TORONTO - JUNE 14, 1990 - Guided Tour of Downtown
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 20 มี.ค. 2017
- A video I shot back in the summer of 1990 of a workmate, Alex, giving a 'guided tour' of downtown Toronto to take with him back home to PEI.
We start at Church and Queen Streets, walk up Yonge to Dundas, west to Bay and down to King St. before ending up back at my '76 Chevy pick-up in the big parking lot on the north side of Queen between Church and Jarvis.
When this man first made this video it was worthless but now it's priceless
Probably one of those heavy shoulder vcr cameras - eh I got old tapes like that.
@@ReligionlessFAITH it was actually shot on a camera like this unit...
th-cam.com/video/AfJSNvtqGi4/w-d-xo.htmlsi=V3YcOYmhtGNFOEYC
The quality and zoom is impressive. Might be image stabilization too. These clips take us back in time
like stepping into a time machine. i dont go downtown often. when i do it feels like "Back to the Future" lol
@@OttawaInHD Thanks, I think the big camera resting on my shoulder helped steady the picture. Personally, I think I did way too much zooming!
Was 15 in 1990, and going to Toronto was exciting. 49 now, and going to Toronto is a logistical nightmare.
The first time I had to drive through downtown was horrendous 🤣
Hello fellow 1974 person 👋
@@richguy66974 the whites
@@richguy66974 unless you are native, Canada ain’t even your real home brother
It was a nightmare then too. You just weren't doing the driving.
Wow, a first hand glimps into a world with no cell phones and everyone is actually living life.
Back when products were built to last. Now we have phones that only give us two years.
His Tshirt cut way down under arms.
His mullet! And moustache!
"This Bud's for You" girl.
No air- conditioning on streetcar.
Old muscle cars and gas-guzzlers.
Old red and cream streetcars. My favourite.
SAM the record man!
1980's geometric patterns on clothes in bright colours.
NOBODY is on their cell phone!
Everyone is calmer because of it.
City Hall looks the same. NO Toronto sign.
Good videography work. Nice eye.
Love the closeup/zoom out shots.
Great montage of the relief/statues of
underclad men on the old
Bank of Nova Scotia building.
Thanks for sharing.
Cell phones absolutely destroyed the fabric of society, everyone with an iPhone in their hands is when everything really started to change for the worse
Good eye!
@@ezpzlemonsqzI was just about to make this reply..... Looking at the kids these days, smart phones really could be the beginning of the end
It's crazy to admit it but looking back, Toronto was so much better back then.
Toronto was a giant parking lot
I was born in Regent Park 1960. Lived and worked downtown at the Eaton Center and Commerce Court until I was 40 and then able to move to a warmer climate. This video brings back soooo many happy memories. I know Toronto has changed but I still try to visit every few years and always love the energy. I’ll be back in a couple of months and looking forward to seeing the old neighborhoods and the new changes. It’s a fabulous city ❤
I was born in Regent in 1982 and both my parents were born there in the mid-50's. This video is a refreshing walk through my childhood.
Northside!!
I can’t make myself watch this. Couldn’t bear to see how Toronto once was when I used to go on heritage walks. It’s
unrecognizable now.
I feel the exact same way. I couldn’t bear to watch it either. I’m so sad 😞
@@HealthWealth-sy2jq I can’t even bear to ride on the subways and buses now. I feel completely out of place, as if I woke up in another country or two or three…
Its simple go to Moscow. Its even better than old Toronto
@@clairecarscallen2925SAME! I avoid subways too. Totally feels like another country. Ie. India etc 😢
@@liamneslind5708you’re right!
Everything about this video oozes nostalgia including your buddy's "I only do biceps and bench press" physique. Thanks for sharing this absolute gem.
Never ever forget what they took from us. "They don't look happy to be on that bus". They had no idea what would be ripped away from them and would gladly go back to that bus.
I was this kid in highschool.. I had my little red mp3 player, held about 15-20 songs, and I would bus home for years during highschool, just zoning out to the playlists I'd make for myself.. that's why the art industry isn't what it used to be, nobody take their time with anything anymore, everything's rushed..
@@hurricanestarang You're still too young. back in the 80s and 90s, it was walkmans, and disc players. MP3's came much later kid.
