urban

Designing for hurricanes and floods: U of T students draft urban planning solutions for a Florida county

ullahnor — Thu, 14 Sep 2017 16:34:12 +0000

Designing for hurricanes and floods: U of T students draft urban planning solutions for a Florida county

ullahnor Thu, 09/14/2017 - 12:34

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Children walk through flooded streets Immokalee, Fla., after Hurricane Irma. A U of T class is looking at urban planning solutions for flooding and storm surges in a Florida county, just north of Miami (photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

Noreen Ahmed-Ullah

Author legacy

Noreen Ahmed-Ullah

Topic

Global Lens

John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture

U.S.

Climate Change

Environment

Cities

urban

Subheadline

The class is made up of third-year master's students at the John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design

Tackling an issue straight from the headlines, a group of 19 graduate students from the University of Toronto are looking at flooding in a Florida county and suggesting ways to address rising water levels, hurricanes and development in flood-prone areas.

It’s timely given that Hurricane Irma hit Florida this past weekend.

Even before this year’s monster-sized hurricane, landscape architect, planner and urban designer Fadi Masoud had been working with Broward County alongside the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), on large-scale environmental issues, and the role of planning policies and tools.

This semester, the assistant professor at the John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design is charging his graduate-level class to come up with design and zoning solutions for the county, which sits just north of Miami.

Assistant Professors Fadi Masoud (left) and Elise Shelley (right) teach a class of third-year master's students at the John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design (photo by Dale Duncan)

On the first day of class this week, he moved through a power-point presentation filled with graphs of changing water levels, views of the region’s complex stormwater management system of levees and canals, and aerial shots that clearly show how Florida’s key east coast cities face flooding problems with the Atlantic Ocean on one side and the swampy Everglades on the other.

He told the class that a report last month showed sea levels rising six times faster than average. The problem has been exacerbated with rising sea levels leading to saltwater entering into canals and destroying vegetation. It’s a region he described as being trapped between the political rhetoric of climate change skepticism, developers not responsibly addressing rising water levels and operating with a “laissez-faire, Wild West mentality,” and local officials who are desperate for solutions.

“Luckily enough this didn’t pan out to be the disaster that it was supposed to be,” Masoud said of Irma. “But the chances of this happening soon are not all that low. None of this is resilient or adaptable. This is going to flood. If one of those gates, pumps, canals fails, this place is just awash.”

And with that he painted a pretty dire picture of the problem at hand. But, he added, there’s a silver lining.

“Working with a city government, such as Broward County’s Environmental Protection and Growth Management Department, that thinks really progressively and is hungry for help from a design perspective has been really rewarding,” he told the class. “For example, some of the student work we proposed last year, at least three or four project ideas have already been adopted as implementation strategies. You being in a design school and in an academic setting, you have the luxury of thinking big and thinking ambitiously.”

Abigail Friendly uses city-building know-how to connect São Paulo and Toronto

Romi Levine — Thu, 10 Aug 2017 16:40:10 +0000

Abigail Friendly uses city-building know-how to connect São Paulo and Toronto

Romi Levine Thu, 08/10/2017 - 12:40

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U of T alumna Abigail Friendly in Rio de Janeiro (photo courtesy of Abigail Friendly)

Romi Levine

Author legacy

Romi Levine

Topic

Cities around the world are growing bigger and taller faster than ever before. By 2050 the United Nations estimates, 6.3 billion people – or 67 per cent of the world’s population – will be living in urban centres.

So how do we ensure that cities still reflect and accommodate their residents as they continue to grow?

U of T alumna Abigail Friendly looks at the different ways cities are doing just that – with a focus on Toronto and Brazil.

In Toronto, initiatives like Section 37 of the Planning Act allow developers to build higher or denser, so long as they feed money back into community projects. Friendly looks at how these kinds of policies compare to those in Brazilian cities like São Paulo.

Friendly completed a PhD in planning at U of T's Faculty of Arts & Science and completed postdoctoral research at the Munk School of Global Affairs’ Institute on Municipal Finance and Governance. This month, she began a new role as an assistant professor in the department of human geography and spatial planning at Utrecht University in the Netherlands.

“I'm living in the centre of an old city next to a canal – it's pretty great,” says Friendly.

