http://spacing.ca/wire/2009/07/18/saturdays-headlines-54/

http://spacing.ca/wire/?p=5569

Even though it is a Saturday, the offerings in today’s newspapers were too interesting to be ignored.  Far from the repetitive strike doom and gloom - union-bashing, criticizing Miller (justifiably or not), temporary garbage dumps, rats and the much-covered garbaneurs - Saturday’s papers had a refreshing selection of provocative articles I thought Spacing readers might be itching to discuss.  I have only chosen a few, so feel free to suggest others I may have missed.

• Here’s to getting high on the green stuff [ Globe & Mail ] - The Globe revisits Les Klein’s proposed idea of putting a “green ribbon” over the Gardiner.

• Yonge-Bloor development on the brink [ Toronto Star ] - Kazakh Developers defaulting on their loans for an 80-storey condo at One Bloor.

• Toronto’s new murder capital [ Globe & Mail ] - A look into the York-Weston neighbourhood in Toronto where 10 deaths have occurred since January, twice as many as the more infamous Jane-Finch area.

• Toronto Life Square in receivership [ Globe & Mail ] - The year-old Toronto Life Square building at the corner of Dundas and Yonge was meant to mark the completed transformation of the area into Toronto’s newest commercial centre.  Instead, mounting debts have led to foreclosure.

• The Dufferin Mall? Really? [ Globe & Mail ] - The role of gentrification in the $11-million transformation of the “ghetto mall” at Dufferin south of Bloor.

• Curb your enthusiasm [ Globe & Mail ] - Toronto’s ‘a la cart’ street food gets a resounding thumbs down in comparison to other outdoor food vendors around the world.

No, this isn’t about ALA. If you’re a longtime reader, you know that I will often say that I intend to post about X conference in a more substantial fashion “later”, and then I never do.

Moving on. Four things that shocked me when I learned of their existence.

1. Estheticians. Specifically in relation to eyebrows.

I’d read some beauty books aimed at teens, and a few of them did discuss techniques for plucking one’s eyebrows. But the notion of paying someone else to attend to any desired eyebrow maintenance? It stunned me. I just assumed that other folks were more skilled in the area of eyebrow shaping.

2. Foundation garments.

I thought others were simply shaped in a way that conformed more closely to the lines of non-tailored clothing.

3. The kind of socks that you cannot see when they are worn.

I assumed the feet of others did not sweat or blister.

4. The kind of test preparation where you pay someone to help you learn the material.

I did not see the difference between this and actual cheating.

All these things, I see now, have to do with self-presentation, whether of appearance or intellect. (Or the appearance of intellect, which was my issue with test preparation.) All of them also connect to the idea of not needing help, whether from other humans or via clothing. They’re versions of the angry toddler outburst: “I can (and should, and it would be morally reprehensible if I did not) do it mySELF!”

But really? There’s not much in life we do all by ourselves.

Originally published at sararyan.com. You can comment here or there.

http://feeds.gothamistllc.com/click.phdo?i=f8d1d74edfb19485646ba0ac7f7df6e3

http://torontoist.com/2009/07/historicist_sketching_cultural_nationalism.php

Every Saturday at noon, Historicist looks back at the events, places, and characters—good and bad—that have shaped Toronto into the city we know today.

</form>

In 1921, the Ontario Department of Education selected Charles William Jefferys to illustrate George M. Wrong's Ontario Public School History of Canada, a textbook being published under Lorne Pierce's Ryerson Press imprint. Upon their first meeting, the English-born artist—whose family had bounced around the northeastern U.S. and Ontario before settling in Toronto around 1880—and Pierce, a former Methodist minister, hit it off immediately despite a gap in age of twenty-one years. In Pierce, Jefferys found a kindred spirit who shared his ambition to excite nationalist sentiment among Canadians. He wanted to popularize Canadian history as an epic and romantic story by bringing historical characters to life through his illustrations. The long friendship and collaboration between artist and publisher, which resulted in a number of books, proved so successful that Jefferys's images became instantly recognizable, Canadian icons that shaped more than one generation's understanding of Canadian nationalism.