@@anonanon7235 okay grandpa
@@anonanon7235 Man that's nothing. I used to have a bard follow me around playing tunes and would use homing pigeons to send out texts. You kids these days
As someone born in this city, and still here.. this was the most depressing thing i've watched in a long time.
why?
Because the city used to be nice. Now it's a piece of shit.
@@justinmassey7651 I couldn't agree more. I grew up in Toronto and it's unrecognizable now. Tragic. I escaped up north but can't help thinking the time for retreating is over.
Word same
Same in MTL, nightmare - but didn't use to be that way ... sad times
Anyone else remember the Skydome? Way better name IMO. It's so weird to think I could see my dad as a young man passing by on these streets.
I was thinking the same thing about my dad man! Shit maybe they were friends haha
I still call it the Skydome. It will always be Skydome.
@@CDN1975 Im still calling the SBA the Air Canada center lol
Everybody I know still calls it the skydome..
Rogers Center
My parents ran a business near Yonge and Bloor, I was 10 years old and roaming freely during this hot summer. Exploring and going into all the stores. What a great time to grow up in this city.
Bro I was doing this only ten years after you haha
Great city and so close to America
Ah the days before Shania Twain got famous.If she walked these streets then-no one would have any idea who she was
I remember that version of Toronto fondly, but it's easy to look back with rose-tinted glasses. I'm not saying today is better or worse, but we have to move on with the times and make tomorrow better for future Torontonians.
WOW! Things seemed so civil compared to today. I wish I could go back to those days. The lack of cell phones is very refreshing.
lack of other things too
So was the thick brown smog during summer
@@shaunpierre Now it's brown all the time.
Lack of browns also helped
Smart phones and mass immigration is completely destroying Western countries as planned.
I remember this day. I was on the streetcar and saw that guy videoing the gold building and thought - “I will never see what that man is filming”. I had to deal with that fact for over thirty years. Now I know. Thank you for posting. Wow Toronto sure has changed! Go leafs.
small world
Now do you want to hear a real unbelievable story ? A couple of years ago, I found a photo of myself, that had been uploaded and posted on YT in around 2011. A guy was on holidays in Toronto in 1977, ( I think he was from Holland) and was taking pictures on Yonge St. He captured a pic of me in my favourite pinball arcade. And like 45 years later, I found the picture of myself on YT. Sometimes the internet can be mindblowing.
@@k_DAN Wow, that is neat!
@@k_DAN that's crazy lol
This is literally the definition of quantum entanglement .. wow!
Got a tear in my eyes I grew up Toronto during the 90’s I was a child and the fond times I had in this beautiful city seem like a distant memory. How this province has changed
I remember the summer of 1990 like it was yesterday.
Good times 😌
I was free
In Vancouver with many girlfriends
Come back to Toronto with bc weed no one want it too sticky hydro
I met this actress lenore zahn at bamboo club
Holy f .she now NDP Nova scotia. Then i venture to south beach
Debauchery and sin
Models & parties
Thank god when you cross border
Wow America aint canada
Now 4 bedroom 4 cats and bored aint life wonderful 🖤🇨🇦 be good toronto 90-92 was good tlmes
@@vantastroganoff4370 are you stupid?
@@vantastroganoff4370 th-cam.com/video/QW-aJU36-ME/w-d-xo.html
Old fart
I Was Living In Mississauga During This Summer
When living in Canada was affordable.
It was affordable before Covid ended in thr Maritimes. Not so much now. Halifax is unreal out of no where. Moncton. All thousands in rent. Thousands and full of homeless we never had tents before had to go to a big place like Vancouver to see that shit.
When it was still Canada, and not india 2.0
Or africa
@@CovntFapula-uc1gl???
When the world was affordable
I have been to Toronto very very few days in my life but this day was one of them, a moment in time when I graduated from high school and went to join my friend Tammy who had run away from our insane boarding school. Bought a pair of thigh high boots at Master John that trip haha, they got a lot of use but no, I don’t still have them. This really brings me back showing up in my feed the night I decided the time has come, far past due, to write this story. Also beside this video in the feed, George Michael’s Freedom 90, urging me to purge my memory, as it has always been part of it all, and freedom the ultimate climax. The story and accompanying soundtrack have been written in my head for 34 years now, time to release the demons. Hope you can see the movie someday. 🍿 🎥 🎦
That was amazing to read. Please write novels! Or screenplays. You have an eye for capturing narrative.