Friendly is one of a new generation of thinkers transforming research across the globe. They come from all corners of the world to do their PhD or postdoctoral research at the University of Toronto, drawn by the chance to work with the leading experts in their fields.

Where do they go from here?

In this latest instalment of a new series from U of T News, we turn the spotlight on Friendly. Below, she talks about the value of comparative research, and what Toronto and Brazil can learn from each other.

How did you become interested in researching cities in Brazil?

I went to Brazil after my master's to look at the participatory budget of housing in a city called Belo Horizonte, which is the size of Toronto.

Participatory budgeting is an approach to local decision-making that emerged in Brazil. At the time I was studying it, it was still a hot topic. Citizens decide on the local budget – they're doing it in Toronto now too.

When I went back to do my PhD at U of T, I had already worked in Brazil for a bit. I spoke Portuguese (it was already becoming a passion of mine), and I thought this is a time when I can do what I want, study what I want.

Your most recent paper for IMFG looks at what São Paulo and Toronto does with money coming from developers for community projects. What did you find?

Land value capture is capturing the value of increased densities. To build higher and denser cities, developers or the private sector shouldn't necessarily be benefiting from all of that extra value that they're gaining, and some of it should go back to investing in cities for everyone.

When I realized that what was happening in Brazil was similar to Section 37 in Toronto – which people are very interested in because it's very politicized – it seemed like a really good comparison and a good way of seeing what was challenging in both cases.

It's interesting to see the difference, especially when you look at the map of where the benefits are taking place. In Toronto, it's all in the centre of the city, whereas in São Paulo, the idea is the whole city should benefit. It's much more dispersed, and that's what I show in the paper.

The research is more data-driven. It's more economics, but it has a social equity perspective that carries through the rest of my research in Brazil and beyond.

Toronto and São Paulo are different in many ways, What’s the value in comparing the two cities?

It's definitely hard to do comparative research – so that's one caution – but I think there's not enough of it. If you looked at the two cases separately, you might learn something about them, but if you look at them in comparison, you can learn from one another. It highlights the differences, but you can also learn about how we can improve things. Planning is really about looking at some of the challenges, how we can improve things, and how we can move toward a better future for cities and for people.

There's literature in different fields that says we should do comparative research more because of all of these benefits in political science, planning and even sociology.

You just moved to Utrecht to work at the university there. What will you be doing?

I started as an assistant professor here – it's quite an interesting, collaborative department. I start teaching in November.

I just got a new grant to do work in Brazil. It'll be fun – I'll be talking to planners and city staff about how they're progressing with a new law of metropolitan governance. I'll be collaborating with a colleague in Brasilia.

I'll be starting up new research as well – I’m hoping to continue my work in Toronto and Brazil.

Utrecht is the largest university in the Netherlands, and Utrecht itself is a really charming old city. It seemed like a really attractive move – and kind of an adventure.

It’s a big decision moving to a new country – what makes it worth it?

It's a great opportunity to make new contacts, try something new, travel to new places, learn new things, and you always grow when you do this kind of thing. Of course it's hard to be away from what you know, to start new things, and learn about a new place and how things work, let alone learning a new language, which I have to do. I have to learn Dutch.

But it's pretty fun so far. It's tiring, but there are a lot of payoffs.

Increasing temperatures could become a challenge for highrise dwellers: U of T engineering professor

ullahnor — Tue, 01 Aug 2017 20:27:25 +0000

Increasing temperatures could become a challenge for highrise dwellers: U of T engineering professor

ullahnor Tue, 08/01/2017 - 16:27

Cutline

Approximately 1,200 apartment towers in Toronto built in the post-war period were not designed to be energy efficient or with adequate cool (photo by AshtonPal via Flickr)

Topic

Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering

Marianne Touchie, an assistant professor in the Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering, is quoted in Motherboard, talking about how climate change and the ensuing increase in temperature is going to cause problems for people living in highrises.

About 1,200 apartment towers in Toronto alone that were built during the post-war period did not worry about energy efficiency and cooling, the article states.

In buildings built between 1945 to 1984, “even the use of air conditioners and fans is not satisfying people from a thermal comfort perspective,” Touchie says in the article, titled, Why Social Housing Units in Cities Will Be Hard Hit by Climate Change.

She's taking part in a study that monitors environmental conditions in public housing units and offers solutions such as specialized films applied to windows.