As a child in Cabbagetown, Jefferys showed a precocious natural inclination towards illustration. Charging one cent for a Canadian historical scene or two cents for an English scene, Jefferys decorated textbooks for classmates with drawings of the Battle of Queenston Heights or Wolfe at Quebec. He attended evening classes at the Ontario School of Art—and would later study further under the tutelage of G.A. Reid and C.M. Manley. But the consistent mismanagement of the family's finances by his father, a builder who'd had designs on his son becoming an architect, sent him into the working world at sixteen, when he became a lithographer's apprentice at the Toronto Lithographing Company in 1885.

As his grandson Robert Stacey noted in C.W. Jefferys, 1869–1951 (National Gallery of Canada, 1985), Jefferys "felt constricted by the advertising medium's limited range for expression and experimentation." Moving to the world of journalism, he began working for the Globe in 1889. This experience, and stints with the News, Courier, and the Telegram—where he illustrated John Ross Robertson's history columns—provided him with the opportunity to travel and come to know its many regions intimately. Whether it was designing soup can labels, or accompanying a reporter to cover a royal tour or political campaign, Jefferys pragmatically accepted these commissions to pay the bills. But his pursuit of more serious art continued unabated.

An accomplished water colour painter, Jefferys was firmly ensconced in the Toronto art establishment. In his youth, he was a member of the Toronto Art Students' League, which set off into the wilderness to sketch landscapes. He was a founding member of the Arts and Letters Club—and later its president—through which he had a direct influence on the Group of Seven painters. Stacey quotes one source as suggesting that Jefferys's influence was such that he'd even been invited to join the Group's first exhibition. He was also a founder and president of both the Ontario Society of Artists and the Canadian Society of Painters of Water Colour.

</form>

His chosen subject matter for the canvas was uncompromisingly Canadian. In addition to his Ontario scenes, Jefferys was one of the first artists to effectively capture the subtle colour variations in the expansive prairie sky and that region's rolling landscape. Yet his artistic career progressed largely without wider public recognition. His paintings didn't sell, Stacey writes, "no doubt because of their straightforward presentation of wilderness, rural, and urban views with which the public critics as yet had few if any romantic or nostalgic associations." And so, he continued his newspaper and magazine work.

In the serious economic depression of the early 1890s, when artist commissions were few and patrons of the Canadian arts community difficult to come by, Jefferys moved to New York City to work with the sensationalist Herald from 1893 to 1901. In the days before photojournalism, it was Jefferys who scrambled around town making sketches about murders, fires, suicides, riots, strikes, and anything else in the bustling metropolis. It all seemed rather tedious to someone who was becoming aware of the power of his medium for popularizing his interest in history. At the time, he would reflect in 1936, "the depiction of the crowded life of the present was a startling and unwelcome change from the romantic imaginings of the past." But he also came to see the beneficial training journalistic illustration provided him. "I realized," he added, "that yesterday was as alive as today and that the accurate and intensive observation of how people acted now and here was the best way to understand how they acted in the past."

In 1899, the death of his first wife, Jean Adams, during childbirth (and that of his infant son shortly afterwards) prompted his permanent return to Canada. Taking an opportunity to engage with more nationalist subject matter, he drew editorial cartoons for the satirical newspaper The Moon. He married the editor's niece, Callie (Clara) West, in 1907. Beginning in 1910, the couple and their five daughters resided in the rural area of York Mills—where a plaque at 4111 Yonge Street marks the location of their home and the barn Jefferys converted into his studio.

</form>

At the Ryerson Press, Pierce recognized the textbook market as not only the best avenue for promoting cultural nationalism but also a lucrative business opportunity. Until then, most English readers and history textbooks in Canada originated from British or American firms—just as these firms dominated the wider Canadian publishing trade. At best, a Canadian schoolbook might be a slightly altered American text printed in Canada. Popularizing Canadian history and stories with youth, Pierce hoped, would ensure they remained interested in their country's arts and letters throughout their lives.

Following the initial success of Wrong's Ontario Public School History of Canada (1921), Pierce used Jefferys's illustrations extensively in further textbooks like Wrong's The Story of Canada (1929) and W. Stewart Wallace's A First Book of Canadian History (1928), as well as in numerous children's adventure stories and poetry books.

