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Toronto could keep the publicly owned railway, and just turn the parking lots into rented out land. Then use the revenue from rents to fund transit

I'm in Rome right now and the city has amazing bones, but this is by far the most car-brained, car choked city I've ever visited. Worse than Manhattan. Worse than Paris. It's like it has all the right ingredients to be an amazing urbanist paradise, but they decided to treat it like a North American, car-centric city. Roads, sidewalks, crosswalks, all jammed with cars. And the streets are so loud. Great infrastructure ruined by cars.

I'm surprised that none have commented. Thumbs up to the mayor from a neighbor (Berkeley)! I've never owned a car, have worked in four countries and am now retired at 77. He is on the right track.

Great video!

Maybe the commies were right

Hello, my husband and I need a place to live in Toronto in December 2023. It will be great share a house.

Yeh its not hard to believe most economic output is the cities because suburbs don't output anything 😂

'Promosm' 😡

Listening to communities and making sure different voices are heard and, apparently, ignored if you and your neighbors don't like what the city wants to do because you and your neighbors are too ignorant to understand how cities should be built.

I keep thinking that a family apartment should be two apartments that can be connected or separate: Then the (one or more) children can have their own space with its own entrance when they are, say, 16+. And when they move out, their apartment can be rented to someone else and the parents won’t live in an apartment that’s too large for them (which I have seen happen many times). Affordability could be an issue, though.

I specifically want to move to the suburbs to get away from all the "urbanization". Its nothing but ugly roads and crime.

I'm a renter and not an owner nor developer.

Hi, very good show. Could someone please elaborate about the section at 2:50 (many members of the development industry are worried and concerned about this new policy and say that it basically will block any new development to reach the 100 Units and will make 98% to 95% of the other Units "just as affordable". ) Thank you.

I'm I the only one not seeing any backyard or kids as she talks about them?

the "if you love nature don't live in it!" statement is wrong. As someone who loves nature and lives surrounded by nature I can tell you with certainty that people ARE meant to live in nature. You can not live without it... I mean, technically you can live without nature, but it will be detrimental to both your mental and physiological health, so you should remove that motto from your life if you don't want to be guided by it continuously and suffer.

At least you are honest in your disdain for suburbs which is a lot more than I can say for most other new age urban planners. I'll take living in nature before I live in a city any day.

Make the station the destination. I don't understand why that's such a hard concept to grasp for city governments. Great vid!

I would never raise my kids in a suburb. No freedom. No connection. It was awful for me, and will be awful for the next generation.

What homeowners are looking for is constantly rising house prices from a lack of supply by not allowing anything getting built. Not simply a new building reducing their home value they want constant increases.

It has always been about design and density... What we have is density without the principles of design that Jane succeeded in proving true. Downtown Toronto has seen highrise towers that blow away street-level life destroying local one-of-a-kind businesses and replacing them with a monotonous repetition block after block of a McDonald's, Shoppers Drug Mart, TD Bank, Cannabis shop, 7/11, Starbucks or similar chain store. When every place looks the same there is no such thing as place anymore.

I think you hit on all very valid points to shift to a more sustainable and walkable city. However, I think you miss one key component is the difference between the street infrastructure we have here in US and Canada serving mainly cars to the many narrow, slow and shared streets in residential neighborhoods throughout Japan. That alone if you can solve that issue will help drive and accelerate all your other points you discussed. Transitioning away from cars to a walkable and transit-oriented city is the secret sauce for a host of issues and lead to more virtuous cycle of long term benefits within a community from housing affordability, stronger local economy, green infrastructure, grass roots planning/development, etc.

Great video!

Lay off the booze when your driving

This is so stupid. They want to move felons into your elementary school neighborhoods.

Has this been built anywhere in Toronto? Is it allowed according to the current bylaws on any piece of residential zoned land ?

Hi Naama, Thank you for the video is very informative and makes really good arguments. Can you please elaborate on Myth #2? I have always thought it good for the government to invest in social housing? Specially in a city like Toronto where prices are way above the average buyer. Is there no European model of social housing that would work for us ?

It would be good to show the entire floor plan, so we can see the aggregation of the apartments and the overall shape of the building.

