Saturday, January 29, 2011 · 1:00pm – 4:00pm

Yonge-Dundas Square, Toronto Ontario Canada

INFINITY is a just released ad-film, aka branding commercial, for Bahrain Telecommunications Company. Toronto based SpyFilms used our home town as the canvas upon which to paint INFINITY…

It’s been in production for over a year.

The Making of is just as stunning as the film itself…

Picture was taken by Rachel Atwell as part of her faces of Toronto project on 10/10/10, this young man is numbered among the homeless in this city.

By Hollie Pollard

Toronto got a new homeless shelter this week. Some have even called it the Homeless Hilton or a place of luxury. Let me tell them a thing or two about any homeless shelter they are there to offer a safe haven, not a hotel and in our city two homeless people die every week.

With that said, we are a city who scream when a new shelter goes up, as who wants it in their neighbourhood. Really, who does? Both the Toronto Sun and BlogTO have called it a place of luxury. I wonder if the writers have ever experienced a moment of homelessness. Maybe their tunes would change. While the cost overrides on this project needs to be questioned, we should never question providing a safe haven or the services provided by a shelter.

Question costs, yes!

Question the need to provide beds and services to save a life: never!

Why am I so passionate about this? You see I was once homeless in a city shelter. Staying in a shelter is not an experiece I would wish on anyone. I have had to stay in a shelter twice. Once in New Mexico and here in Toronto. After my divorce, I went from co-owning 11 properties to homeless literally overnight. I gave birth to a baby girl while homeless. I was terrified as most who enter the doors. When one hits rock bottom there is fear, anger, and depression. When you cannot provide for yourself, one needs a help up not a hand out. I know I did. I needed a community who cared.

When I arrived back in Canada, I stayed at the Red Door on Queen Street. Life with a newborn child in a shelter is no joy. There was no joy, no peace. I lived to get things done. I was thankful though that I had a bed for the night. I was thankful that they helped me get medical attenton for my sick child (Rachel had been born protein intolerant, and the only formula she could have cost $30 a can). The shelther offered important services so we could get a little bit of our lives back…well in actuality so Rachel could have a first home.

Shelters play an important role in our city. They allow people who do fall into that deep abyss a safe haven in which to rebuild. They are not a Hilton. They are a safe bed, a place to reassemble the pieces of a life. Can we really place a price tag on that? Should we not be wanting to do more to give a hand up. I know I did not want to be homeless at the time and now we have a place, I have a job and we have moved on but I will never forget the help that came when I was homeless. Instead of walking past in a hurry, perhaps we should be looking for ways in which we can help reintergrate those that are in the abyss.

Many who have been homeless are now housed. Many are like me… giving back in the community. May we see this new shelter as a great tool in providing support to those in need. May we see it as as a hand up and not as a Hilton.

Originally published in CommonCentsMom, By Hollie Pollard.

By HiMY SYeD

Within the hour, the Olympic Torch Relay will be in our City for the first of three days before heading out to points west and ultimately to ignite the Olympic Flame to officially open the Winter Games in Vancouver.

Between now and then 1,000 Torontonians will have become torchbearers carrying the Torch for a total of 48 kilometres through our city’s streets.

At about 1:52 p.m. The Torch is expected to cross south on Yonge Street at Steeles Avenue.

The relay will travel south on Yonge Street, then along Highway 401, stopping at Albert Campbell Square in front of the Scarborough Civic Centre at about 3 p.m.

SCARBOROUGH PROGRAM

Main Stage

• National anthem, led by Nicole Stamp
• The Toronto Children’s Concert Choir
• Zumba Dance Girl, Michele Walks
• The Snooky Tynes Family Band
• Fireguy, Brant Matthews

Ice Rink

• Speed Skating demonstration by Toronto Speed Skating Club
• Sledge Hockey demonstration by Toronto Sledge Hockey

Trampoline Stage

• Snowboarder/Skier performance on trampoline by Extreme Trampoline

Busker Stage

• Juggler Kobbler Jay, Jason Henderson
• Fire guy, Brant Matthews

3 p.m.

• The Olympic Flame arrives in Albert Campbell Square

The relay will then travel along Ellesmere Road/York Mills Road before making its way back onto Yonge Street and will travel south to College Street, where the Olympic Flame will be carried by a torchbearer on a westbound College streetcar.

From there, it will travel to SickKids Hospital, return to Yonge Street and head south to Queen Street West, and onto Nathan Phillips Square for the Community Celebration, arriving at the square at 7 p.m.