It was clear, however, Sandra Campbell writes in the Journal of Canadian Studies (30:3), that "Jefferys's art proved even more potent than the prose it illustrated, and Pierce was quick to capitalise." He published Jefferys's Dramatic Episodes in Canada's Story (1930), assembled from sketches and essays Jefferys had originally composed in the 1920s for the Star Weekly, and Canada's Past in Pictures (1934). The magnum opus was The Picture Gallery of Canadian History (1942, 1945 and 1950), a three volume set that collected over 2,000 sketches. This bestselling set went through six printings by 1970.

</form>

Jefferys's most famous images depict intrepid individuals—explorers, missionaries, and military men—who are caught up in the events of their time. Pioneer women are also given substantial attention with the stories of Madame de la Tour, and the Filles du Roi recreated. In images like "The First Furrow," anonymous people undertaking the ordinary tasks of settlement are elevated to heroic stature. Recalling his water colour painting, the regionally distinct Canadian landscape is an almost ever-present character that began to seem more romantic. But Jefferys's greatest skill—learned in his newspaper days—was in bringing his human characters to life with their expressive emotion and the suggestion of movement.

Jefferys intended these books to be comprehensive accounts of Canadian history. "My aim," he wrote in the preface to Dramatic Episodes, "has been merely to pick out from the great mine of Canadian history a few fragments that may suggest its richness in human interest and its wealth of picturesque and dramatic incident." As a result, there are patterns of omission in the volumes. Although Jefferys and Pierce were outwardly concerned with English and French unity in Canada, Jefferys's interest in Quebec, with very few exceptions, ceases after the Conquest. Scenes in Eastern Canada predominate over Western vignettes, as do rural venues over the urban and industrial. Most of these omissions stemmed from the artist's avowed preference for the distant past over more recent, post-Confederation history in his selection of episodes.

Seeing himself as a popularizer, Jefferys was equally unconcerned with his sketches interrogating the larger historiographical context within which his characters moved or with the novel interpretations of emerging Canadian historians like Donald Creighton or Harold Innis. Rather Jefferys was a romantic historian, who emphasized drama, narrative, and individual actors loaded with symbolism. Writing in the Journal of Canadian Studies (11.4), Dennis Duffy called it history as opera.

</form>

Yet Jefferys's reconstructions of bygone events were based on painstaking research. He scoured visual and written sources to ensure accuracy of historical or ethnographic detail. He personally explored battle sites, settlements, and territory traversed by the explorers. Friends noted his idiosyncratic habit of collecting and studying musket locks, shoe buckles, and other antique miscellany—which explains the preponderance of commonplace items and obsolete farming implements sketched in The Picture Gallery of Canadian History. His sketches scrupulously adhered to historical (and technical) accuracy whenever possible. He explained the importance of accuracy in art in a 1936 article in the Canadian Historical Review: "The critical examination of written history, the comparison of source-documents, are marked features of modern historical study. The pictorial reconstruction of history too frequently displays the lack of a corresponding degree and quality of discrimination." His sketches have a level of academic vigour not likely seen in the accompanying illustrations of other children's texts of the era.

Jefferys was by no means the only artist seeking to cultivate nascent Canadian nationalism during in the early twentieth century. But unlike others "sequestered in the drawing-rooms or galleries of the elite," in Osborne's words, Jefferys's partnership with Pierce ensured his heartstring-pulling imagery was "physically and intellectually accessible to the general public." The Ryerson Press dominated the elementary and high school textbook market in English-speaking Canada from the 1930s to the early 1960s. During the Depression, Pierce even distributed complimentary copies of Dramatic Episodes to impoverished school districts, and encouraged the Carnegie Endowment to purchase copies for donation to American libraries. With generations of boys and girls as his captive audience, Jefferys's (admittedly whiggish) presentation of history became one of the dominant and enduring influences on Canadian nationalism and, Duffy adds, "the collective memory of his countrymen." Speaking at Jefferys's funeral in October 1951, Pierce provided an apt, if florid, eulogy: "No other artist, no other Canadian, has done so much to knit together into one community of fellowship and purpose all parts of Canada. No one has done so much to build a covered bridge between the English and French speaking peoples of Canada."

http://spacing.ca/wire/2009/07/18/street-scene-wires-above-richmond-st/

http://spacing.ca/wire/?p=5407

The cage that powers the TTC.