I was 19 yrs old then. Toronto is unrecognizable now. Same with Burlington where I grew up. There was a lot more breathing room in 1990, that's for sure.
I don't know, I came to Toronto in 1993, it was very much as on this video. Every time I come now, I do not feel it changed that much, especially if you got a bit away from downtown. Of course 30 years did not pass for nothing ....
Grew up in Pickering remembering going to the Ajax theatre. It was just in the middle of farmer fields. Now it it is surrounded by Costco, Walmart, Canadian Tire a bunch of other stores and housing. The area I grew up in still feels the same, any time I drive by it.
@@dmitripogosian5084 "Every time I come now" - So you don't live here now, which is why you don't see how much it's changed.
Downtown before it became Browntown...
@@mrveritas700 i know right west toronto is indian north is asian and east is mixed and centre is everything combined now
I'm pretty sure that's me reading a book/play on that packed bus. Thanks for posting. It makes me nostalgic for living in Toronto. ❤
Man I was born June 14 1990 in Toronto and Toronto totally different now. I'll be 34 in June😂. Just seeing this video shows you a blast from the past
Wow that's amazing! I remember that day, it was the birthday of a pretty blonde I dated. We went bar hopping, drinking on patios in the King & John area. So many great memories from that summer.
Me too, except I was 25 when this was filmed
You mean nothings changed 😂
@@victorchen9170 If you don't know why are you commenting?
@@leftistfactchecker7672 ?
I was in the 9th grade, and lived in Etobicoke. My friends and I would go downtown on the weekends and window shop and eat food. Man I miss those days!
I live in Etobicoke & it's bad now 😥
@turd Ferguson Where I live people are killing each other sad😪 every two days someone gets hurt & mostly teenagers
turd Ferguson yeah diversity is good but to an extent people here don’t even have patriotism or care about Canada because they all came from somewhere else
@@sda9995 it's all teenagers from one particular culture though. It's all part and parcel with woke culture cancelling police and that culture raising their kids to not respect police or society's rules.
You were smoking pot and got stoned
Much better times....
Ever since you left
@@hal7112 rdrr - Still here, dingleberry hal
@@ryline666 "it's David Perry" 🤣🤣🤣
@@stevie1748 Nice
Well there was a recession then but people were in generally a better position of living regardless.
I moved to Toronto in September '89 and honestly Toronto was AMAZING in the 90s...not so much now 😒
Cool place back then
Longest away 2000
4 million in 5 years on down i could not travel
@@vantastroganoff4370 sorry I don't speak methanese 😒
@@W1DN173it was the worst time. Best time was pre Columbus
Disagree, love Toronto today, seems just as vibrant as it was back in 1990.
@@LHRTW Cope harder ya poor
Quite a few people in my life passed away just after this video was made. God, I wish they were all still with us.
Oh how I miss old Toronto. We moved here from Europe in 86' and never looked back. I love this city. Just after 1:38 minutes you can see a terrifying billboard of Joseph Bloor. Lol, thank you for posting this!
poland i assume?:)
2050 is closer than 1990......
that hit different
Damn, I feel like I'm old already at twenty
@@vm99125 I’m twice your age buddy…lol I feel young 3 out of 7 days a week. 😉
😳😳😳😳😳
2050 the world will be gone. Thank goodness.
Construction is all you see and hear. Nothing has changed.
0:44 - A TTC Street Car full of 100% whites. 2018 its 90% brown/black.
F Dannn And your point is?
@@moeanthony9308 it's a s#!t hole now
@@vicenzinu3668 then move son
Means Toronto is a very progressive City. I went in 2019 and you can see the evolution, improvements and now has a global city status. Toronto is an example of growth and progress for so many countries.
My TV is now the same size as the Cineplex Theatre screens at the Eaton Centre.
🤣 I remember that, sitting in otherwise empty cinema, watching some crap movie, but it was fun.
They can jack up the rents, gentrify the neighbourhoods in the seemingly unending quest to be more 'New York' but this, this is when Toronto truly shared a soul with New York City and I feel blessed to have lived in that time and remember it well!!