“During the heat wave [in Toronto] last summer, over 80 percent of the suites that we monitored had average temperature of over 30°C. [These units] will become unbearable as temperatures continue to rise.”

Read about potential solutions

Uncovering a forgotten neighbourhood: U of T researcher explores Toronto’s ‘Greenwich Village’

ullahnor — Thu, 27 Jul 2017 18:20:51 +0000

Uncovering a forgotten neighbourhood: U of T researcher explores Toronto’s ‘Greenwich Village’

ullahnor Thu, 07/27/2017 - 14:20

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A row of old brick houses is what remains of the area today (photo courtesy of Heather Murray/Sarah Galbraith-Murray)

Jessica Lewis

Author legacy

Jessica Lewis

Topic

City & Culture

English

Humanities

Faculty of Arts & Science

Cities

urban

As English Professor Heather Murray began digging into information on some of Toronto’s forgotten arts and literary history, she became fascinated in a neighbourhood once considered our very own “Greenwich Village.”

Located at the southeast corner of the University of Toronto's downtown Toronto campus, between Bay and Elizabeth streets on Gerrard Street West, the area was actually referred to as “Toronto's Greenwich Village” or even as “Greenwich Village” back in the early 1930s, Murray says.

The cultural scene began in the mid-1930s and continued through until the early 1970s, with the neighbourhood playing host to painters like Arthur Lismer, Albert Franck, Franz Johnston and studio artisans such as metal workers Nancy Meek (later to become Nancy Pocock) and Rudy Renzius.

Writer Morley Callaghan could be found there as well as sculptors Eugenia Berlin and Pauline Redsell. Later, the abstract-expressionist Painters Eleven group got its start with artists like Ray Mead, Kazuo Nakamura and Harold Town hanging out at the home of Albert Franck and Florence Vale.

The name Gerrard Street Village came along a little later and that is the name Murray is using for the book she's working on about the history of the area from 1925 to 1950, when many of the artists and artisans came as immigrants or refugees.

Today, what's left is a row of seven old brick houses that include a Tim Hortons, Jimmy’s Coffee and other small restaurants.

U of T students track migratory bird deaths for extensive North American study

ullahnor — Tue, 25 Jul 2017 20:22:31 +0000

U of T students track migratory bird deaths for extensive North American study

ullahnor Tue, 07/25/2017 - 16:22

Cutline

Researchers found large buildings in areas of low urbanization – those surrounded by vegetation like forests and gardens – had a higher bird collision rate than large buildings in areas of high urbanization (photo by Gary Hershorn/Getty Images)

Don Campbell

Author legacy

Don Campbell

Topic

Subheadline

Study finds nearly one bird per day dies in collision with campus buildings during migration season

Even though he grew up in an urban area surrounded by buildings, it wasn't until Omar Yossofzai took part in a study on migratory birds that he realized how many birds die daily after crashing into buildings.

The fourth-year undergrad led a group of U of T Scarborough students to track fallen migratory birds colliding into campus buildings over a 21-day period last fall.

The group was part of a massive North American study looking at the number of birds crashing into windows. Altogether, 40 colleges and universities across North America were involved in the project with U of T Scarborough being the only contributor of data from Toronto and southern Ontario, which falls in an important migratory corridor for birds.

Researchers found that large buildings in areas of low urbanization – those surrounded by vegetation like forests and gardens – had a higher collision rate than large buildings in areas of high urbanization, like those surrounded by other buildings or parking lots.

“It was kind of stunning to see dead birds on the ground,” says Yossofzai (below), a biology student who led the U of T Scarborough portion of the study.

Professor Stephen Hager of Augustana College in Illinois launched the study to understand the effect building size and vegetation cover was having on migratory bird mortality rates.

A total of 19 bird carcasses – all non-native migratory species – were found on the U of T Scarborough campus. Of that number, 12 died in collisions with the humanities wing.

Jason Weir, associate professor of biological sciences at U of T Scarborough, says it makes sense that the humanities wing is a magnet for bird collisions.

“It’s a large building next to an area of low urbanization with lots of vegetation, so naturally it’s a hotspot for birds, especially migratory birds,” says Weir, who supervised Yossofzai and whose fourth-year ornithology class participated in the project.

That’s not to say greater urbanization in general doesn’t have an effect on bird collisions, adds Weir.