Street Scene will appear each week showcasing the illustrations of local artist Jerry Waese.

http://feeds.gothamistllc.com/click.phdo?i=92e69a704efe1513dba82ea71c900e90

http://torontoist.com/2009/07/strike_watch_day_twenty-six.php

As the city accumulates garbage throughout the ongoing city workers' strike, we'll be accumulating photos. Torontoist's photographers are checking in on garbage and recycling bins around the city throughout the strike, an attempt to follow the tangible effects of the strike and complement our other coverage.

WHERE: Bay Street and King Street West.

WHEN: 7 a.m. today.

I like to look at sexy pictures on the internet. Self portraits especially, because there's a confidence in the best of them that I find really inspiring. Like this one of Katie West. Or this, of Malloreigh. I think I understand images that capture the subject, that catch an expression or a bit of body language that expresses something about that subject. But I don't know if I understand the body language itself. That sounds so lame to say, because of course I understand it to see it, but the way I move my own body is different I think. I move like I don't think anyone can see me, because I can't see myself. So everything is just either efficient or lazy.

When I set up a camera to try to take pictures of myself (not necessarily sexy pictures, though of course that's what got me started on this, so let's be honest and talk about those) I don't know what to do. I look at the camera and what? I just try to think sexy thoughts. Which of course leaves me with these pictures where I'm staring at the camera with my mouth half open to say something. Because I'm used to "sexy" being words and I'm used to "sexy" being actions. Ideas that you either say or do that bring you closer to someone else, so that you're both part of the same dirty story for a little bit. I don't know how to tell those dirty stories with the way I look.

But I want to.

So, here's a request. Can you post links to sexy pictures of boys? I'm not really looking for pornography, here. I guess I'm trying to figure out things that make for compelling images of men. Post really masculine pictures, or androgynous, or whatever you think is sexy. Also, if you feel up to it, talk about what you like about the image?

http://asofterworld.com/index.php?id=27

and, probably more importantly,

http://asofterworld.com/index.php?id=43

are now available as prints. #43 is one of my favourite of our comics.

http://feeds.newscientist.com/c/749/f/10897/s/5537aa5/l/0L0Snewscientist0N0Carticle0Cmg20A3271760B10A0A0Eencrypted0Ecctv0Eprotects0Ethe0Einnocent0Bhtml0DDCMP0FOTC0Erss0Gnsref0Fonline0Enews/story01.htm

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20327176.100

Software that securely scrambles footage of anyone who is not a suspect should ease privacy fears over surveillance cameras

http://feeds.gothamistllc.com/click.phdo?i=a1864e6b6bdc8006da66e4dcd59b42d1

http://torontoist.com/2009/07/urban_planner_july_18_2009.php

Urban Planner is Torontoist's daily guide to what's on in Toronto, published every morning. If you have an event you'd like considered, email all of its details—as well as images, if you've got any—to events@torontoist.com.

MUSIC: The twenty-first annual Beaches International Jazz Festival kicked off last night at Woodbine Park. Today you can soak up music by main-stage performers Teeny Tucker—who will be making her Canadian performance debut—and Monkey Junk, with their unique blend of R&B, soul, and funk. The New Generation stage also boasts a solid line-up, with flamenco fusion guitarist Johannes Linstead and local jazz-rock coterie Ninja Funk Orchestra. Other events during the ten-day festival include a Workshop and Lecture Series, Streetfest with entertainment along two kilometres of Queen Street East, and performances at Kew Gardens next weekend. Woodbine Park (Lake Shore Boulevard East and Coxwell Avenue), 12 p.m., FREE.

PARTY: The second annual Toronto Zombie Walk Fiendraiser is happening tonight, with performances by The Screamagers, The Raclones, and The Skullians that will wake the dead. Tonight's event of blood and gore will also feature giveaways and a zombie costume contest. Money raised from the party will go towards the operating costs of this year's Toronto Zombie Walk, which is happening on October 24 with an anticipated crowd of a couple thousand mindless monsters. The Smiling Buddha (961 College Street West); 9 p.m.; $10 for humans, $7 for zombies.

WORDS: Local artist, photographer, and writer—not to mention target of the "Dinner with a Stranger" project—Franke James is back with an illustrated book about going green in the city, Bothered By My Green Conscience. During today's book talk and signing, James will discuss and read a visual essay from her autobiographical book, which addresses feelings of inner conflict and powerlessness about going green, with the hopes of inspiring change and motivating readers to do something that will have a real impact in their life. James takes aim at "SUV-driving, imported-strawberry-eating urban dwellers" (including herself) and challenges individuals to "do the hardest thing first." Roots (100 Bloor Street West), 3–4 p.m., FREE.

