To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

Is the city really getting shit!

When i moved here 9 years ago it was a great city, not to crowded, ok infrastructure, nice people.

I find recently that people are so mean and passive aggressive, the subways system is a joke, we have a mayor that looks like he just won a pie eating contest and the city just seems to be going to the shitter.

Everyone wants to raise prices on everything yet my wages are not going up.

I dont know, maybe its me, but has anyone else noticed this shift in what i thought was a great city? or is it me? is it time for me to go home? LOL

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

The cost of living pressure isnt just Toronto.

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

One wonders what bearing his weight is upon his ability to be mayor.;)

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

Well nothing really but he really is a terrible mayor, to me his fat, badly dressed demeanour just reflects on his terribly poor decisions as mayor. its like you look like a mess, act like a mess! I feel sorry for the poor fella whos going to have to clean up his mess in 4 years.

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

Oh, I think that's a serious consideration. I wouldn't hire someone as a programmer or an accountant, or anything really, if they were as fat as he is. My line of thought is that, if a person can't gain control over their own body, they're not likely to be able to work anything external to it. It's a bit like considering an applicant with piss stained trousers, poor aim in that regard doesn't directly prevent someone from doing sums but I'd rather a tax advisor who was cleaner.

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

Yes, im aware of that, but ive never lived anywhere else so im asking SPECIFICALLY Torontorians.

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

In my view its simple

If you can't manage or properly take care of your own body, why should I trust you with anything else!

In the same vein as messy desk, messy mind, messy disorganized work..

What you see is what you get!

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

Im guessing you didnt vote for him:lol:

Democracy sux when the other guy gets in.

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

To be honest Mr Ford was all about getting the ‘gravy’ out of the council..

The consultants have been called in (KPMG) and we seem to be lacking in excess gravy...

Now it cuts, 10% in all departments, and a quite impressive drop in popularity

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

Are you saying that the "gravy" was nothing but political rhetoric and it was never really there, so now he has to make cuts to services that actually affect people in order to spend less as promised?

Well, KPMG did OK out of it if no one else. Quelle surprise.

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

LOL I wasnt able to vote :( only been a citizen a month but no i wouldnt have done. This guy had no frickin clue about politics and the only gravy hes ever seen is the stain down the front of his crumpled shirt LOL from where he ate at the chip truck outside city hall at lunch.

(they do, do good fries though, gotta say)

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

It's all relative - compared to London or New York, Toronto still isn't crowded and does have ok infrastructure. I find people pretty much the same wherever I go though: most people are basically nice once you get to know them. Some are genuine jerks for sure, but they're a very small minority.

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

Toronto hasn't moved all that much in 6 years for me- although I had an absence during that time.

I do think the city will gradually lose it's way in standard of living tables. This is based on the fact that so much of it is now being lined up for high rise condo's and there are so many being built. On it's own this does not mean much but without additional roads or additional subway lines getting from A to B will simply be more and more time consuming.

This is where I feel London has really stolen a march on it's North American counterparts because of it's investment in the tube network and crossrail.

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

It's just you. Toronto has always been a bit shit.

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

Agreed that increasing housing density will make transport more painful in Toronto but I wouldn't hold up London as an example of how to do it right. Anyone who's ever taken the Northern or Central lines to work in the morning would think that the crush on the Yonge line was a bit of light relief...

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

I have no idea what he looks like, nor do I care. But I believe your statement above summarizes the comments of the posters above perfectly.

I also belief that those such comments as those stated above reflect very poorly upon those that live in Toronto or its surroundings;)

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

I agree that they are over crowded, but with the investment in the tube infrastructure and the new trains they are introducing the capacity of the overall tube network in London will be increased 30%. The crowding on lines such as central and northern will be reduced dramatically.

The fact of the matter is most Londoners ride the tube to work and this is why it is a good example for Toronto. All the people who I work with here in Toronto would not dream of using the subway. There are simply not enough stations or trains. The network needs to be built out effectively.

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

What comments? I live in Toronto and see it everyday i see your in Calgary. IM not running it down essentially im saying its changed a hell of lot from my perspective in the last 9 years.

But ask most people in Toronto and they will all say the mayor is a fat useless slob!

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

He's a fat slob, no doubt about that, and that undermines confidence in his ability to manage and to communicate. I'm unsure to what extent this is a political stance as I don't what most Canadian politicians look like. Mr. Harper, the Prime Minister, is certainly a porker, you wouldn't want to have to pass him on a tram. By contrast, that fellow from the Bloc, Gilles someone, looks as if he has a mirror in his house. I don't know if the Liberals or the NDP have a leader at the moment. From this, admittedly limited, sample, I think we can conclude that oozing corpulence is the Conservative style, one that well befits the champions of unbridled capatialism and that the French are a blessing to Canada in bringing athleticism to Parliament.

Toronto has gone to the dogs since the closing of the Nova Fish Bar. When the cheese man is dead there'll be no reason to go there.

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

Look around you at the average canadian male;)


I doubt very much that being a fat slob has a negative impact on your ability to communicate with other fat slobs. Michael Moore is a fat slob, but he's quite good at getting a point over, even if he's not Canadian.

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

Point taken. I'll change my trousers more often.

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

SUVs explained.