More buildings, especially large ones, increase the overall risk of a collision. Rather, the take home message should be that all large buildings, particularly those in areas of low urbanization with vegetation coverage, should adopt better conservation practices, he says.

“Toronto is an important place to consider because even though it’s urban, we have a lot of natural vegetation with extensive amounts of forested areas in an urban setting, and it’s in a migratory corridor,” Weir says.

It’s estimated that nearly 1 billion birds die annually in North America as a result of colliding with building windows. Since the 1970s, there’s been a sharp decline in boreal forest bird populations, Weir says.

While climate change and loss of winter habitat in central and south America are factors, he says what’s happening when these birds migrate could be a major factor in driving their numbers down.

“Human-caused mortality on migratory birds is astronomical,” he adds.

In addition to building collisions, house cats also have a huge effect on the migratory bird deaths, notes Weir. Past studies showed that house cats are responsible for as many as 4 billion bird deaths every year across North America.

He says practices such putting decals on the outside of windows every few feet and turning out lights or lowering blinds during early morning and late evening, especially during migration, are good starts. Keeping cats inside, or at the very least putting a bell around their neck, can also go a long way in reducing bird deaths, he says.

“Any conservation steps that we can take to mitigate the mortality rate would be very helpful,” Weir says.

Financiers are now controlling public works, much to the public's confusion

ullahnor — Mon, 24 Jul 2017 15:11:23 +0000

Financiers are now controlling public works, much to the public's confusion ullahnor Mon, 07/24/2017 - 11:11

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Ontarians got a taste of privatization in the 1990s, when the Conservative government of Mike Harris handed over the lucrative Highway 407 toll road in a 99-year lease for a fraction of its value (photo by CC BY-NC)

Author legacy

Mariana Valverde

Topic

Subheadline

U of T's Mariana Valverde & The Conversation

In the 1990s the large, nationally owned British Railways was split off into dysfunctionally separate entities and sold off to private owners in a world-famous example of complete privatization.

During the recent British election, polls revealed that most citizens now support the Labour Party’s promise to renationalize the system.

This may not seem very relevant to Canadians, because we never went through wholesale privatization – in part because we never had the wholesale nationalizations that Britain had in the 1950s.

But suddenly these international debates have indeed become relevant to Canada, although the issues here are being obscured by the downright Orwellian terminology used by infrastructure insiders.

In Canada, outright privatization was promoted in the mid-1990s by the neoconservative government of Ontario Premier Mike Harris. But one of the first instances of infrastructure privatization, southern Ontario’s 407 toll highway, proved to be a disaster and so enthusiasm quickly faded.

But while they may have shied away from completely selling off major public works, Canadian governments at all levels have still found ways to go along with the global trend of giving private capital a bigger role in public works.

Not really partnerships

As I’ve learned as an academic researching infrastructure governance, what’s emerged as the main Canadian model goes by the name of “public-private partnerships.” Ontario and British Columbia are its key promoters, though the Ontario government prefers to use the obscure term “Alternative Finance and Procurement,” which does not contain the politically sensitive word “private.”

If George Orwell, that foe of euphemistic government-speak, was still with us, he’d likely point out that “partnership” is a highly misleading term. Major provincial infrastructure projects like hospitals, bridges and transit lines do bring public and private sector “partners” together, but they’re not partnerships.

A legal partnership is a long-term agreement to join forces and share financial risks over time – such as a law firm with partners.

But today’s public-private partnerships are actually arrangements whereby corporations provide financing, engineering, construction and design services for projects chosen by governments and ultimately funded by governments. The construction folks do their work and leave. The lenders stick around to be repaid over a long period. And any project that cannot be made attractive to the big financial players simply does not get built.

Infrastructure financiers, including pension funds, make big profits. But in Canada, public-private projects have so far remained publicly owned. Some of these will generate revenue – like transit lines via passenger fares – but many will not, since in Canada road and bridge tolls are politically unpopular. That’s one major reason why the financiers don’t really want to own the assets.

The bill isn’t due for decades

Why do governments continue to overpay for private finance, as Ontario’s auditor general pointed out in 2015?

Because of the time frame. Infrastructure investors, especially pension funds, want to secure revenue streams 30 and 40 years in the future. Even youthful Justin Trudeau will have long retired when the private finance credit-card bill comes due.