BENEFIT: Benefit Without Borders, a fundraiser variety show and the first annual global benefit for Burners Without Borders, is happening tonight in the heart of Kensington Market. Proceeds from tonight's event will go towards supporting Burners Without Borders, an organization dedicated to building community through art and action, born out of a "spontaneous, collective instinct to meet gaping needs where existing societal systems were clearly failing." The show will feature burlesque performances by Starlight Burlesque, the antics of One-Arm Bob, belly dancers, comedy acts, circus performances, and other mixed-bag weirdness. Bread & Circus (299 Augusta Avenue), 9 p.m., $10.

CULTURE: The thirty-seventh annual Festival of India (or Ratha-Yatra) begins today with a colourful parade of forty-foot-tall floats, chanting, drumming, and dancing down Yonge Street (beginning at Bloor Street and continuing south to Queens Quay). With the theme of "Journey Through India," the weekend-long festival—expected to draw nearly forty thousand people—will showcase the heritage of many different regions throughout the country. The Yoga Meltdown is also happening tomorrow as part of the festival, where the city's yoga community will come together to present outdoor classes and demonstrations, vegan and vegetarian cooking demonstrations, mantra meditation circles, and a free all-you-can-eat vegetarian feast. Yonge Street and Queens Quay East (25 Queens Quay East); parade 11 a.m.–2 p.m., festival 12–9 p.m.; FREE.

http://feeds.newscientist.com/c/749/f/10897/s/552dc53/l/0L0Snewscientist0N0Carticle0Cmg20A3271740B30A0A0Eclingy0Emartian0Edust0Eguilty0Eas0Echarged0Bhtml0DDCMP0FOTC0Erss0Gnsref0Fonline0Enews/story01.htm

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20327174.300

Experiments on Earth reveal the culprit behind Mars's especially sticky dust – which might help scientists devise ways to combat the problematic powder

http://feeds.newscientist.com/c/749/f/10897/s/552c039/l/0L0Snewscientist0N0Carticle0Cmg20A3271740B90A0A0Eairport0Etravelators0Eactually0Eslow0Epassengers0Edown0Bhtml0DDCMP0FOTC0Erss0Gnsref0Fonline0Enews/story01.htm

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20327174.900

When rushing to catch your plane, is it faster to hop on a moving walkway or not? A new mathematical study tackles the answer

It took me two years to fall in love with Athens. It's taken me four to get to the comfortable forever friends stage with Seattle. It's strange to have definite, finite plans for the next year, and then beyond that-? Hunches, probabilities, hopes, things I'm working towards- but so much depends on so much that is unknown. I wonder where I'll go next. I like the medieveal notion of the wheel of fate. Is that a cop out?

One strange thing about moving around so much, and being so deeply rooted in all the places that I've moved, is that sometimes I'll have this fragment of a memory that is very intense, and then spend a long long time flailing around, trying to locate the memory's geography, and the people who might have shared it with me.

One thing I like about being alive is that I am in the midst of the beginning stages of a proper penpal ship with a person I met once, eleven years ago, and spent about three hours with. And whose mom found me on facebook and said that her child had mentioned me in passing several times over the intervening years, and would I like his address? And some whimsy said yes, and suddenly there is that sort of intellectual confessor and collaborator I wanted- someone to engage in that process of figuring it out, via pen and paper.

Also there is this whole kind of raising a teenager thing. It is beginning to consistently be a positive experience. Which is pretty fantastic.