There should be covered walkways connected them and some may even have walk/bikeways even if they are 4-20 stories up so you can get from building to building. If you have them in large groups as they are in many of these pictures, you could have floor escalators or even people movers in the largest developments. And to make this work the best you may have deser clusters with gaps between them for larger green areas. Underground parking and corridors should be a must.

Maybe the context is not fit for the location. Brilliant.

That was great.

Toronto is a city with plenty of good welcoming people. That’s genuinely true. But Toronto as a city, it’s slightly better than average US cities. And if we are focusing only on growth, it shows quite remarkable dynamic. But that’s just it. Toronto now is just a typical example of Americanized gentrified city with losing cultural and historical singularities to the ever growing real estate speculation. It’s because we are only focusing on the growth and blindfolding our-selves about all the losing qualities. Yes, Toronto has a good urban planning policies such as mid rise planning guideline which reminds me of good European urban planning guidelines. But that has completely lost it’s dynamic due to frenetic and quasi-chaotic real estate development which starts kicking people out of the city and killing urban diversity. Toronto has some beautiful green patches here and there like Trinity bell woods, Riverdale. And areas like Don valley,High park are effectively amazing. But the city’s urban blocks are rather very grey in Toronto with raised proportion of heat islands everywhere. One time, the city which Jane Jacobs was so fond of, now it’s been becoming exactly like the cities which Jane Jacobs has criticized of. Due to uncontrolled or rather politicized real-estate speculations and development, Toronto has lost many good and unique values and it becomes more like a typical American big city with also typical problems inherent in those American big cities. Personally, I think Toronto still has chance to become a happy city with a very unique cultural trait and kind people. But if the city continues as it’s been lately and if city keeps its long, wishful and unhealthy obsession on wanna-be-NewYork, that chance will simply be slimmed out.

Getting to Net Zero by 2050 would cost $9.2 trillion a year (McKinsey). That's not going to be good value for money. That's nearly one-tenth of global GDP. That money would be better spent on a myriad of things including educating the fifth of humanity who are illiterate and represent a 7% annual loss to the world's economy. Maddeningly, there is no climate crisis. The Earth was warmer in the recent and distant past.

Great webinar and insight into all forms of housing solutions!

Very interesting context from legacy to greenfield ...

Where are the footage?

This is so true! Really interesting content

Very useful & interesting, as Toronto moves to increase density.

I guess all those European cities have everything completely wrong then.

Wild... I just put on my headphones and they started autoplaying a background tab. The background tab was a recommended video from another waterfront Toronto vid I was watching. So out of the blue high school pal Aaron Barter is introducing himself from a mystery tab! This waterfront project is looking incredible though, can't wait to see the new Don River and explore the new trails and wetlands.

The canopy really looks amazing.

I wonder why Canadian municipalities are strict about constructing very tall buildings. Look at other countries, where they build taller buildings in their cities. We need to test our limits and build beyond what is considered nearly impossible.

Wow. That density look like a living hell. I would feel claustrophobic. The noise levels must be deafening. I'll stay on my 100 hectare ranch.

I think it's an interesting fact that the same percentage live in 20+ story buildings as in RV/vehicle/boat in the US, but talking about 20 story buildings gives the impression that it is the one true way to density. I used to live in Hoboken, NJ and there are some high rises, but most people live in 3-5 story apartment / condo buildings. With this type of construction, they achieve a density of about 50,000 / square mile. In the DC area where I live now there are plenty of rowhouse neighborhoods with high density, walkability, and transit.

THIS SHOW IS AMAZING!!!! Canada is doing a lot of rail projects now but it wasn't always like that and it may slow down so i hope this expands as i would love to see this channel go internationally so transit enthusiast can watch/see projects happening in urban/regional/national/international railway projects worldwide. One thing i wish was done is more maps showing the locations in regards to the whole city to get a better sense of the locations being spoken of for those who don't know the city.

to build a livable city, people should have access to sunlight as a right. There are many other ways to allow for more density without affecting sunlight.

Great idea and great speech!!

Really nice effort. Thanks and best wishes ahead.

Thank you.

Great informative video! Could you expand on point 3 on how the lack of government funding in Tokyo promotes mixed use development? Is this possible with a public transit system?

Thanks for the video. How long would approval for a conversion take once an application is filed? A year? 5 years?