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

i spend plenty of time in Toronto when i'm not travelling for work, and i don't enjoy it all that much! i'm a country boy though so it might not be any fault of the city itself. however the mayor comes across as a total arse. also a bit disappointed with how they're tearing down the brick buildings and replacing them with condos in the supposed historical quarter of the city (saint lawrence market area)

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

The major new building there, that ghastly thing south of the market, is on an site that's been empty for years. Obviously the building drags down the neighbourhood but no bricks were sacrificed for that one. To the west of the market, where the Fish Market restaurant and Frank Pontieri's garage used to be, yes, that was a nice looking block and it'll be nasty when they're done. Looking at that I'm glad I don't live there anymore, it'll end up being like City Place or St. Jamestown, high density rented units, getting rougher by the year.

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

:D Yes, the mayor's a twat but it's an austerity climate all over the western world and Toronto is getting off pretty lightly in my view. Yesterday's furore about TTC cuts essentilally boils down to whether they should raise the $3.00 fare (which gets you from one end of the city to the next; compare that with London) to $3.10 or $3.15, or make cuts to services. That would be the first hike in 3 years. Umm, no brainer.

Then, the police issue. I see them all the time. Where? Parked outside Tim Horton's, that's where. For god sake's. If they're that bored or there's that little to do than to try and emulate Bob Ford's appearance, we should have fewer of them and save some money.

I didn't vote for the whale and don't support the cuts. At least, though, they seem to be fairly broad-based and not as ideologically one-sided as Cameron's in the UK. I was just there for two weeks. You think London's got it better? Hop over there and experience things for a bit and then let's have a chat.

He's a twat but he won't change that much.

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

:rofl:

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

I thought Toronto was quite expensive, filthy, unkept and full of people shouting and talking to themselves. But I have to say, I thought the transport network was excellent.

James... im just about to head down to Northcote in 10 mins. :)

And I had a superb Dhansak last night.

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

Compared to London, Toronto does have a huge homeless population, many of them deranged. So too does Vancouver, we might consider this to be a feature of Canada vs. the UK. I don't know that Toronto's dirtier though, I don't see any difference there. Transit is good if you live along one of the three streets with the subway (four if you count the line that goes to Mel Lastman's house but that's way up north and not much help). It's not so good if you have to travel east/west along another street than Bloor as the trams are very weather and traffic prone.

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

That was fast!

I remember meeting Will Greenwood in the Northcote pub with some rugby chums a couple of years ago. Nice guy actually and always enjoyed his wit when he commentated.

I wouldn't half mind a decent fry up from one of those cafe's down there right now.

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

I was surprised at how many homeless people there were when I went over to Victoria on Vancouver Island. It seems that they will happily plant themselves anywhere in Canada not restrict themselves to the large cities.

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

Victoria is the capital of BC isnt it, not some hokey 2 horse town?

If I was homeless in Canada I too would head for somewhere with the mildest climate... Really the only thing stopping many people from moving to Victoria is the employment prospects vs the cost of property there, if you are homeless that not really an issue...

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

I don't think that really holds up. In this article (it is the Guardian so it must be right) http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/20...-homeless-rise there were 4,672 rough sleepers counted in London in one night. This was 2009 but I can't think it has got any better.

This report on Vancouver http://www.metrovancouver.org/planni...se%20FINAL.pdf states the number of rough sleepers counted in Vancouver as 731.

Granted that London is a bigger metropolitan area than Vancouver, but at about 8 million people to 2.5 million people I don't see how you can claim Vancouver has a huge homeless population compared to London. If Vancouver had an equal proportion of rough sleepers as London you would have expected about 1,450 to be found. Double the actual number.

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

I don't believe I did claim that. One thinks of Vancouver as having a lot of homeless beggars, just as one thinks of it as being rainy, but that may just be the image of the place; something brought about by advertising and promotion.

Toronto vs. London, no contest, lots of natives in Toronto.

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

BC advertises for, and promotes, homeless people now ? ;)

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

Who knows. I suppose I should go and look but even with a graduation to attend I'm not inspired to visit.

"Compared to London, Toronto does have a huge homeless population, many of them deranged. So too does Vancouver"

I suppose the issue here is whether or not the full stop after deranged ends the comparison with London. I wouldn't for a moment compare Vancouver and London and am a bit startled that anyone would.

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

Something else to improve the quality of life in Toronto:

http://www.thestar.com/news/transpor...d-transit?bn=1

Just depressing.

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

I'm curious. Toronto's deficit is supposedly $750m or something like that. How does that compare with cities of the same size in the western world? Natch, it's wise to clear one's debts but over a manageable period of time. What's Vancouver's status?

Just wondering how much in the shithole TO is, supposedly, from a financial perspective.

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

On a positive note my company is relocating. I will now be able to see my office from my Condo window. An 8 minute walk with the new bridge from Fort York to Front.

Add this to the bar on my ground floor and I have worked out that during the winter I will be able to venture outside just 16 minutes a day and never have to leave the same two blocks all season should I choose.

I truly believe it would have been difficult to foster this life style in many other cities.

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

The number of rough sleepers appears to have gone way up in London and down in Vancouver. However the number of people using emergency shelters in Vancouver has gone up apparently.

http://www.vancouversun.com/news/Num...515/story.html

Re: To my fellow Torontarians....is it me or.....
 

B'strd. I meanwhile am finally giving in and despite paying a premium to live one min from a subway station am going to start driving to work as the bus part of my journey is just so bad.

As for the deficit, if Ford had not cancelled the vehicle registration tax and not gone for a 0% property tax increase there wouldn't be a problem.