Also, if anyone has some spare, relatively nice arm chairs kicking around- well, they would not go to waste in our living room.

http://feeds.gothamistllc.com/click.phdo?i=c99602cc6237453b1074699cbed0969e

http://torontoist.com/2009/07/toronto_life_square_is_broke_and_life-less.php

Toronto Life Square—the massively unattractive ogre on the north-east corner of Yonge and Dundas, which houses not only a Future Shop, Google's local offices, and an AMC that uncomfortably doubles as Ryerson classrooms, but also a vast and ever-growing pool of all of our tears—is "broke," according to the Globe and Mail. What's more: Toronto Life, who scooped up the naming rights in 2007, "has been locked in a months-long legal dispute to remove its name from the project." (Perhaps the magazine finally realized the irony of suggesting that the building that loomed over Dundas Square added anything to Toronto life.) The Globe notes that, under the building's original owners, a subsidiary of PenEquity, it racked up some $280 million in debt, and has now been placed in receivership, meaning that it'll soon change ownership but not, unfortunately, disappear altogether. That fate will, for now, remain confined to the dreams of those who want to believe Toronto could have done so much better.

http://secretvespers.com/2009/07/17/shadow-arms/

http://secretvespers.com/?p=833

I used the last sheet of a pad of drawing paper today. Do you have any rituals around the first or the last of anything?

Share and Enjoy:

http://feeds.newscientist.com/c/749/f/10897/s/552385a/l/0L0Snewscientist0N0Cgallery0Chowdoesmygalaxygrow0DDCMP0FOTC0Erss0Gnsref0Fonline0Enews/story01.htm

http://www.newscientist.com/gallery/howdoesmygalaxygrow

Edwin Hubble devised a classification system for galaxies that is still in wide use today – see the diversity of galactic shapes in our gallery

http://spacing.ca/wire/2009/07/17/stolen-bike-recovered-through-covert-bike-strike/

http://spacing.ca/wire/?p=5495

Heather’s story is not one many Toronto cyclists may be used to hearing.  Although it begins with what is for many an all too common experience - having one’s bike stolen - the tale finishes with a scene that wouldn’t seem out of place in a James Bond film or Tom Clancy novel.  Complete with an improvised set-up at the appropriately named ‘Castle Frank’ subway station, a team of undercover cops, nervous yet supportive friends and a tinted ‘old-school’ SUV, Heather’s story is nothing short of spectacular.

It begins on the Friday night of the long weekend in May, while Heather was having a drink with friends at a bar in Kensington.  “I had a feeling and I don’t normally have that feeling,” recalled Heather, who was anxious over her bike which she had parked outside to a post-and-ring.  “It’s a nice enough bike that I don’t normally take it out at night,” she explains, making it all the worse when, to her shock, she emerged from the bar only to find both her bike and lock nowhere to be found.

Hearing about her loss the following day, a friend jokingly searched Kijiji for a similar bike to Heather’s.  He found one selling for $750 and light-heartedly sent her the link via Facebook.  Remarkably, her friend had actually stumbled upon Heather’s stolen bike, identifiable not only by its make and colour, but by its loosened front brakes mentioned in the description - an adjustment Heather always makes to avoid going head over her heels in case she has to stop suddenly.

In disbelief, she called the number provided and arranged to meet with her potential bike thief for Tuesday.  Following the phone call, she filed a stolen bike report to a cop who, as Heather describes, was completely uninterested in her story and just wanted to take down her info and be done with it.

After giving the cop her purchasing order for the bike, its serial number and description, he referred her to the OPP whose jurisdiction includes online fraud.  The number led to a dead end, however, since not only was the office closed for the long weekend, but the line turned out to be for cases related to child pornography.

Understandably frustrated at the cop’s apparent disinterest, she consulted with some friends and decided to just try confronting the potential thief on Tuesday with an offer of $100 along with several friends and photos to prove that it was indeed her bike.
Tuesday afternoon rolled around and sure enough, she got a call from her bike thief confirming their meeting that evening at six o’clock outside Castle Frank Station.  She quickly texted several friends to meet at Castle Frank and went on Facebook to print off some photos of her riding her bike.

By coincidence, the friend who had originally found the link to her stolen bike happened to be on Facebook chat, so upon seeing Heather online, he asked for an update on her stolen bike search.  Upon hearing that she was “about to go get my bike back gangster style,” her friend freaked, telling her about how there was an active bike mafia in Toronto and that her plan was a terrible idea.

Getting increasingly nervous, Heather decided to try the cops one more time.  It was now almost 5:45 and the clock was ticking.  After giving the police her information and being put on hold twice, she finally met with a voice on the other end of the line: “Heather, is this Heather?  We are going to get this bike back for you, do you trust us?”