This is crazy! I live in PEI, grew up in that section of T.o and am watching this in 2024
OMG! This makes me want to cry...
Born & raised there. Used to play floor hockey in the stairwells in the Maple Leaf Gardens. Lived in the beaches in the 80’s. Good times there. Moved to the US in 1996 & have never looked back. Could never move back to Toronto, as what made it great is gone. All my relatives moved away to get out of that condo maze & traffic disaster.
Must've walked that boardwalk countless times
Ahh Yonge street, my old stomping grounds, with it's arcades, Sam, head shops, and so much fun. I moved to the west coast by '90, but I would visit and it looked like this during the 80's as well. I don't wanna be a downer, but it's such a sewer these days, a waste of space, a shadow of it's former glory. Yonge and Dundas especially...ugh. It's all gone or slapped together in a way that doesn't make sense, but memories, photos and home movies of the real deal remain. Thank you!
Sam!!!!! ❤❤❤ So cool…. 😢😢😢😢 I know everyone misses the past, but it’s so true, I miss the 90’s (What a bummer, there’s no emoji of a Record for Sam the Record Man!!!)
I wasn't born yet, and I've never been to Canada in my life, but this video makes me nostalgic.
I was 14 and running around in those streets at the time lol
I Was 14 I Turned 15 In August 1990.
I had turned 16 a week prior. What great times 😊
😂
I remember that seagull at 9:43. I met him the other day and said would you stop hangin out at city hall and staking at people's food leftovers? He didn't have much to say. In his heart he knew what he was doing is wrong and that's why he quickly flew away.
I hope you and that seagull are doing well 😬
🤣👍🏻
These old clips are always so fascinating
Feels like time travel!
Considering how unstable personal video cameras were in the early 90s, this guy has some pretty steady shots!
Toronto has sure changed, hasn't it! Everywhere you go now, nothing is recognizable. I'll be honest, I don't like, too many places have been torn down. All the places I used to go to when I was young, gone, just gone, there's no memories left of the city. Our historical buildings are demolished for condos, restaurants, clothes stores. Not the city I grew up in, it's very sad!
Yeah, and no condos going up everywhere and driving up the cost of living in the city!
Very true!
Moved there in 1987 and gtfo in 2007. What a shit hole it is now.
I remember when Honest Eds closed down, that was a tragedy. At the rate Toronto is going the only historical sites that will be left is Kensington Market and Casa Loma
@@CelesteKTheNewWaveRevue I know. But Toronto has to evolve.
The great days when Toronto was a safe place to be and enjoy yourself with family and friends. 😢 I miss these days and how Toronto used to look. 😔 what happened to us Toronto?💔😩
mass immigration happened 😂
@@evanw4059 definitely 😁
It’s not that bad today, cmon
Whole world's been destroyed dude
@@evanw4059 Funny. The multiculturalism is my very favourite thing about Toronto. Different foods, music, art, perspectives -- the traffic is terrible, but those things are great, IMO.
What a time capsule❤
Absolutely!
the toronto i miss so much
Toronto was great back in the days. I truly miss it. Thank you for sharing this video. Brings a lot of memories.
Wow downtown really had a huge change since then!! Yonge & dundas i cant believe it.
Yes... Now it looks like an attempt at looking like an American city ...
@@1984potionlover Actually as a Common Wealth country we likely made an attempt to look like London ✌️
Who cares about america anyway 👎
@@dazzT.O. lmfao stop, Canada looks exactly like the usa, there is nothing british in Canada left
@@dazzT.O. btw toronto ugly af, got nothing on beautiful chicago
@@NationalismDjazair lol chicago, out of all the cities that are actually better looking than toronto.. you picked a toronto clone
What a treasure trove., holy crap. I wish I had shot videos of Toronto when I was a young kid.
Right no cellphone back then
@@sda9995 th-cam.com/video/QW-aJU36-ME/w-d-xo.html
Miss those days, When things made sense.
Exactly the comment I was about to make! ...I think the last Good Times were around the late 90's.
@Netherscorn wonder what the next generation will choose as "made sense".