Another reason for the popularity and success of the Ontario/B.C. model is that governments are happy to use big contractors who hire union labour. And hospitals and prisons built through private finance and private procurement are staffed by the same public sector union workers as older facilities. So opposition from labour and NDP opposition is muted.

Nonetheless, the infrastructure model used for the past decade, in which major infrastructure projects continue to be publicly owned and union labour is protected, is now in danger.

The federal government is making noises that it will fund the new “Infrastructure Bank” – which is not actually a bank but an infrastructure agency, to confuse Canadians even further – by selling off the few major assets that Ottawa owns, mainly airports.

The Liberals’ Infrastructure Bank might not ever do much; its predecessor from the Stephen Harper era, Public-Private Partnerships Canada, hardly made a dent.

It sounds virtuous – but isn’t

But a very real danger lies in what insiders call “asset recycling,” an approach heavily promoted by infrastructure guru Michael Fenn. The term sounds vaguely ecological, but it means selling off choice public assets to raise funds for infrastructure capital costs, as Ontario did with 51 per cent of Hydro One. That selloff netted the province $9 billion.

The Ontario Ministry of Infrastructure’s 2017 update states that in addition to Infrastructure Ontario’s public-private projects, the province is also “unlocking the value of existing assets …all net revenue gains from the sale of designated assets are to be credited… to support the province’s key infrastructure priorities.”

If you did this at home, you’d essentially be selling your backyard to pay for a new summer cottage. You can make it sound somewhat virtuous by calling it “asset recycling,” but that’s what it is.

And we won’t see governments selling off dilapidated public housing, which could actually use new investment. Instead, they’ll sell well-maintained, revenue-generating assets – those that would, if they remained in public hands, provide steady revenues into the future.

So the privatizations that Ontario’s neocon Mike Harris dreamed of in the 1990s?

They may be at long last be successfully implemented by a host of Liberals.

Mariana Valverde is an urban law and governance, and infrastructure researcher. She is a professor of criminology at the University of Toronto. This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

U of T hosts Toronto Community Housing track-and-field meet for 300 kids

ullahnor — Mon, 24 Jul 2017 15:00:14 +0000

U of T hosts Toronto Community Housing track-and-field meet for 300 kids

ullahnor Mon, 07/24/2017 - 11:00

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100m race for boys aged nine to 12 (photo by Jelena Damjanovic)

Jelena Damjanovic

Author legacy

Jelena Damjanovic

Topic

About 300 children spilled out of school buses for a day of long jumps, ball toss and racing at Varsity Stadium last week as the University of Toronto welcomed children from 40 Toronto Community Housing (TCH) communities.

The event, a track-and-field-meet, was an expansion of a partnership between U of T's Faculty of Kinesiology and Physical Education and TCH that brought Midnight Madness basketball to TCH youths in the fall and will welcome another 300 children for a swim meet on August 10.

“We look forward to opportunities to assist our community partners in projects that make a real difference in the lives of young people,” said Beth Ali, executive director of KPE’s co-curricular athletics & physical activity programs. “The use of sport to provide leadership and educational development opportunities for young people is a perfect fit for our faculty and the University of Toronto.”

Event staff racing at the track-and-field-meet (photo by Jelena Damjanovic)

The track-and-field event was part of a seven-week free summer camp for TCH residents ages six to 12, called Rookie League camp, which is run in partnership between TCH and the Jays Care Foundation.

“We’ve been running the Rookie League camp for 29 seasons, helping build strong communities by teaching children life lessons about teamwork, leadership and fair play, on and off the field,” said Husein Ladha, supervisor for active living and centralized programs for TCH. “This year, U of T very graciously offered to host a track and field meet for the kids (free of charge), and we were delighted to add it to the program.

“To get them out of their communities, have them visit a world class facility like the Varsity Stadium is an experience that they’re going to remember for a lifetime.”

In her welcoming address, Ali shared with the crowd that the track they were about to run on is the same track where U of T Olympians like Gabriela Stafford and Sarah Wells once trained.

Cheered on by an enthusiastic crowd of fellow campers, the children took turns running 100 and 400 metres and then quickly returning to the stands to join the cheering squad.

Jahmiya, 8, and Ameerah, 6, said their favourite part of the day was eating pizza and cheering each other on.

“I really want my cousin to win,” said Ameerah.

