Gil Meslin Profile picture
Oct 16, 2018 26 tweets 12 min read
1. Maps and charts!

I posted this a little while back, based on data from the City's new 25-ward census profiles.

Let's pull it apart...
2. Reminder: this is based on counts of dwelling units, not of population in dwelling units.

First, StatCan definitions of structural type:
3. Single Detached Houses.

Share of occupied dwelling units in this type ranges from 54.8% (Ward 25) to 0.4% (Ward 13).

Only 3 wards >40%.
4. Single detached houses as a share of total occupied private dwellings, mapped:
5. Semi-detached Houses.

Most common in Ward 7 (20.4% of dwelling units) and Ward 14 (20.0%).

Very different parts of town, though!
6. Two examples each of semi-detached houses as found in Ward 7 and in Ward 14.
7. Semi-detached houses as a share of total occupied private dwellings, mapped:
8. Row Houses.

Constitute the highest share of the total dwelling units in Ward 23 (15.6%), Ward 25 (14.2%), and Ward 22 (11.9%).
9. Row houses as a share of total occupied private dwellings, mapped. Highest share in northeast/west.
10. Examples (from Ward 25) of the townhouse complexes that contribute to those row home counts in parts of Scarborough & Etobicoke.
11. Dwelling units in a duplex.

As a share of total occupied dwelling units, highest in Ward 1 (10.4%), Ward 21 (9.9%), and Ward 25 (8.7%).
12. Duplex units as a share of total dwelling units. Highest in Scarborough, Davenport & NW Etobicoke. Would like to dig in to this further.
13. Dwelling units in apartments under five stories.

41.6% of total dwelling units in Ward 9, and 20%-30% in much of the old City of TO.
14. This type's the closest proxy for #MissingMiddle. Includes main street walk-ups, apartments over shops, triplexes/quadplexes/6-plexes...
15. ...and, of course, my favourite: neighbourhood-scale walk-ups on residential side streets.
16. Dwelling units in apartments under 5 storeys, mapped. Most prevalent in Davenport & old City of TO, but also significant elsewhere...
17. They represent 18.1% of total occupied dwelling units in Etobicoke-Lakeshore (Ward 3).

Think walk-ups along Lake Shore Blvd West...
18 ...and a concentration of post-war walk-ups can be found in parts of North York, notably to the west of the Bathurst corridor.
19. Dwelling units in apartments 5 or more storeys. High rise.

Represents more than 80% of total dwelling units in wards 10 and 13...
20. But what's interesting is that across the inner suburbs, in all but a few wards, 30%-50% of dwelling units are in high rise apartments.
21. As Toronto was going through its post-war expansion, we built a LOT of 5+ storey apartment buildings/units, particularly in the 1960s.
22. (we also didn't connect those tower neighbourhoods very well, a legacy we now strive to rectify)
23. ...this character - suburban tower clusters surrounded by expansive low-rise n'hoods - makes it hard to describe TO using avg densities.
24. Two sides of a coin.
A wide swathe of the city where 30-40% of dwelling units are single-detached, and 40% are 5+ storey apartments.
25. a swathe of suburbs built out during a few decades of rapid growth. Different than the core, but each also different than the others.
26. It's fascinating. A city of grown-together cities. Local differences partly revealing past politics, plans, economics, infrastructure...

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More from @g_meslin

Jan 23
1) Something that stood out to me re: opposition to 60 units of modular housing at 175 Cummer Avenue.

This is Willowdale and Cummer: Image
2) The left image outlines the site of the proposed modular housing, on the north side of the Willowdale Manor property. The right image shows the proposed plan overlaid on the aerial. ImageImage
3) This is the single-issue Voices of Willowdale website, that was created just to voice opposition to the proposed modular housing project. Image
Read 9 tweets
Nov 11, 2021
Dear @OntarioPlanners,
You may want to reacquaint yourself with the Statement of Values and Code of Practice that you require planners to study as part of earning accreditation.
Statement of Values:
To respect and integrate the needs of future generations.
Members recognize that their work has cumulative and long-term implications. When addressing short-term needs, members acknowledge the future needs of people, other species and their environments...
Professional Code of Practice:
1.0 The Planner's Responsibility to the Public Interest
Members have a primary responsibility to define and serve the interests of the public. This requires the use of theories and techniques of planning that inform and structure debate...
Read 5 tweets
Oct 19, 2021
1) When @fordnation proposes an idea for Toronto’s waterfront, you can be he will use the phrase ‘world-class’. No surprise, it’s one of the first phrases you find at the top of the government page on the #OntarioPlace redevelopment.
 
Let’s talk about ‘world-class’.
2) I hope we can begin with the shared premise that Ontario Place should be something special. That it is uniquely endowed with legacy, location, landscape, built heritage, and public ownership. It should be a jewel on the waterfront. A calling card for Toronto.
3) And just to emphasize the context, we are talking about a waterfront site, near dense and rapidly growing communities, at the heart of a city of almost 3 million people, and a region of 7 million.
Read 32 tweets
May 10, 2021
1. Last Friday was the 7th of May.
That was the one-year anniversary of Sidewalk Labs confirming, in a post from CEO Dan Doctoroff, that they would no longer be pursuing the Quayside Project.
2. Others, more knowledgeable than I on the subjects, wrote and spoke at length on concerns related to process, scope, financing, data governance, and privacy. I myself wrote about the need to achieve greater public return from such a unique public asset as the Port Lands.
3. I don’t want to relitigate any of those issues. I want to talk about another aspect of Sidewalk’s pitch that got under my skin from the outset.

I want to talk about ‘lands that for 100 years have been lying fallow’.
Read 41 tweets
Jun 12, 2020
1. A process is currently underway to develop a vision and framework for 520 acres of land in Downsview, served by three subway stations and a GO station.

It’s big!
Time to play, ‘How Big Is It?’
2. The Downsview site, atop NYC, would take you from Tribeca to Downtown Brooklyn, encompassing the entire Brooklyn Bridge.
3. The Downsview site, atop Washington DC, would take you from GWU, past Lafayette Square, to the Washington Monument and National Mall.
Read 14 tweets
May 5, 2020
1. To recap.

Paris: 650 km of fast-tracked bikeways
Milan: 35 km of streets transformed for cyclists/pedestrians
NYC: 100 miles of open streets

Toronto? After weeks of foot-dragging, you may get a short stretch of curb lane closed off in front of a busy grocery or drug store.
2. And it’s not just places like Paris, New York and Milan. Cities around the world and across Canada have been well ahead of Toronto with respect to expanding space for active transportation and outdoor activities.

3. To provide some additional context, here is a great resource, maintained by @MikeLydon, tracking COVID-19 Livable Streets Response Strategies:

docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d…
Read 33 tweets

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