Toronto - the city of subways

[Arakawa]

Today's weird trivia is somewhat misleading. After copious Googling, I have found plenty of studies. Here's the one where Toronto is, indeed, number two:

http://www.smartplanet.com/blog/cities/top-10-smartest-cities-in-the-world/1654

But I haven't found any study that ranks cities as "smartest" in the obvious sense of "populated by the most intelligent people in quantity and/or quality". What is being measured is "previous city rankings in innovation, quality of life, sustainability, digital community, and digital governance." (I assume these rankings were assembled long before the Rob Ford era.)

Moreover, since it doesn't take an Einstein to make an announcement about putting "smart" stuff into the budget, and it doesn't take a Frederick the Great to come along on a tidal wave of right-wing populism two years and reverse all of the decisions, a large portion of what is being measured seems to be hot air.

Since these sorts of rankings are deeply within silly season, we could hardly do worse by looking at the almost certainly deeply flawed ranking of which city has the most people who obsess over taking IQ tests:

http://www.iqleague.com/group/smartest-city-in-the-world

... wherein we learn that the smartest city in Canada is supposedly Kamloops.

[Music-chan]

You gave way more thought to my silly trivia than I did.

[Arakawa]

... and apparently, this is now happening:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/69910321@N03/6910719082/

I've heard of filmmakers dressing up Toronto to look like New York, but this is the first time (to my knowledge) anyone has been insane enough to try to dress it up to look like Japan. Either that or this was the most kickass April Fool's joke ever.

*shakes head*

As proof, voici street view of the same location from before we got taken over by Japan:

http://maps.google.com/maps?q=Elizabeth+Street,+Toronto,+ON,+Canada&hl=en&ll=43.654452,-79.384782&spn=0.005061,0.007178&sll=43.652022,-79.415209&sspn=0.010061,0.014355&oq=eliza&hnear=Elizabeth+St,+Toronto,+Toronto+Division,+Ontario,+Canada&t=m&z=17&layer=c&cbll=43.654338,-79.384737&panoid=h7Z5zP5DVlI84vsTeXx1LA&cbp=12,270.86,,0,-0.4

[Jon]

Guess what, Torontofolk?

I'm coming to your awesome city, in a month! I've been asked to speak at a conference, and I'll extend it into a vacation to see Toronto and maybe Montreal. I'll be flying on on May 3rd, flying out on May 13th.

[Arakawa]

The Toronto Island Airport is probably one of the most unfortunately placed passenger airports in the universe.

http://maps.google.com/?ll=43.628341,-79.396348&spn=0.020129,0.02871&t=h&z=15

[Jon]

I hear it's really convenient to get downtown though.

[Arakawa]

It involves taking a ferry, but yes.

May have photos later.

[Arakawa]

Toronto vs. the Windy City comparison (based on unfair and innacurate first impressions), in keeping with the 'city of subways' thread topic. I wonder how far off the mark this is:

Toronto has a self-similar fractal structure. Outside of the main downtown, there's a host of high-rise satellite 'downtowns' sort of strewn randomly about: downtown Missisauga, Yonge-Eglinton, Scarborough Centre, North York Centre, Six Points, not to mention a bunch of other random clumps of high-rises such as High Park which are too residential to be called a 'downtown' even in jest. These often coalesce due to the gravitational pull of either a subway station, or a mayoral ego. (Or, in the case of North York Centre, a mayoral ego demanding a subway station. And not just any station! An interchange station!)

Chicago has two areas: Downtown and Not Downtown. Almost all of the highrise buildings are in downtown -- Not Downtown seems to be mostly flat. Thus, in spite of actually having more people than Toronto, Chicago feels smaller. You're either somewhere way out in suburbia, near downtown but looking in, or somewhere in downtown (which is fairly compact). In Toronto you go out... into a suburb-looking place... and you think that's it... and then you stumble on another clump of highrises... and it feels like it never ends...

This may have something to do with why public transit is more popular in Toronto -- for a city with a half-assed subway (with only two real lines to Chicago's six-or-so real lines), the system runs to a surprising amount of secondary destinations which have a moderate amount of stuff going on. The bus routes also funnel into the same secondary destinations, so it all more-or-less connects even if the buses suffer from horrible traffic.

By comparison, in Chicago only the Loop seems to be a reasonable center of gravity to anchor the El lines with. These go out into the suburbs, which are mostly uniform and thus don't manage to capture a significant amount of passengers in their catchment area.

Half assed statistics that show just how strong the difference in popularity ends up being:

• daily ridership of the 144-station Chicago El system (~600,000) < daily ridership of the 32-station Yonge-University-Spadina subway line in Toronto (~700,000)
• daily boardings of the El system inside the loop (~70,000) < daily traffic in Sheppard-Yonge station in North York Centre (satellite downtown, ~100,000), daily traffic in Bloor-Yonge station in downtown Toronto (~250,000)

On the other hand, because Chicago has one downtown and everyone knows it, the city arguably has a more iconic and unified image. This is something you don't see in Toronto where the subsidiary downtowns are/were competing for attention to some extent, with most of them being fairly bland. (Again, some of the regional centres exist for no reason other than mayoral ego.)

