news
Newsstand: July 7, 2011
Thursday, Thursday, you’re so good to us. In the news: Toronto property prices are super high, TTC Chair defines her transit belief system, the Pan Am Games are coming but no one seems to care yet, Ford on football, and a small story about cycling infrastructure.
If you’re like us—witty, urbane, live in Toronto, say ab-zurd instead of ab-surd—then your prospects for owning property in this city are as plausible as your dreams of running the United Nations one day, when you grow up. It’s nice to think about sometimes, but you know you’ll probably just go on toiling away at your okay job, telling yourself stories in order to live, and watching rent cheque after rent cheque flutter out the window, the returns of that investment amounting to nothing more than freedom from your mom’s nagging, a leaky kitchen sink, and an ugly yard that you don’t do anything about because—hey!—you’re just renting. And you’ll probably keep on renting until your rich grandpa finally dies because the cost of homeownership in Toronto is bananas, with the average home price crossing the half-million dollar mark in June.
Current TTC chair Karen Stintz is firing back after former TTC chief David Gunn had some not so nice things to say about the current state of the transit system. Stintz brushed aside Gunn’s evaluations of the system, by zanily saying his comments “reflect where his belief system is.” Apparently Gunn does not believe in the almighty power of automated card payment or factoring in regional transportation possibilities.
Think back to four years ago. Do that, please, or this won’t work. Okay, you’re thinking about it, the apartment you were in, the job you had, the bar you always went to, the person you were engaging in relations with. It doesn’t seem like four whole years ago, does it? No, because time is a monster that flies faster than our minds, or something. Anyway, the point is Toronto is hosting the Pan Am games in just four years time, and we haven’t broken ground on any of the major construction projects. There’s only one request for proposal out now, the one for the athlete’s village. As this year’s games in Mexico enter the last 100-day stretch and organizers scramble to finish construction, Toronto organizers sit back and relax. Let’s hope that you, you Pan Am games organizers, you, don’t get got by the mind monster of time.
Another member of the family Ford is taking over something with the word “Toronto” in it. Krista Ford, daughter of Councillor Doug Ford (Ward 2, Etobicoke North) and niece of the mayor, was named captain of the Toronto Triumph lingerie football team. Okay.
And the City made another incremental move toward replacing the worn-out bike lanes on College. Rejoice!