blog's weekly film news? Well, because unlike all the others, he didn't come to Toronto to steal your job, instead choosing to spend his time sitting around his apartment in his bathrobe, freelancing for publications such as Eurogamer, Twitch Film, and Plan B magazine. |
Sarah Nicole Prickett |
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Sarah (Nicole) Prickett (middle name optional) has survived evangelical Christianity, emocore, the University of Western Ontario, a blonde phase, and two decades of not living in Toronto. She has a cat named Franny, an ever-expanding vintage belt collection (the collection; not, thankfully, the belts), and a blog of her own. She also has lots of friends and doesn't write on the internet to make new ones. |
Miles Storey |
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Miles is a professional web developer—or "designer" if he's in hip company. A Brit by birth, Miles grew up on a small island in the middle of the Indian Ocean and thus doesn't get any TV references from the 70s. With the tropics in his blood Miles has never been one for settling down. He is a seasoned traveller who has lived in various parts of the world in the last thirty-something years before finding a relative stability in Toronto. As well as photography Miles also enjoys books, films and the music of Tom Waits. Miles's favourite thing about Toronto is the streetcars, I mean, it's like a train but on the street, how frickin' cool is that? |
Copy Editors
Jennifer Alexopoulos |
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An incurable insomniac, Jennifer often passes the wee hours writing complaint letters about poor grammar to governmental bodies, organizations, and unsuspecting bloggers. As a result, she's convinced she's been barred from visiting a long list of public and private spaces. When not trying to rid the world of errant apostrophes, Jennifer is an adventure sports enthusiast and traveller. While she can ramble at length about many sketchy adventures, her biggest advice to others is never to jump on the back of an ostrich. Jennifer can often be found running trails around the city with other people's dogs. She tries not to lose them. |
Meg Campbell |
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Meg was born in Oakville, spent her formative years in Calgary, went back to Oakville for high school, and escaped to Toronto as soon as she started studying art at U of T. And after spending a frightful number of years in or near the Annex, she can tell you what it means to know too much about a neighbourhood. Meg now writes and edits things for a living and also sifts through some (very) short story submissions and posts them here. She's also into local infrastructure, local politics, local arts and media, and very local wildlife (her cat, Gustav). She has an unhealthy grammar and punctuation obsession—hence, the copy editing. Psst: her real name is Meagan, but no one really uses that, unless they are her employer...or her mom. |
Staff
Todd Aalgaard |
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Todd Aalgaard is an Islander of B.C. extraction, but threw a dart at the map in 1999 and ended up in Toronto. After studying anthropology at York University, he became a writer, musician, freelance journalist, web-ordained minister, and that guy who's not around enough but will totally buy you a drink once he gets paid. Having appeared in places like MONDOmagazine and Momentum, Todd's friends and family best describe him as "tall." Get him drunk enough and he'll probably write a song about you. |
Roxanne Bielskis |
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Roxanne grew up in Jane-Finch, which is really all she's got for street cred. She writes and draws Povertyville for Torontoist, Poverty High for Shameless Magazine, and occasionally puts together whole books of her comics that she calls...Poverty. In her real life, she teaches high school. I know, weird, eh? Other things that ruin her street cred: she cries whenever she sees a cute baby and always says "please" and "thank-you" to her cat. |
Christopher Bird |
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The Explosively Talented Christopher Bird (or the ETCB to his family and friends) has worked in no particular order as a filmmaker, waiter, administrative assistant, script doctor, freelance writer, freelance character assassin, web monkey, teaching assistant and hobo who dances for quarters. He is now a student at Osgoode Hall Law School, so Shakespeare wants you to kill him first. Everything he writes that The Man won't allow you to read on Torontoist can be found at mightygodking.com. |
Kasandra Bracken |
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Some summers ago, Kasandra left a big house in the world's largest hamlet and relocated to an apartment one block away from the busiest pedestrian square in Canada. She made the move for the best journalism program in the nation, yet was wary of the scary city, petrified of nearly three million potential pickpockets. Thus far unscathed (no jinx intended), Kasandra has come to terms with her clichéd "falling in love with the city", and when she's not writing (about the aformentioned city), she likes taking part in the art of Lomography, working towards her master's in Wikipedia, and listening to as much Beach Boys as possible. |
Ashley Carter |
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Ashley is a film school dropout turned journalism grad with fine words in fine places like Exclaim! magazine, TO411, and the bathroom wall at your parents' house. Sometimes she rips your ticket at the not-for-profit Revue Cinema and one time she defeated Bowser and saved the Princess. You don't know her, but she knows you. And she's not overly impressed. Jokes! She actually thinks you are pretty alright. That's the dichotomy of Ashley Carter: initial skepticism followed by warm tolerance. |
