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Newsstand: May 25, 2015
Monday: it's back again. Today, vendors at St. Lawrence Market have a temporary stay of eviction, TTC services will be expanded in September, and swatting is a bad prank to pull.
A controversial decision to evict outdoor and indoor north building vendors at St. Lawrence Market has been delayed a second time: all vendors will now be allowed to stay in place until after the Pan Am and Parapan Am Games conclude in mid-August. However, after that time, the six indoor vendors will have to vacate their spaces; those selling outside will be allowed to stay until October 11. Vendors are being evicted to allow for the market’s north building to be abolished, although there’s controversy over the way in which the eviction has been handled. Some vendors believe it has less to do with the demolition, as there’s a temporary vendor space that will apparently have more than enough room, than it does with what one vendor suspects will be a revamping of the larger south building.
In September, the TTC will restore much of the bus service cut by the Ford administration, as well as add some new service, with the intention of ensuring 99 per cent of Toronto residents are within a 15-minute walk of at least one all-night bus. Both all-night and off-peak-hour services will be extended (or, put another way, the cuts to those services will be reversed). According to Mayor John Tory, the overnight bus service in Toronto provides transportation to five million people each year.
One Richmond Hill family learned first-hand this weekend about a nefarious internet trend called “swatting.” Swatting involves calling police and having a large force, ideally (hence the name) a SWAT or SWAT-esque crew, sent to the home of unsuspecting people. Online services that allow people to place anonymous calls make the “prank” surprisingly easy to get away with.