The Community Celebration at Nathan Phillips Square will run from 6 to 8 p.m. showcasing performances by local, national and international artists, for all age groups.

Toronto’s Final Torchbearer, Olympic medal winner Vicky Sunohara, will light the cauldron.

The Torch’s first day in Toronto ends with a fireworks display in front of Toronto City Hall.

Day two of TorchTO begins at 6 a.m. at Queen’s Park tomorrow morning.

Most mornings along Sunnyside Beach, neighbourhood resident Graz takes her dog Trenton for his walk.

Yesterday morning, she was surprised to find a whole bunch of Torontonians getting ready to dip into freezing Lake Ontario.

It was a fundraiser for the Wildland’s League for a project to help save the natural habitat of the polar bear. Polar Bears are being displaced. Climate change is melting their ice. This morning’s polar bear dip brings awareness to the issue.

Another Polar Bear Dip happens on New Year’s Day.

That one is also a fundraiser for the Toronto Chapter of Habitat for Humanity.

By John Bonnar

A sombre memorial vigil marked by both song and silence commemorated three more homeless deaths in Toronto during the monthly vigil held Tuesday outside the Church of the Holy Trinity.

More than 30 people cupping candles that flickered in the cold morning air gathered in the courtyard of the Eaton Centre at noon, as they do on the second Tuesday of every month.

Homeless people, affordable housing advocates and others stood below the steps near a small wooden structure at the south entrance of the church that now contains over 600 names of men, women and children who have lived and died on the streets of Toronto as a direct result of homelessness since 1990.

The one hour event was sombre as long stretches of speeches were mixed with the crowd listening to poems and music.

Housing activist Tanya Gulliver said one of the names added was from a homeless death in 1996.

Toronto Homeless Memorial. ( Photo by HiMY SYeD, on Torontopedia.ca )

“I think this speaks to the importance of the memorial because this was a family member who came to the church and asked that her sibling be added to the memorial,” she said.

Every month for the last ten years, the Toronto Disaster Relief Committee (TDRC) has tracked and monitored homeless deaths in the City of Toronto and held a vigil at the Homeless Memorial in downtown Toronto.

TDRC is a group of social policy, health care and housing experts, academics, business people, community health workers, social workers, AIDS activists, anti-poverty activists, people with homelessness experience, and members of the faith community who provide advocacy on housing and homelessness issues.

In 1998, they declared homelessness a national disaster and demanded that Canada end homelessness by implementing a fully-funded National Housing Program.

In 2009, there were 29 names added to the Homeless Memorial.

“We know that these are only a fraction of the names of homeless people who have died,” said Gulliver. “I was in a shelter recently that said they have at least one death a month and I know we don’t have their names on here.”

Former United Church of Canada moderator Bruce McLeod, in referring to the homeless, said, “They are shadows cast on the sidewalk as we rush by, cell phones in our ears, human shadows beneath our golden towers, our endless stadiums, opera houses, theatres, shopping malls, our rent gouging rooming houses.”

We refer to the homeless in distant, abstract terms, said McLeod.

“There is no such thing as the homeless,” he said.

“There are only people without homes, people with names and dreams and memories.”

This story and photo originally appeared on Rabble.ca and is cross posted here with permission from John Bonnar.

• WHAT : Release party for winter 2009-2010 issue of Spacing
• WHEN : Wednesday, December 9, 2009, 7pm – midnight
• WHERE : Toronto Reference Library, The Appel Salon, 789 Yonge Street
• HOW MUCH : $10 (includes copy of mag), $5 for subscribers
• ATTENDING ? : RSVP to Spacing’s Facebook event

Make your way to the Toronto Reference Library (7pm-midnight) on Wed. Dec. 9th, to take part in Spacing’s 16th issue release party and holiday party. We’ll have some games and activities, plus the music to dance to thanks to our resident DJs Track Meet.

From Spacing Toronto.

Torontonians got a sneak peak of the above video the other night when Mayor David Miller hosted a special Copenhagen edition of the cp24 TV show The Mayor.

It will be playing in Copenhagen for the duration of the COP15 Climate Summit.

Hopefully the above City of Toronto’s video will help redeem Canada’s standing at these climate talks.

www.ClimateSummitForMayors.dk

The video is after the jump…

Winter 2009-2010 hit the snooze button, skipped November, and finally decided to show up for work. The snowfall expected circa midnight was fashionably late, finally hitting the city at about 4 a.m.

