Author archive

On Thursday, March 11, WATERFRONToronto held an open house to discuss their proposed new soil recycling facility on the Portlands.  I’m cautiously supportive of this one, with some reservations.

The good news is that all the soil in question is already on the Portlands.  The other good news is that it’s being cleaned up from its current toxic state in order to enable more human uses of the Portlands area.  This includes making way for the Don Mouth revitalization project that’s really kind of inspired.     Read more »

Public Consultations into the New Streetcar Yards at Leslie/Lakeshore
Thursday, 2010 April 8, 6:30-9pm
Fire Academy, 895 Eastern Ave

On Tuesday, March 9, I was invited to help out and listen in to a meeting where Leslieville residents got together to begin forming an association.  The issue that galvanized the community into action was the proposed new streetcar yards at Leslie and Lakeshore on the Ashbridges Bay Treatment Plant site.  It was a packed hall and strong opinions were voiced from many angles.

The plan is to have almost 100 streetcars leave the new site every morning between 5 and 7 am and slowly spread throughout the city, way up to St. Clair, downtown to King Street, and all along Queen, College/Carlton/Gerrard, Dundas, Spadina and so on.  The Connaught and Roncesvalles yards will also be maintained, though the Connaught yards will have to be changed to accommodate the new design.  The streetcars will be four times the length of the current non-articulated models, or double the length of the articulated designs on the street today.     Read more »

I just attended the opening of the Green Party of Canada Economic Summit taking place this weekend at Ryerson University.  Peter Victor, who I greatly admire, gave an updated version of his talk about an economy not focused on growth.  As always, I left inspired.

An economic model that respects resource limits recognizes that once we have provided the fundamentals required to live comfortably, we should stop striving for more and more things and start putting our efforts into building relationships, and spending time with our families and friends.     Read more »

I attended the Canadian Organic Growers Toronto conference today, and could easily write a dozen posts.  I’ll write about just one speaker, Percy Schmeiser, who I had first listened to perhaps a decade ago or more at a Toronto Vegetarian Association event.  In those days I was not a food activist at all.  I just liked vegetables and wanted to be informed about what I was eating and feeding my family.  So I went to Mr. Schmeiser’s talk then not necessarily expecting to be convinced of the harm of genetically modified foods.

Mr. Schmeiser’s story is one of profound and infuriating wrong.  When I first heard him speak, he was embroiled in a legal battle with Monsanto, which had identified their genetically modified crop on his field, and demanded that he pay for using their patented product.  As a heritage seed developer, he certainly didn’t welcome Monsanto’s “contribution”, which had contaminated all his fields and destroyed 50 years worth of work.  All he did was refuse to pay.  And in retribution, Monsanto dragged him right up to the Supreme Court, counting on the fact that he would succumb to the immense pressure of overwhelming legal bills.     Read more »

Wishing you a happy and prosperous Valentine’s Day and a romantic and sexy Lunar New Year!

[Tiger Valentine image courtesy of Charlene Chua Illustration.]