@@raczyk As a millennial, "when things made sense" was when everyone had a phone so they could be easily reached but the phones didn't have the internet on them. It's hard to find more stuff to be angry at though tbh because as a gay person, I remember going from having to hide myself to basically forgetting I'm gay because of how much of a non-issue it is these days. I try not to be too cranky overall as I see "kids these days" become unrecognizable with their new slang and humour. Times change, I need to accept that too.
I took off from Rio de Janeiro to Toronto on June 14, 1987, three years to the day this video was filmed. I flew CP Air (Canadian Pacific Air Lines), which no longer exists. Precious memories!
Thanks for the comment! you might enjoy a video I shot at YYZ a month before you flew...
th-cam.com/video/_h26qqaFGqM/w-d-xo.htmlsi=H4Y8FQOC-wFIMWbW
@@hardyboy1959 Wow...a month to day before I landed in Toronto. The jets with the white circle and the Maple Leaf in the middle are from CP Air. Exactly how I remember. Thanks for the memories!
Those were the best years 80s and 90s What happened to our beautiful Country?? 🇨🇦 🍁 🇨🇦
sad. As a new comer landed in 2019, I couldn't even recognize. So many changes job market, Indian, house affordability, international competitivity. Now I even barely see people who speak English on streets.
Trudeau Sr. started it and his idiot stepchild is trying to finish it off.
Mass immigration
@ytbytb8103 good, fuck the colonizers
Indians flooded all of Canada and shit on our diversity. Theyve completely destroyed the country.
The month I graduated high school over in Ajax. When I was young I was filled with the possibility and couldn't wait until future 10 years 20 years and here we are 34 years later and all I want to do is go back to the 1970s and 80s💕
Dude, I miss the arcades on Yonge...just north of Dundas.
Something you wouldn't hear today: "I'll be home in eight days... when I get there, you'll see this, when you see this, I'll be there."
The real Toronto.....so raw and vibrant
been here since '84 - I still love Toronto with all of it's flaws and bullshit. Thanks for this upload - been on a nostalgic binge this year!
It was like I was walking with you guys back in time. Seeing the old familiar places that are long gone now. I remember having dinner w my best friend on Xmas eve bc our families were such messes we didn’t want to be w them. It was at the Licks Hamburgers across from the Eaton Centre, where Yonge Dundas Srq stands today. Such a lot to recall & take in from those days. It’s a privilege to be able to see these things again
4:43 Loved going to Toronto when I was a kid in the 80s just for that arcade and one or two others nearby. I've never seen so many video games in my life.
Freaking glory days. It was all new and shiny. We were not yet jaded, just amazed, and excited for more.
I’m not gonna say what we’re all thinking …
But I will say, this is when Toronto was Canadian and clean and respectful and safe.
👏👏👏👏😊👍
Except it wasn't
@@javiervega1065 Oh! 🔥🤣
That no one is fat?😅
Take your dog whistles and shove them up your fascist asshole.
This was the best video I have watched in a long time.
Thanks very much for sharing.
So weird seeing the city I was born in, know and love just a few years before my birth.
It's so familiar and yet so foreign.
What a GEM of a video!! Thanks for uploading.
I miss those old Toronto Police cruisers. They were amazing to see on the streets. Wish they were still around.
great find and thanks for the video. I loved how Toronto has grown and changed over the decades. This was cool. Thanks
This is amazing, thanks for posting!
Thanks for the vintage tour of Toronto.
Excellent camera work buds! Kept hoping to see myself walking by. 👍
Thank you for posting this. Makes me realize how much we've changed... But also how we haven't changed at all.
Post-P Toronto needs love.
This was the year that I was born!!! Thanks for uploading
I used to take that crowded streetcar on Queen Street and transfer onto the Trolleybus at Bay Street to go to school with my older brother. I was only 8 years old when this was taken but it brought back memories of being a kid growing up in the "Big Smoke" like it was yesterday. Loved this video, thanks for posting it.
Used to be a nice city.
My mum would've been a high school junior growing up in Jane and Finch around this time! Crazy to see how much Toronto has changed over the years. Thanks for sharing!
