🌡️ It was officially cold this morning. Temperatures will stay in the low teens for the afternoon with a small chance of rain.
🌊 I don’t know if I can swear in this newsletter but I imagine some of you dedicated Lake Ontario swimmers will when you read this story. The province wants to reroute the waste pipes that dump sewage into Lake Ontario away from the beach Therme is building alongside its spa.
🎤 Another overrated English band is coming to the not-yet-built Rogers Stadium next summer. At least Coldplay, unlike Oasis, actually has some bangers.
🛠️ Remember those city park workers who were caught not doing their jobs? Their union came to their defence, arguing the city’s investigation didn’t consider things like gridlock and faulty equipment that prevented them from performing up to standards.
📉 TVO’s John Michael McGrath uses the latest examples of deteriorating public services in the city (animal carcasses not getting picked up, city crews not doing their jobs) to politely encourage the city to try solving some problems itself and not blame everything on the province.
💸 Nathan Philipps Square will stay ugly for a while longer as the city doesn’t have enough cash to fund a revamp.
🚄 The stops and starts of the age-old high-speed rail corridor between Toronto and Quebec City keep coming. Federal cabinet ministers say they’re serious about the project. Just as serious as the last time. And the time before that, ad infinitum.
✈️ More Billy Bishop banter! A UofT professor and the founder of NoJetsTO argues in favour of extending the runway to make the airport safe, but against extending the lease to 2073.
🔍 Two Toronto city councillors want the province to call a public inquiry on the Eglinton Crosstown LRT. At this pace, the inquiry would probably wrap before the first trains ran.
🦝 Acceptance? Resignation? Some kind of reverse psychology? Whatever the thinking behind it, Toronto’s newest raccoon-themed park just opened near Yonge and Eglinton.
🌳 Two Toronto sisters got bored during the pandemic and started visiting different parks every day. Four years later, they just hit their 500th. I honestly didn’t think there were 500 parks in the city. Apparently, there are 1,500, but 400 are meagre parkettes.
🚉 Spadina Station is known as the one with the super long walkway that TTC rookies use to transfer between lines instead of waiting for St. George. Tucked away in an inconspicuous part of the station is a quilt sewn by an underappreciated Toronto artist that brightens up the area and has a surprising link to historic resistance movements.
📺 City council meets today and has some interesting items on the agenda. Catch the live stream here.