So, the nerdy conclusion is that if you want to design a city for public transit, make it have a self-similar fractal structure with pockets of density. On the other hand, if you want to design a city with an iconic feel, make sure you don't have any bland secondary centres that could compete with your main downtown.

[Music-chan]

Hmm, my impressions of Chicago have mostly been based on driving around. I hadn't actually used the public transit system until this summer there.

It's true that most of the stuff in Chicago is very centralized.  Many of the museums are within walking distance of each other (if you don't mind walking, that is) and even though a "few blocks" can be a couple of miles, there's plenty of things to do for those few miles.  Drive into Chicago for the day, park at one of the big lots on the edge of town, walk into town and entertain yourself.  That's something my family has done since I've been young.

I did notice that the Chicago transit system feels much larger than the Toronto one, but my experiences are pretty limited.  Also, when I think of Toronto I guess I really think of it as having one big, central part of downtown, then a bunch of....shopping centers? It's hard to explain because I'm only just now getting familiar with the various parts of the GTA.  I'll probably read this in a year or two and think I was crazy for thinking that but, like I said, I'm still pretty new to the living in a huge city thing.

[Jon]

Which area of Toronto should I look to stay in?

[Arakawa]

Hm. I can't speak to the quality or pricing of any of the hotels, obviously. The conference is at the Bell Lightbox, right? Namely, this place:

http://maps.google.ca/maps?client=safari&rls=en&oe=UTF-8&redir_esc=&um=1&ie=UTF-8&q=bell+lightbox&fb=1&gl=ca&hq=bell+lightbox&hnear=0x89d4cb90d7c63ba5:0x323555502ab4c477,Toronto,+ON&cid=0,0,5721766538735862166&ei=YTCZT82_JYaxgweinZT0Bg&sa=X&oi=local_result&ct=image&resnum=1&ved=0CCQQ_BIwAA

(Wikipedia is useful as it has an index of Toronto neighbourhoods:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toronto_Entertainment_District

Note that, at the bottom, there is an index of adjacent neighbourhoods, so you can click around most of the downtown core.)

I'd probably check the following areas out:
- In the vicinity of the Bell Lightbox (since you may as well be minutes of walking distance away from it).
- The vicinity of St. Lawrence Market (the area south of King and east of Yonge) is the oldest part of Toronto and is thus fairly neat. You will be dependent on either walking or the moderately-unreliable King streetcar to get to your venue.
- Areas in the vicinity of Bloor and Yonge, or the university (Bloor and Spadina) may be convenient if you have some reason to get around to more far-flung areas of the city (High Park, The Beaches, anywhere up north, &c) as well as downtown. You will be taking the subway most places, which is extremely reliable. Generally, in the areas I indicated, immediately north of Bloor is preferable to immediately south of Bloor.

I can't speak to the actual quality of the hotels, but those are interesting neighbourhoods.

You will want to consider how the public transit is anywhere you choose to stay, as taxis in Toronto are expensive. The subway is always a safe bet to locate on. Out of the streetcar lines, Spadina is the most reliable; King and Queen are the most hectic.

I'd probably think twice about staying in the following areas:
- Anywhere south of the rail corridor, as it is guaranteed to be deadly boring.
- Anything too close to City Hall, as it is also likely to be boring.
- The entire area east of Yonge and west of the river, unless someone specifically recommends a location to you (e.g. like I just recommended St. Lawrence Market). Some parts of it are very nice. Some parts of it are downright sketchy. I don't feel confident enough to untangle which is which for the purposes of staying there an extended period of time. For example, Queen and Jarvis I found to be an unpleasant intersection. That said, it's safe to explore during the day. I make no guarantees about what it's like at night.

If you find a hotel in some other neighbourhood, ask and I'll try to tell you what to expect.

[Jon]

That is where the conference is located, yes. But I'm actually looking to find a neighborhood to stay in from the 9th to the 13th; after the conference and after I get back from Montreal. Right now I'm looking at something at the corner of Yonge and Bloor. (Not actually a hotel.)

[Arakawa]

That is where the conference is located, yes. But I'm actually looking to find a neighborhood to stay in from the 9th to the 13th; after the conference and after I get back from Montreal. Right now I'm looking at something at the corner of Yonge and Bloor. (Not actually a hotel.)

That's probably a solid choice (again, for the reason that it's easy to get to most locations from there). Where will you be staying during the actual conference?

[Jon]

The Hyatt near the lightbox, looks like.

[Music-chan]

It's probably too late to throw in my two cents, but the hotel we stayed in last year for the SR was really nice.