For the last few weeks, a small corner store/cafe at 42 Dewson Street has been in the news here in Toronto. It has been in the news because, despite the fact that Toronto is actively working to allow more uses like these in residential neighborhoods, it is my understanding that it currently remains a legal non-conforming use. Meaning, it's allowed to operate only because it's been there for a long time.
The specific fight right now, though, is around whether this corner store is allowed to serve people coffee. It can sell groceries and stuff, but can it serve coffee? (Also, self-serve coffee is apparently an entirely different thing and acceptable behavior.) The store owner thinks the answer is yes. But then somebody called in an anonymous tip and the city came knocking:
CityNews reached out to the City of Toronto for a response. They said “the building at 42 Dewson St. is in a Residential Zone, and a non-residential/commercial use is not permitted. Any change of use from a Retail Grocery/Variety Store is not permitted; and that includes store staff preparing food or drinks (or coffees) for sale to patrons. A change of use, requires zoning relief from the Committee of Adjustment.”
Okay, so serving coffee to people is potentially problematic. But why? Here are three possible reasons that immediately come to mind:
Somebody else in the neighborhood is serving coffee and they're ruthlessly trying to eliminate all competition.
Serving coffee encourages people to linger and lingering people make more noise relative to people who don't linger.
The neighborhood is filled with pedants who like to read zoning by-laws in their spare time and they just can't stand seeing such a blatant disregard for refreshment rules.
There are, of course, other possible reasons. And according to Twitter/Reddit, the real reason is that the property is owned by a rich developer and the neighborhood is, for a variety of reasons, pissed off at said rich developer. I don't know that this is true, but maybe it is. Because fighting over served versus self-served coffee seems like an insane thing to argue about.
If you happen to agree, Dan Seljak has a petition you can sign, here.
Photo: CityNews
I take the UP Express train into the office every day (here in Toronto). This is a rail service that we have spoken about many times over the years on this blog.
It started as an airport link that was too expensive, but was then repriced so that more people would use it, and use it locally. It is now widely used by people like me. I don't know the exact split, but in the mornings, it feels like majority commuters.
Then on Monday of this week, the province announced that local service would be reduced from every 15 minutes to every 30 minutes. Supposedly this was in order to improve service between downtown and Pearson airport.
Commuters immediately reacted. In fact, while riding the train on Tuesday morning, there was quite literally a guy beside me on the phone trying to complain to his local city councillor and MPP. A petition was also started on Monday that, at the time of writing this post, had close to 6,000 supporters.
And then -- some 24 hours after the initial announcement -- the Minister of Transportation announced that the province would be walking back this service change and that he had "directed Metrolinx to not proceed." Boom.
As a daily rider, this selfishly makes me happy. But more importantly, I think it, once again, shows how quickly voices can get amplified in today's world and how important good regional express rail is to our city. Clearly we need more of this!
Sadly, it probably also shows that some people have no idea how lines like these are actually getting used. I have to believe that if anyone had looked closely at ridership and the split between local/airport, that this decision wouldn't have been made in the first place.
This will probably be my last Gardiner East post before the decision goes to City Council next week on June 10th. But I have such good news that I need to share it with you all.
This morning 14 “CityBuilders” came together for the first time in support of removing the elevated Gardiner East and replacing it with a surface boulevard. They are real estate developers, investors, and other prominent business leaders in the city. And they sent a letter this morning to every single Toronto City Councillor outlining their position.
I can’t tell you how thrilled I am to see this happen, so I’d like to call out each and every member of the CityBuilders. They are (in alphabetical order):
Castlepoint Numa
Cityzen Development Corporation
Context Development
Continental Ventures
Daniels Corporation
Distillery Historical District
Dream Unlimited Corporation
Greybrook Capital and Greybrook Realty Partners
Kerbel Group Inc.
Manulife Real Estate
QQE 162
Streetcar Developments
TAS
Tridel Group of Corporations
These are some of Toronto’s most important city builders and I am sure this will get the attention of both Mayor John Tory and the rest of City Council.
If you haven’t yet signed the Gardiner East petition that Stephen and I started, please do so by clicking here.
Happy Friday :)