PAN AM GAMES: IT TAKES A VILLAGE
What New George Brown College student residence, part of Pan Am/Parapan Am Games Athletes’ Village
Where Cherry and Front
Why Construction was completed last week. The village will house 7,100 athletes and team officials during this summer’s Games. Some 353 units, about 10 per cent of the total, will be set aside for affordable housing after the Games.
IN LIKE A LION
Chinese New Year celebrations marking the Year of the Sheep begin with a traditional lion dance at Market Village in Markham Saturday, February 21. See photo gallery.
BAY BLOOR SHUFFLE
On Monday, February 23, the Public Works and Infrastructure Committee recommended the removal of the pedestrian scramble at Bay and Bloor. The transportation staff report makes a decent case that this particular scramble has offered minimal benefit to pedestrians and has had a significant negative effect on motorists. Yet the city’s own polling shows that the scramble is popular, especially with parents at nearby Jesse Ketchum School. One more bit of bad news for Bloor this week: another backpedal on plans for bike lanes on the east-west route.
SPOTTED
Former NDP MP and mayoral candidate Olivia Chow at Environmental Defence’s 30th anniversary gala on February 18 at Daniels Spectrum. It was announced this week that she is joining Ryerson University as a visiting professor in the faculty of arts, where she will teach community organizing and activism. ICYMI details.
MASTURBATION AND OTHER HOT TOPICS AT SEX ED RALLY
The Campaign Life Coalition rallied at Queen’s Park on Tuesday, February 24, against the new provincial sex education curriculum. The event was MCed by famously anti-gay former TDSB trustee Sam Sotiropoulos, who implored the media not to portray the 200 or so people gathered “as religious fanatics [and] social conservatives who ought to be dismissed,” before adding, “These are parents of the very children that this education is intended to pervert.” Then Jack Fonseca of Campaign Life pumped up the crowd by asking, “Do you feel more comfortable that the Liberal government enlisted the help of a child pornographer to develop the new sex ed curriculum?” to which the crowd responded, “We say NO!” Full story with quotes from some of the more, um, colourful participants.
TERROR FEARS IN CASE OF MYSTERY TUNNEL
“There’s no criminal offence for digging a hole.” Toronto Deputy Chief Mark Saunders admits police don’t know what to make of a tunnel in a wooded area near the York University campus at Jane and Steeles unearthed by a conservation officer. A generator, wheelbarrow, rosary and Remembrance Day poppy nailed to the wall were among the objects found in the 10-metre-long, metre-wide, two-metre-high tunnel. Its location near this summer’s Pan Am/Parapan Am Games tennis venue has sparked speculation that it may have been part of a terror plot. Saunders says the tunnel has been filled in because it posed a safety hazard, which raised questions among media about why the cops didn’t wait until the person or persons behind the construction turned up. Saunders didn’t exactly answer that question.
THE WEEK IN NUMBERS
$74.8 million
How much the city is on the hook for “sunk costs” for cancelling the Scarborough LRT.
$3.1 million
What the city spent on efficiency studies during the Ford years.
$16.1 million
How much the city auditor says was saved as a result.
ST. LAWRENCE MARKET FLUCTUATIONS
Vendors in the St. Lawrence Market’s cart program have launched a petition asking the city to reconsider evicting them on April 1. According to the city, the program is just an unfortunate casualty of redevelopment of the north building at Front and Jarvis, which necessitates using Market Lane as a construction staging area. In a letter sent to vendors in December, Market manager Nick Simos details the space constraints caused by the redevelopment that mean the small wooden carts surrounding the perimeter of both the north and south buildings will need to be freed up to accommodate farmers come summer. More on this story.
TAR SANDS HIT BY DOUBLE WHAMMY
Two critical blows for tar sands producers this week. On Tuesday, President Barack Obama vetoed Senate and Congressional approval of TransCanada’s Keystone XL Pipeline. On Monday, Shell announced it is halting development of its 200,000-barrel-a-day Pierre River Mine project in northern Alberta.
Compiled by NOW staff with files from Ben Spurr, Zach Ruiter and Anthony Burton.