U of T task force on city hall reform featured in Toronto Life

ullahnor — Thu, 20 Jul 2017 19:41:52 +0000

U of T task force on city hall reform featured in Toronto Life

ullahnor Thu, 07/20/2017 - 15:41

Cutline

A city hall task force launched by U of T recently made recommendations on how to reform municipal government in Toronto (photo by Thomas Hawk via Flickr)

Topic

School of Public Policy & Governance

Toronto Life features a School of Public Policy & Governance (SPPG) task force that recently released recommendations for reforming city hall.

The task force, launched by U of T's Gabriel Eidelman, an assistant professor at SPPG, released a report titled “A Practical Blueprint for Change” that makes 14 recommendations such as capping council meetings to 12 hours and restricting councillors’ questions to staff.

Read the article

Young Urbanists League: how a U of T alumna created Toronto's most engaged online community

Romi Levine — Wed, 12 Jul 2017 20:12:18 +0000

Young Urbanists League: how a U of T alumna created Toronto's most engaged online community

Romi Levine Wed, 07/12/2017 - 16:12

Cutline

Alumna Rachel Lissner started Young Urbanists League after graduating from the urban studies program at U of T (photo by Romi Levine)

Romi Levine

Author legacy

Romi Levine

Topic

In a recent post on the Young Urbanists League Facebook group, a user asked fellow members what they would like to see Toronto tackle if barriers, budget and bureaucracy were non-issues.

Answers varied from the realistic (adding more rental housing units) to the imaginative: creating a swimming lane from the west end of the city to the downtown core.

The lively, engaged brainstorming session embodies what the Young Urbanists League, founded by U of T alumna Rachel Lissner, is all about – passionate, innovative thinking on what makes Toronto great and how to make it even better.

Lissner founded the group in 2014 after she graduated from the urban studies program in the Faculty of Arts & Science. She initially started the group as an offshoot of a book club, hoping to provide a platform for young people with an interest in urbanism – especially in Toronto.

“I wanted to create a space where people could have an entry-level conversation,” says Lissner. “They were coming into the world of urbanism from different perspectives.”

The group has since grown to almost 4,200 members and has become mandatory reading for local journalists and urban-focused students alike.

“It's a really good resource for people looking to dig a little deeper into the happenings of the city,” says Amilia Cervantes, a fourth-year urban studies student at U of T who is a member of the Facebook group.

She says most of her classmates are also part of the group, using it as a way to stay in the know on urban issues.

“I find a lot of the stories I see in the group are not necessarily the stories that pop up in the mainstream newspapers – it'll be more detailed or more local, and I wouldn't necessarily know about them otherwise.”

Young Urbanists League has also been successful in connecting people to job opportunities and even a handful of romantic rendezvous.

“For a while, my secret barometer was if anybody was going to get married as a result of Young Urbanists League,” Lissner jokes, though she admits it hasn’t happened yet.

Originally from Washington D.C., Lissner moved to Toronto to study at U of T.

She knew she'd come to the right place as soon as she took her first urban studies course, taught by Shauna Brail, who is now the director of the urban studies program and U of T’s presidential adviser on urban engagement.

“I was in disbelief that there was a field where you could study all of the things I was interested in,” Lissner says. “I loved urban studies because it got me out of the classroom and as a result, I was very busy exploring Toronto.”

When she isn’t rallying her online community to become more civically engaged, Lissner practises what she preaches by attending public consultations, hosting discussions on cycling or reporting potholes to 311 via Twitter.

“A lot of young people are underrepresented in everything – but especially municipal stuff – because they are not necessarily tied to institutions,” Lissner says.

She hopes more U of T students and alumni in all disciplines find ways of becoming more involved in municipal activities.

“You shouldn't have to learn about it when you're confronted with it, you should be invested in everybody's well-being from the get-go,” says Lissner.

While there have been events organized by Young Urbanists League, Lissner hopes to eventually find a way to boost the virtual community’s offline presence.

“It's good to recognize that people have multiple identities, and I don't think you can really recognize that until you meet someone face to face,” she says.