Michael Chrisman |
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Michael is a born explorer. He spends his time delving into places most people don't know exist or at least prefer to pretend they don't exist. Alleyways, industrial brownfields, vast parking lots; the modern landscape. Michael's interest in the not-so-fine line where the natural environment and the man-made environment meet has influenced his professional work greatly. He splits his time between environmental design and photography to the detriment (and sometimes benefit) of both. Born on the west coast of the United States and raised in Toronto's suburbs, Michael is grateful to have called Toronto home for the past eight years. |
Amanda Factor |
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Amanda Factor has never lived anywhere besides Toronto and isn't gonna. Got that?! She works as a closed captioning editor, which means she gets paid to add sound effect descriptions to the fight scenes in Walker, Texas Ranger. She considers herself painfully uncool because she is constantly "discovering" "new" bands that have been cool for like a year (Have you heard of Vampire Weekend? They're awesome!) In addition to writing for Torontoist, Amanda loves throwing vegan dinner parties (play your cards right and maybe you'll get invited to one). Oh, yeah, and she will out-Simpsons quote you, right here, right now. |
David Fleischer |
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If you google "David Fleischer" you should know that: first, he is not a Brazilian economics expert; and second, he does not write for The Advocate (not that there's anything wrong
with that!). A native North Yorker, he has written for the National Post and Post City Magazines (no relation) and is a co-founding editor of Afterword, Canada's national Jewish student newspaper. Really. David writes stories no one has published and once wrote songs and played guitar in a band called Urban Cactus. It featured several people who are now sufficiently successful that it would be pathetic to so much as drop their names. |
Alex Nino Gheciu |
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Alex can most often be found slumming it in Rexdale, where he bathes publicly and competes in tiddlywinks tournaments for grocery money. He has attained degrees in Professional Writing and Political Science from York University, which means he can maneuver a fork with exquisite finesse. In his spare time, when he’s not auditioning for the next season of From G’s to Gents, he’s usually slamming your favourite band in Eye Weekly. If you ever feel deeply insulted by one of his reviews, he is prepared to make amends by throwing a sorbet party in your honour. Otherwise, if you want beef, he’s got plenty. |
Kaori Furue |
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Kaori is basically a white girl due to having grown up in Cole Harbour, Nova Scotia. She sadly never became fluent in Japanese and thus cannot properly pronounce her own name, which is utterly unique according to Google. She writes technical documentation and tests software for a living, but spends the rest of her time eating and writing about what she ate. Her adventures big and small (mostly small and mostly about food) can be found at her unfortunately named blog: I can’t believe I’m back in Toronto. |
Amanda Happé |
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Amanda grew up around, but not in, Toronto, and now can't imagine calling anywhere else home. She is a communication designer by day, but not by night. Before joining a design studio, Amanda worked in the arts, with a background in contemporary gallery practices and the curation of historical museum collections. She studied art at university, specializing in painting and printmaking, and maintains a painting and photography practice. An accidental writer, Amanda spends the majority of her time walking to her destinations, taking photos, and making images. |
Stephen Johns |
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Stephen Johns is a proud Northwestern Ontarian who nonetheless spent his childhood wishing he could live in Toronto. It took him twenty-four years (not to mention a five-year layover at Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario) before his wish finally came true; three years later and he's now an erstwhile Torontonian who's scratching together a meager existence in Calgary, Alberta while plotting his eventual return. Steve cares far too much about the fortunes of the Toronto Maple Leafs, the Toronto Blue Jays, the Minnesota Vikings and Manchester United for his own good; the rest of his life is generally devoted to reading, going to musical theatre and worshipping at the altars of the Who, Bruce Springsteen and Pearl Jam. He's currently trying to figure out to incorporate his myriad interests into a lucrative career with minimal hours. |
Tim Kiladze |
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Tim Kiladze is a graduate of McGill University and he lives a life at the extremes. Despite growing up in Mississauga, he has always been fascinated by urban areas and he is completely obsessed with pop culture. He loves Ralph Lauren, reality TV, and reply-all e-mails, and very few things hit him in his heart like a soulful, sped up 70s sample. |
Nick Kozak |
