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Travel Ontario

Toronto City Guide

by (author) John Must

Publisher
Firefly Books
Initial publish date
Sep 2001
Category
Ontario, Maps & Road Atlases
  • Paperback / softback

    ISBN
    9781552975374
    Publish Date
    Sep 2001
    List Price
    $9.95

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Where to buy it

Out of print

This edition is not currently available in bookstores. Check your local library or search for used copies at Abebooks.

Description

Not many people have walked every street and back alley in Toronto's central core. John Must has, and he wants to take you on a fascinating journey of discovery.

There is a lot more to Toronto that the CN Tower and the Blue Jays. You'll discover 356 restaurants, 146 intriguing neighborhoods, hundreds of shops and places, forgotten parks, infectious nightlife and theatre, and intriguing insights. Even if you thought you knew this city, you're in for a surprise.

68 maps pinpoint 1,500 places, give street numbers, parking lots, gas stations, one-way streets, 24 hour services -- and more. 170 local Web sites provide a source for additional up-to-the-minute information and a detailed index lists over 1,800 things for you to see and do.

This book is a must have reference for anyone who lives in the city and a source for more practical, straight-up and fascinating information about Toronto than any other book. It also has a great visitor's guide included!

The Toronto City Guide contains

 

About the author

Excerpt: Toronto City Guide (by (author) John Must)

The following is a sample Neighbourhood Profile from the Inner-city neighbourhoods section. Each profile is accompanied by a detailed map of the area, a listing of local Places, Entertainment, Food, Hotels, Services, Shops and more.

 

Regent Park

In the early 1940s this are supported the city's worst slums. Then came Canada's first large-scale housing project.

The existence of the neighbourhood enclosed by Queen, Parliament, Gerrard and the Don Valley has always been looked upon with a certain amount of derision. The ruling èlite looked down on the original unskilled Irish workers who settled here from the mid-1800s. Those who came after them were poor immigrants from other lands. Between the two world wars the neighbourhood deteriorated into a major slum. And the derision worsened.

In the mid-1940s the city decided to knock down the entire neighbourhood of small, rat-infested houses and re-build it. It was a bold and imaginative concept for its day. The area north of Dundas Street was designed for three story housing set amid enclosed open spaces, while south of Dundas accommodations would consist of high rise apartments. For people who had never had indoor plumbing or hot running water, the development bordered on Heaven. No one at the time seemed to realize that the whole project was designed without truly functioning streets. Those that did exist on maps were little more than dead-end lanes and walkways with no through traffic. Only Dundas Street East breathed any transportation into the area. And it managed to cut the project into two pieces: Regent Park North and Regent Park South. Each half then became an inward-functioning world unto itself.

The development was also a paternal, if not patronizing concept. Within two years of the first residents moving in at the beginning of 1949 there were confrontations with city fathers. People wanted to put up television aerials, but the mayor insisted this new form of entertainment was inappropriate for "the honest, though not entirely deserving, poor". One mother countered by saying that television in the home was necessary "to keep kids off neighbouring streets." The mayor threatened to have any aerials torn down.

By the mid-1980s, it became obvious to everyone that all good intentions to rectify "poverty, alcoholism, disease and broken families" were falling apart. The largely Caribbean, Tamil and Asian poor found themselves living in a neighbourhood rife with drug dealing and prostitution. The historic derision toward this part of town returned.

There are rumours circulating at city hall that the neighbourhood should be torn down again and built from scratch. And that's exactly the solution politicians had 150 years ago.

Editorial Reviews

A concise and handy compendium focusing on neighborhoods, places of interest, museums and restaurants and clubs.

Canadian Jewish News

Handy and compact.

American Reference Books Annual