Uncover hidden histories of Toronto’s Kensington Market with augmented reality app from U of T students

Romi Levine — Tue, 11 Jul 2017 16:19:43 +0000

Uncover hidden histories of Toronto’s Kensington Market with augmented reality app from U of T students

Romi Levine Tue, 07/11/2017 - 12:19

Cutline

Photo by paxpuig via Flickr

Peter Boisseau

Author legacy

Peter Boisseau

Topic

City & Culture

Faculty of Arts & Science

University College

Cities

urban

Undergraduate Students

Teaching

Kensington Market

An augmented reality app that guides users through a dynamic tour of key locations in Toronto’s historic Kensington Market is now available for free download – thanks to U of T students in the Faculty of Arts & Science.

Students enrolled in University College’s 'Digital Tools in a Canadian Context' course used original research and archival documents to unearth generations of Kensington Market’s vibrant legacy and transform it into an interactive database.

“Kensington Market is a microcosm of factors that have contributed to Toronto’s richness as one of the world’s most multicultural city, and reveals how Canada has changed over time,” says course instructor Siobhan O'Flynn, a lecturer in Canadian studies.

Read about U of T research in Kensington Market

The student researchers were exposed to an array of high tech and old school technology, from digital tools, data plotting and coding techniques, to analogue curiosities like microfiche that left them scratching their heads about pre-internet research methods.

Nicole Paroyan interviewed members of the Ladovsky family, owners of the well-known United Bakers Dairy restaurant that was a staple of the market for more than 60 years before it moved uptown.

Along with their memories, the Ladovskys shared a treasure trove of artifacts, including menus from a bygone era.

“What was interesting was that the move by the family business to a different part of the city also reflected the movement of the Jewish community in Toronto,” says Paroyan, a fourth-year Canadian studies student. “It was fascinating how I could learn so much more about the city and immigration by studying the market’s history.”

The team worked with Toronto digital creative company No Campfire Required to create the app, which displays layers of archival video and digital content for 12 points of interest at 11 locations in and around the market. The app works through any mobile device viewfinder, triggered by a geolocation signal and specific features of each building.

From the childhood homes of composer Percy Faith and actor Al “King of Kensington” Waxman, to points of interest in the neighbourhood’s rich immigrant history, the Kensington Market: Hidden Histories app is on the Android App store and will be available for Apple devices soon, says O’Flynn.

The app is also complemented by an interactive online map on the project website with details about more than 30 market locations.

While its boundaries may have shifted slightly over the years, the market is generally acknowledged to consist of the area between Bathurst Street to the west, Dundas Street West to the south, College Street to the north and Spadina Avenue to the east. It was once home to 80 per cent of the Jewish population in Toronto, and later became a base for waves of new immigrants, from Portuguese fleeing unrest to Caribbean cultures establishing a foothold in their new city.

The market was also for a time a focal point for hippy counterculture, and the app includes tours through landmarks like the old Victory Burlesque Theatre, where Canadian rock icons Rush once shared a stage with the New York Dolls punk band.

“It’s interesting how one building could have so many different layers,” says Natalie Simonian, a third-year student in physiology and health and disease.

The app also reveals details of the market’s history as a welcoming enclave for early political groups, including anarchists, socialists, and feminists.

For Sally Zeng, who often spends social time in the market, the storied neighbourhood will never quite look the same after participating in the research project.

“I didn’t realize there was such a rich history behind the buildings I walk by every day,” says Zeng, a fourth-year diaspora & transnational studies student.

urban

Designing for hurricanes and floods: U of T students draft urban planning solutions for a Florida county

Read more about flooding issues in South Florida

Abigail Friendly uses city-building know-how to connect São Paulo and Toronto

Increasing temperatures could become a challenge for highrise dwellers: U of T engineering professor

Read about potential solutions

Uncovering a forgotten neighbourhood: U of T researcher explores Toronto’s ‘Greenwich Village’

Read more about Murray's research on the neighbourhood

U of T students track migratory bird deaths for extensive North American study

Financiers are now controlling public works, much to the public's confusion

Not really partnerships

The bill isn’t due for decades

It sounds virtuous – but isn’t

U of T hosts Toronto Community Housing track-and-field meet for 300 kids

U of T task force on city hall reform featured in Toronto Life

Read more about the task force

Read the article

Young Urbanists League: how a U of T alumna created Toronto's most engaged online community

Uncover hidden histories of Toronto’s Kensington Market with augmented reality app from U of T students

Read more at CBC News

Read about U of T research in Kensington Market