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Newsstand: May 19, 2011
Illustration by Sasha Plotnikova/Torontoist.
It’s Thursday, nerds! In this edition of newsstand: TDSB gets creative to fix busted school roofs, the fate of the Fort York bridge, our solution for cumbersome patio bylaws, convicted pot smoker has a good idea that you don’t have to be high to agree with, and a really big head.
The Toronto District School Board has found a way to get to work on long backlog of repairs despite their thinly stretched budget: send the kids to school in power plants. Gotcha! They’re not actually sending the kids off to Darlington or anything. The Board voted to turn existing schools into mini green energy production hubs by renting out almost every school’s roof to a solar energy company. In the process of installing a bunch of solar panels to harness the power of the sun, the energy company will repair the school’s badly damaged roofs. And then, as if that wasn’t nice enough, the company will share a portion of the profits generated from the sale of the energy—predicted to be enough to power 6,000 homes—with the TDSB. Swell guys, those green energy folks.
Now compare that bit of long-sighted creative infrastructure planning that benefits the city and its residents for decades to come to this next tale.
Despite the valiant efforts of Mike Layton (Ward 19, Trinity-Spadina), the Fort York bridge is being put on hold, potentially ending the project entirely. As you may have guessed, we’re kind of pissed about it.
As sun-seeking Torontonians crack open beers on patios this season, so too cracked open are mild irritations about patio operating hour bylaws by restaurant owners. The city-wide bylaw states patios need to close at 11 p.m., but bars and restos can get special permission from community council to stay open later (or get shut down entirely, like the Labyrinth Lounge patio). But the variance in patio operating times across the city is causing a bit of jealousy amongst businesses. Oh well, as we always say, if a patio closes at 11 p.m., just crack open a can of Old Milwaukee and sit on a curb. We always say that.
In what comes off as a reasonable and surprisingly cogent proposal, a man barred from smoking pot under house arrest who knows he’s totally gonna smoke pot anyway is asking to skip all the nonsense and go straight to jail. Shahrooz Kharaghani, one of the leaders of the pot-worshipping Assembly of the Church of the Universe, was convicted on drug trafficking charges. Of course.
And nothing says Thursday like a a giant photo of Josh Matlow’s (Ward 22, St. Paul’s) head and a kind of story about the future of ball hockey on city streets.