Weather knocked out power in several places before Toronto Hydro crews got the juice back on, notably

• Weston Road and Davenport
• Sheppard & Kennedy in Scarborough
• Don Mills & York Mills
• Bay Street between Adelaide to Richmond in the Financial District

Peter Noehammer is the City of Toronto’s director of transportation services.

Speaking on various radio stations this morning he highlighted how the City is getting a handle on things plus some recommendations.

Salters headed out at 2 a.m. with equipment being dispatched to all roads. In priority high order roads, followed by expressways and high pedestrian routes, then finally local roads. As the snow turns to rain, they’ll wait it out a bit and deal with the slush later in the morning after the rush dies down.

They’re trying a few new things as a pilot project:

• A few sidewalks will get anti-brine in a few places
• The Martin Goodman Trail will be cleared in more spots that it was last year
• A new mixture of salt and water, leaving a small residual layer of salt, just enough to prevent ice from forming

Noehammer  also reminded everyone to be mindful of conditions, keep safe distances from fellow drivers because tailgating is lame when you can’t really stop on a dime. When driving alongside or behind The City’s largest snow clearing equipment be mindful of their size and their visibility. They have blind spots and may not be able to see your smaller vehicle.

In downtown, the City can’t clean sidewalks mechanically, so they’re asking residents to clean their sidewalks. It also happens to be a By-Law requirement. As Ben Wicks used to say, Be Nice, Clear Your Ice !

I walked the stretch in between Bloorcourt and the The Annex before the snow turned to rain.

It wasn’t long before having one of those Only in Toronto moments, thus the inspiration for this post’s title:

See more images of Toronto’s first snowfall of the season captured between 4 and 5 a.m. this morning after the jump…

Palmerston Boulevard looking south from Koreatown.

The Snow Tiger Cavalcade of Lights sitting on the Traffic Island bordering Koreatown and Christie Pits Park was finally in its element as the snow began to fall.

Every winter, folks wonder how this corner ice cream shop survives the winter months. And every winter I see the shop packed with people picking up hot chocolates or hot dogs after a day's worth of tobogganing one of the city's most accessible hills steps away in Christie Pits Park. Now that a Tim Horton's opened two doors north, we'll have to wait and see how this bit of competition plays out.

Ketchup and Mustard. Yesterday, you'd never notice how many bikes were locked to rings as you'd walk past them. This morning, you notice them everywhere.

Ever want a front row seat to watch a winter storm?

Its was beginning to get a bit weird having Xmas trees for sale and no snow to help move the product. At this spot across from Bathurst Station, proceeds from tree sales go towards the Out of The Cold program which turns excess space into makeshift shelters for when it's just too damn cold for the homeless to remain outside.

The Bluenight Vomit Comet rockets past Honest Ed's.

Snow . . .

. . . Flakes.

Suit . . .

. . . Cases. Many airlines have a two bag limit, with this mornings delay or cancellations of at least 100 flights out of Pearson, bags or no bags, it wouldn't really matter.

Newspaper boxes at Bloor & Bathurst: Eye, Now, and the Little Paper that Grew.

The Howland Avenue acorn street sign now a weathervane... Why not? It'll do.

The snow turned to rain as it approached 5 a.m. I spied this cyclist slip a few times biking past The Brunny. Take it easy today and make the best of the first blast of winter.

If you’re on Flickr, you can share your winter pics in the T. Toronto. Period. Flickr Group Pool.

Your best ones may be featured in an upcoming TOgraphy collection.

By HiMY SYeD

Moments ago Toronto City Council after a marathon session over the past week  finally passed the Billboard Tax on outdoor advertising despite heavy lobbying from the Billboard Industry.

Rami Tabello of IllegalSigns.ca sent the above tweet immediately after the vote passed with the recommended tax rate intact despite numerous attempts by councillors influenced by the Outdoor Advertising industry to dilute the proposed By-Law.

@anthonyschein: http://twitpic.com/sklvw - A crowd full of hardworking and winning activists at #TOcouncil

Jonathan Goldsbie sum things up nicely :

The vote means Toronto gets a projected $10.4 million in revenue in a time of budget cuts and tax increases no doubt coming in 2010.

Perhaps as important, Torontonians now have less billboards and less eyesores in the public realm.

The Billboard Tax and Signs by-law officially passed 29-12:

The vote on the Billboard Tax passes 29-12. Here's who voted and how (via @ryanmerkley).

We’ll be posting a full article shortly about Rami Tabello and his crew from  the IllegalSigns.ca campaign who worked to make today’s By-Law a reality.

IllegalSigns basically got everything they wanted.

Til then please share your thoughts in comments below.