OMG - we are GUSHING watching this - wow - so amazing - I was living and working in the area at the time - as a teenager. This is brilliant thanks for sharing it - the guy is adorable as well
Thank you for posting this Brian, this is the Toronto,and Yonge street I remember, and always will. I was born and raised right in the downtown core and still reside here, but it's not the same anymore and a shame what this wonderful city has become. I remember going to Baskin Robbins, and Licks burgers when they were side by side at Yonge and Dundas with my mother and siblings. If it wasn't for your video I could only picture it in my head which I do and always will because it was one of the best times and some of my greatest memories ever. Thanks again. It's very much appreciated.
im only 19, but i can tell clear as day this was definitely some golden years of our city.
Everyone I’ve spoken to who lived in Toronto in the 90s has said that the city has become unrecognizable
@@maiqtheliar3502that's what mass immigration gets you
Its changed so much downtown. I hardly recognized the Gardener Expressway travelling eastbound to Jarvis. It almost looks like a different city compared to 10 years ago.
Look at how little traffic there is on the street then vs now. I lived a 45 minute walk east of there just off Queen E. God how I wish I could visit those days again
Wow it's been close to 34 years since this video was shot! I lived in Regent Park at the time. Traffic has gotten much worse over the years. As a teen I frequented the Eaton Centre, Sam the Record Man, A&A and Sunrise Records, the Head Shops. As an adult I try to avoid downtown T.O. Thanks for posting. Cheers Brian and Alex!
Once one of the safest cities in North America. This video reminders of the those days.
Sure makes me mad seeing what the city once was and what it's become. And did anyone vote for over a million third worlders to immigrate to Canada every year? Nope its just forced on us by wacko politicians. Terrible.
Wow Excellent video!!
Didnt get there til '91 but man this brings back memories 😊
Chi mig for sharing
this is nice to see. makes me wish i could show people what the urban scene was like in toronto back then.. lots of style and diversity. way more natural girls too
It was such a different city back then. I think I was around 14 in 1990 and remember Toronto back then. There's lots of great stuff about the city now but there is so much I miss about Toronto from back in the late 80's and early 90's.
Kids in the Hall. 😊👍
Thanks for the video loved it
A lovely little blast to the past ❤ Thank you for posting this 😊
Wow, this is my favorite video ❤ it's crazy how things changed over so many years ... I was born and raised in Toronto ontario. I was 1 year's old when u were traveling there...the fashion the old school cars even the cop cars I loved seeing it all ❤
Watched TO change so much since the 60s. Completely different city now. Fun fact still waiting for another Stanley Cup in 2021. I was 8 when they won in 67. LOL. 🇨🇦🍺🍺🥅🏒
I was a 15 year old club kid during this time RPM, focus, inner city etc Never went through the rocker stage lol house music, rap, hip hop,reggae. Hung out at Eaton Center. The underground Yonge and Gould With a large large group of us from around Toronto. Had the best times back then.
Thank you ❤❤
Focus! With the Sarasoda coolers! Many weekends at Focus, RPM, Whiskey - so much fun.
😍👍
This is so beautiful....
I don’t care what anyone says . I have Lived here 30 years . Love it . Unlike small towns across the province things are always changing . So much to document and see . This actually proves it .
Thanks for this!
From 1983-1997, we were downtown and in Toronto constantly. 1997 afterwards life started to change and it seemed like the Toronto I knew did too. Great video.
This is great. Found it randomly, and I just bought a 944 two months ago!
Priceless my friend 🧡.
11:10 was so trippy. Kinda made me feel like this is when architecture started becoming “mass-produced” and looking all the same. Specifically office buildings.
Love it boys. I was in an open custody group home at the time at dovercourt n i still remember the heat, especially since i moved n have stayed in scotland since 91
Excellent video. Toronto was a great city back then.
This is awesome! Thanks!
This is amazing
Ironically it was a much "grittier" city, but also much safer. Brings back memories of all my time spent there that year
Except it wasn't safer
@@javiervega1065 it was safer, less immigrants back then
@@javiervega1065 Not if you go by rainbow feels but we are talking about statistics
@@randyreal5871 it took me 15 seconds on google to prove you wrong. statistics say the exact opposite of what you are claiming
@@randyreal5871 Crime peaked in the late 20th century in the US and Canada
Watching this in 2024 and it seems like construction never stops.
I miss walking around Toronto at all times of day and night, such a cool city to explore tbh
This is the Toronto i would have liked to visit, not the current one, and thanks to this video I was able to.