Stay safe out there

YouTube video by Oh The Urbanity! North America’s Best Housing Reform is Under Attack

North America’s Best Housing Reform is Under Attack

You really suck

OSS simple sabotage field manual

NEW VIDEO: North America’s Elevator’s Problem

Elevators are absolutely essential to modern cities..... and it turns out North America kind of sucks at them. We partnered with @sightline.org to look into the many issues plaguing our elevator industry, and what it might take to fix it.

Not sure what to do about this. If you try to raise it with councillors, they will ask staff and staff will say that the money in reserves is all allocated and the growing reserves aren't a problem. But, if the money came out of underspending on the operating budget, it sure seems like a problem?

An important chart to understand as Toronto heads into next year's budget process. We'll hear that the budget is barely balanced, the situation is precarious, the same as we have heard for the last 5 years, despite the City actually posting billions in surplus except in 2023. Why?

From the Metro Toronto Planning Board's 1959 draft Official Plan (voted down by Metro Council). You could not say something this obvious in Toronto's Official Plan anymore.

Obviously no one from Toronto is in a position to criticize Calgary since we didn't even pass the citywide sixplex reform that our HAF agreement required. But I feel for Calgary advocates who worked on zoning reform, saw it succeed and people then said "Too much housing. Roll it back."

The promise: Subway for the cost of a streetcar

The result: Streetcar for the cost of a subway

I distinctly remember the consensus in Toronto 10+ years ago that subways were about wasting money to preserve more surface space for cars.

LRTs were the sensible progressive option, providing almost as good service for much less money.

It turns out the service is... not so great after all.

Great deputation. I would bet that they got the quote from the 1960 planning board report by way of House Divided.

The estimated budget for the Waterfront East "LRT" (streetcar with tiny tunnelled section) is $2 billion?!?! Subway prices for 4km of streetcar. Glad we'll spend next year's municipal election talking about a made up crime surge.
www.thestar.com/news/gta/tor...

YouTube video by SBB CFF FFS Gare de Lausanne; la métamorphose expliquée.

Metrolinx: we'll need to do discontinuous electrification at Union Station because we can't touch the heritage canopy

SBB/CFF/FFS: we are raising the existing canopy at the Gare de Lausanne by 1 m and move it laterally by 90 cm to slightly modify the tracks' geometry.

youtu.be/CNuJLQguRgo?...

Stacked bar chart showing the number of apartment units in Toronto by year of construction with categories for private, TCHC, and other social housing. The vast majority were built in the 1960s and 1970s, with a minor up-tick in recent years.

Charting number of rental units in apartment buildings in Toronto by year of construction

(This is a quick update to a similar chart I made ~2.5 years ago)

#toronto #housing #dataviz #NationalHousingDay

Are you fucking kidding me it’s like we are living in a cartoon

The real galaxy brain Canada is to make London Ontario the biggest London, but Canadians are afraid to dream big

Developer Peabody pulls out of building 564 homes in Southall - BBC News Hundreds of affordable homes will no longer be built in west London after Peabody withdraws plans.

“A large housing project delivering more than 500 homes in west London will no longer go ahead…Specifically, [the developer] claims that the most significant reason for its termination was the new requirement to provide two staircases in London for buildings over 18 metres.”

YouTube video by Andy's Paradox IS EUV WOKE?! A Delusional Europa Universalis V Review

youtu.be/2ZjYDxxswb8?...

Why I’m still skeptical about ALTO’s HSR project A reality check and a plea for transparency.

I've done something that I don't do very often. I wrote a short, quick polemic post. It was prompted by a discussion in here.

It's about why I'm still skeptical about ALTO's HSR project and why there is no way around transparency in public projects.

open.substack.com/pub/marcochi...

What I want to know is if there’s a way to adjudicate cases with fewer resources while maintaining high standards of justice

This is an incredibly absurd way to develop laws. It’s essentially a fact free vibes Only method of developing rules. It can’t go the way of the dodo fast enough.

My disdain for these people is indescribable.

Platner chair retailing for $27,000 Canadian

Still making me feel old

That's what I thought but I was looking at it today and the number for the Eglinton Crosstown seems to include both giving it a much higher cost than other sources
transitcosts.com/toronto-egli...
schoolofcities.utoronto.ca/wp-content/u...

@alonlevy.bsky.social In your transit costs spread sheet, do you usually include things like operations and maintenance or just the capital cost?

Strange scenes at Planning and Housing Committee yesterday: a heritage listing of a 1930s 4plex in Leaside was upheld over objections of residents and neighbours. The residents clearly know what's up, even as the City sticks to canned lines that listing is no big deal, doesn't impede development.

YouTube video by Oh The Urbanity! How This Small City Built Light Rail For Cheap

The most underappreciated issue in urbanism is the Anglosphere’s transit construction cost problem.

It’s not just that we’re spending too much money on any particular project.

It’s that we could be getting *much more transit* for the *same amount of money we’re currently spending*.

Despite all of these junkets, I don’t think either the Austrians or the Americans really have a clue about what the circumstances are like in the other place. Neither understands the vast gulf in demand, shortage, or construction cost between the two places.