She did, and after telling the cop her story he gave her these instructions: “You’re going to take the subway to Castle Frank Station; you’re going to go up the escalators; you’re going to go out the front doors; on your right hand side is Bloor Street; wait there.  Two unidentified police officers are going to approach you.  Do you understand?”

She did, and headed off to Castle Frank to the cheers of her coworkers, all of who were well aware of her coming rendezvous.  Just before Heather entered the subway, she remembered to text her friends - who were all converging on Castle Frank from all over the city - the new plan: “Pretend u don’t know me. Cops involved.”

Heather arrived at Castle Frank, went up the escalator, out the doors and to the right.  Looking around, she noticed a man conspicuously reading a newspaper nearby who turned out to be her boss.  He flashed a quick smile at her before quickly burying himself back in his paper.  On a grassy patch to her left lay a “hippie” - another friend of Heather’s friends, she realized - who acted lost in thought, staring at the leaves hanging overhead.  Continuing to survey the spot, Heather noticed a couple sitting across the street wearing big sunglasses despite it not being a very sunny day. Upon closer inspecting, she saw that they were her friends, pretending to make-out while keeping an eye on her.

Taking in the scene, her phone rang.  “Private number,” the screen read.  Answering it, she heard a deep voice say “Heather, this is District 14.  We’re in a bit of a bind here.  Traffic is really heavy; we’re going to be a little late.  How are you holding up?” Reassuring the cop that she was doing fine, Heather was told to wait and that, whatever she did, don’t contact the bike thief.

All of a sudden, her bike appeared, ridden by a man Heather could only assume was the guy looking to meet her.  “He rides up right next to me,” she recalls, “my bike is within arms length. I could touch it if I wanted to.”  Looking around, the man on her bike waited to see if anyone would respond, knowing a woman of Heather’s age might be watching from nearby.  Heather looked away, giving him no response.  After a minute or two of waiting, the man biked across the street where he circled slowly, watching the street.

Moments later, a hefty and heavily tattooed man wearing a raggedy old outfit approached her: “Hi there Heather, how’re you doing there?” It was a cop, Heather soon found out, and after telling him that her bike was across the street, he told her to wait there and hopped into an old-looking SUV with tinted windows and disappeared across the street.

After several minutes of waiting, her phone rang again.  It was the same cop, this time asking her to cross Bloor and go and sit on the very bench where her sunglasses-wearing friends were pretending to be making out. Sitting down next to them as if they were strangers, the cop then told her to hop into another tinted SUV parked on the street.  The next thing she knew, the SUV took off around the corner, as her friends looked on in shock.

The SUV, it turns out, was full of more undercover cops who told her they were going to park the car and go to meet the bike thief who was already chatting to the first group of cops.  They left Heather in the parked SUV and disappeared around the corner.

A paddy-wagon drove by soon after and the next thing Heather knew, the cops had re-emerged from around the corner and were walking by towards her.  Casually rolling alongside on of them was her bike.  The thief had been arrested, she was told, and that - other than her still missing helmet - her bike was in perfect condition.  As Heather returned to Castle Frank reunited with her lost bike, her friends threw off their acts and came to congratulate her.

Speaking about her experience, Heather remarked afterwards how her attitude towards the police has changed.  “Now every time I bike past a cop car, I say hi to them as my friends because I never thought they were fans of cyclists.”  The cops also told her that they would be continuing to conduct more ‘bike strikes’ in the hopes that such strong responses to bike thefts will discourage larger operations like those of Igor Kenk.

Photo from David Topping

http://spacing.ca/wire/2009/07/17/fridays-headlines-106/

http://spacing.ca/wire/?p=5555

STRIKE
• Is Ted Reeve Dr. city’s smelliest street? [ Toronto Star ]
• Arbitrated deal would be richer for union [ Toronto Sun ]
• Toronto on strike: the city defers to strikers, again [ National Post ]
• Where’s Miller? [ Toronto Star ]
• The upside of T.O.’s Great Stink [ National Post ]
• Residents’ new bag-yard [ Toronto Sun ]
• Toronto on strike: the horrors of a green bin uncollected [ National Post ]

CITY HALL
• Cancelled by Mayor, councillors demand meeting [ Globe & Mail ]
• Council may meet on unresolved issues [ Toronto Star ]
• Mayor mulls new council meeting [ National Post ]