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Nick Kozak is a Polak, but he was born in the Middle East in the fine country of Kuwait. At six months of age his parents drove with him west through warring states in a Volkswagen minibus, but would not settle in France—no, these migrating bohemians chose Toronto. A year never went by without leaving the country on some trip and, since graduating from U of T in 2005, Nick has pretty much spent all of his time abroad travelling, working, and studying. With a completed MA in Photography in China, he has returned to Toronto, and thinks that his travel experience should allow him to connect with the multiculturalism of this town. Hopping from one 416 (or 905) area to another to photograph will be a lot cheaper, too. |
Tony Makepeace |
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Tony Makepeace (panoramaist) was born in Montreal and experiments with photographic processes, from 19th century to current. He is currently on the faculty of the Visual and Creative Arts program at Sheridan Institute. Feel free to contact him with your questions regarding optics, chromatic aberration, and toning formulas. He will also take questions of a general nature. |
Stephen Michalowicz |
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Stephen was born in Toronto and raised in the suburban utopia of Etobicoke. After studying history and political science at the University of Toronto, he went on to complete his Master’s in American history at the University of Western Ontario. When he’s not napping, listening to political podcasts, or sorting through historical documents, he can often be found composing bizarre articles for his blog. |
Kevin Plummer |
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Kevin Plummer grew up in Saskatchewan then bumped around Canada with stints living on the west coast and the east coast, before finally arriving here in the middle. Now, whenever he needs escape from the clichéd existence of a cubicle worker, he stumbles out to wander the city he loves. He’s got a very diverse set of interests from urban affairs and history to classic film noir to obscure soul music, and finding new ways to procrastinate. |
Posterchild |
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Posterchild is a Street Artist, now living in Toronto. He creates public installations (or "Street Art" pieces) that are both playful and political in order to engage with his environment and those who share it with him. You can see his work at Blade Diary.com. |
Robin Rix |
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Born and raised in Toronto (thanks, Mom and Dad!), Robin now lives in Bonn, Germany. A graduate of the University of Toronto and the University of Oxford, he works in climate change and emissions trading policy. Interests include politics, travel, maps, and the Beatles (and he has duly made a pilgrimage to Liverpool). Robin has contributed a chapter to Notes from Canada's Young Activists: A Generation Stands Up for Change, wrote Canada25's annual policy report, Canadians & the Common Good: Building a Civic Nation through Civic Engagement, and is a previous national winner of Magna's annual "As Prime Minister..." essay competition. |
Nicole Villeneuve |
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Nicole is a transplanted Haligonian who actually became less skeptical of this great city by reading Torontoist, so she's really glad they let her join staff. She is a full-time employee and a part-time student and writer who always forgets to get her hair cut, but doesn't forget much else. Her sense of humour probably most resembles your dad's. |
Johnnie Walker |
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Johnnie Walker is a playwright and actor who lives in Little Italy. He spends his time producing his own plays with the theatre company he founded, reviewing other people's for this very blog, and having his bicycle stolen. He has lived in Toronto his entire life and likes absolutely everything about it. Except for all the bike theft. And yes, that is his real name. |
Urban Planners
Robin Hatch |
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Robin Hatch had a rough childhood, often receiving prank calls from peers asking her if Sheryl CROW was there, ROBIN? Or, was BATMAN there, ROBIN? Or, had she HATCHed any ROBINs lately? All, of course, followed by hysterical laughter and the *click* of a phone receiver. Since that time in her life, Robin feels she has grown considerably. These days, Robin can safely say she has comeback puns when people ask her if she's been ROBIN [sic] any banks lately. Or, if the car she owns is a HATCHback? Yeah, real funny, idiots. Robin is a member of Sports: The Band. Robin shamelessly adores Twitter. Robin loves the internet! Robin is an English specialist at the University of Toronto. |
Vicky Peters |
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Writer, photographer and unemployed film industry veteran Vicky Peters returned last year from a self-imposed "wet coast" exile that never managed to shake her Toronto roots. She joined the staff at Torontoist after pondering the idea of city-as-muse and coming to the conclusion that Toronto may be hers. That home-town inspiration might also explain the two recent novels set here—one in the past, one in the future—and a semi-fictional tome (in development) that stretches back fifteen generations on this part of the continent. So far, her novel-writing's on the down-low, but she hopes to change that. On the other hand, when Torontoist was voted the city's favourite blog in the NOW readers' poll last year, she had a bit of a Johnny Fever moment—believing up to that point that no one was actually reading her posts. |
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