TRANSIT
• Rail line will speed trip to Montreal [ Toronto Star ]
• Get transit shovels in the ground [ Toronto Star ]
• Feds herald ‘new era of rail service’ [ Toronto Sun ]

OTHER NEWS
• Giant mall connected to city, yet a place apart [ Toronto Star ]
• Rink an ‘oasis’ in city [ Toronto Sun ]
• Close some buildings, save our schools [ Toronto Sun ]
• Planetarium offers U of T world of expansion [ Toronto Star ]

http://spacing.ca/wire/2009/07/16/throwback-thursday-the-belt-line-railway/

http://spacing.ca/wire/?p=5544

Every Thursday, Spacing will bring you a snapshot of Toronto’s past, looking into what took place that day in the city’s history. Throwback Thursday will address how the city has evolved, with an emphasis on issues that remain relevant for development in Toronto today.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

On this day in 1889, the newly established Belt Line Railway held its inaugural meeting.  The doomed railway would only run from 1892-1894, falling victim to both the 1893 depression and the faster, more direct Toronto Street Railway.

With two loops, the Belt Line Railway was to provide public transit service to Toronto’s suburban communities.  The east loop started at Union station, ran east until turning north along the Don River, passing the Don Valley Brickworks, up through Moore Park Ravine and along the northern edge of Mount Pleasant Cemetery.  Crossing over Yonge Street and what is now the Davisville Subway yards, the loop continued northwest until Spadina, where it intersected with Eglinton Ave. W and turned west, eventually meeting up with the Grand Trunk railway tracks just west of Caledonia Road.  From their the route circled south back to Union Station.

The west loop was slightly shorter, also beginning at Union station but running west along Lake Ontario until Swansea, where it turned north at the Humber River following a route similar to the South Kingsway. The tracks turned east at Lambton, paralleling St. Clair West just north of the street until eventually meeting with the Grand Trunk lines at Caledonia which led it back to Union Station.

By July 1892, stream trains were running around each loop six times a day, charging five cents per station to a maximum of 25 cents.  When it opened, the line became popular for middle class Torontonians, who took Sunday-afternoon trips along the Belt Line for a taste of the dramatic countryside.  Real estate brokers were also frequent riders, using the line to show off the striking landscape surrounding the city to land speculators looking for development projects.

Now home to some of Toronto’s most prosperous neighbourhoods, it’s possible that the individuals who would go on to divide up and develop parts of Rosedale, Moore Park, Forest Hill, Bloor West and Swansea got their inspiration from a Sunday afternoon trip along the Belt Line Railway.

The photo above is the Moore Park stop, the Belt Line’s showpiece station. John Thomas Moore personally oversaw the station’s design and construction and is largely responsible for its grandeur.  Being both a key stakeholder in the Belt Line Railway and major developer of Moore Park, Moore was looking to attract not only riders, but residents.

Despite its brief existence, the Belt Line Railway, unlike many other long-gone streetcar lines in Toronto, is remarkably well imprinted on the city’s modern urban landscape. Its off-road routes have largely escaped any major redevelopment and remain visible on Google Maps even in sections where the tracks were removed almost a century ago.

The loops are also memorialized through the concerted efforts of Torontonians who continue to make use of the lines.  Although the Kay Gardner Beltline Park is the most well-known instance, the Don Valley section of the eastern loop is now a gravel bike trail.  Parks also dot the east-west line running north of St. Clair West along the western loop, including Gaffney Park and the St Clair Gardens.

Although both lines were formerly filled with stations - based on the fee system, the more stops the train made, the more money the trip costed - now only one station still stands none now remain.  Although not part of the Belt Line Railway, the Don Valley Station, built in 1896 on the sight of the Belt Line’s closed Queen Street East stop, still exists as a reminder of the era.  First relocated to Todmorden Mills, the Don Station now resides on the John Street Roundhouse site as part of the Toronto Railway Heritage Centre.

For more information on the Belt Line Railway, see:
• Toronto Railway Historical Society
• Lost Rivers Website
• Don Watcher Blog

Photos from the Toronto Railway Historical Society and the Toronto Archives in order of appearance: (Fonds 1244,  File 1244, Item 1109), (Fonds 1244, File 1244, Item 1109c), (Fonds 1231, File 1231, Item 1419), (Fonds 1231, File 1231, Item 1684).