Daily insights for city builders. Published since 2013 by Toronto-based real estate developer Brandon Donnelly.
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Daily insights for city builders. Published since 2013 by Toronto-based real estate developer Brandon Donnelly.
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Brandon DonnellyCanada must become a global superpower
The silver lining to the US starting a trade war with Canada and regularly threatening annexation is that it has forced this country out of complacency. Indeed, I'm hard pressed to remember a time, at least in my lifetime, when patriotism and nationalism has united so much of Canada. According to a recent survey by Angus Reid, the percentage of Canadians expressing a "deep emotional attachment" to the country jumped from 49% in December 2024 to 59% in February 2025. And as further evidence of...
Brandon DonnellyThe bank robbery capital of the world
Between 1985 and 1995, Los Angeles' retail bank branches were robbed some 17,106 times. In 1992, which was the the city's worst year for robberies, the number was 2,641. This roughly translated into about one bank robbery every 45 minutes of each banking day. All of this, according to this CrimeReads piece by Peter Houlahan, gave Los Angeles the dubious title of "The Bank Robbery Capital of the World" during this time period. So what caused this? Well according to Peter it was facil...
Brandon DonnellyThe story behind those pixelated video game mosaics in Paris
If you've ever been to Paris, you've probably noticed the small pixelated art pieces that are scattered all around the city on buildings and various other hard surfaces. Or maybe you haven't seen or noticed them in Paris, but you've seen similarly pixelated mosaics in one of the other 79 cities around the world where they can be found. Or maybe you have no idea what I'm talking about right now. Huh? Here's an example from Bolivia (click here if you can't see...
Brandon DonnellyCanada must become a global superpower
The silver lining to the US starting a trade war with Canada and regularly threatening annexation is that it has forced this country out of complacency. Indeed, I'm hard pressed to remember a time, at least in my lifetime, when patriotism and nationalism has united so much of Canada. According to a recent survey by Angus Reid, the percentage of Canadians expressing a "deep emotional attachment" to the country jumped from 49% in December 2024 to 59% in February 2025. And as further evidence of...
Brandon DonnellyThe bank robbery capital of the world
Between 1985 and 1995, Los Angeles' retail bank branches were robbed some 17,106 times. In 1992, which was the the city's worst year for robberies, the number was 2,641. This roughly translated into about one bank robbery every 45 minutes of each banking day. All of this, according to this CrimeReads piece by Peter Houlahan, gave Los Angeles the dubious title of "The Bank Robbery Capital of the World" during this time period. So what caused this? Well according to Peter it was facil...
Brandon DonnellyThe story behind those pixelated video game mosaics in Paris
If you've ever been to Paris, you've probably noticed the small pixelated art pieces that are scattered all around the city on buildings and various other hard surfaces. Or maybe you haven't seen or noticed them in Paris, but you've seen similarly pixelated mosaics in one of the other 79 cities around the world where they can be found. Or maybe you have no idea what I'm talking about right now. Huh? Here's an example from Bolivia (click here if you can't see...
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Brandon Donnelly#DensityCreep
Support Brandon Donnelly
Brandon Donnelly#DensityCreep
The Toronto Star published an article today called: Midtowners battle the rise of the midrise. It’s about a group called The Density Creep Neighborhood Alliance, which was formed in order to fight a 4 storey stacked townhouse project that is currently going through the rezoning process.
Here’s a snippet from the article:
“I’m really concerned about my property value going down,” says Lisa Goodwin, 49, a stay-at-home mother of two who has lived in a four-bedroom dwelling on Keewatin Ave. for 19 years. “Right now all the houses are $1.1 to, say, $2.2 (million) but they’re looking at putting in places that are only $500,000.”
Not surprisingly, social media took hold of this and #DensityCreep quickly started trending on Twitter. BuzzFeed ran a piece called, Toronto Real Estate Is So Preposterous People Are Protesting Condos That “Only” Cost $500K. And somebody even bought densitycreep.com (their site is .ca) and redirected it to NIMBY on Wikipedia.
There’s so much I could say about this. But you all already know what I’m thinking. So I’ll end with this quote from the article:
“The simple fact of the matter is that the creation of a more sustainable, equitable, and affordable city requires the development of midrise and other more dense housing options along major roads, subways, and streetcar lines in already built up areas,” says Christopher De Sousa, director of the School of Urban Planning and Regional Planning at Ryerson University.
We have work to do.
The Toronto Star published an article today called: Midtowners battle the rise of the midrise. It’s about a group called The Density Creep Neighborhood Alliance, which was formed in order to fight a 4 storey stacked townhouse project that is currently going through the rezoning process.
Here’s a snippet from the article:
“I’m really concerned about my property value going down,” says Lisa Goodwin, 49, a stay-at-home mother of two who has lived in a four-bedroom dwelling on Keewatin Ave. for 19 years. “Right now all the houses are $1.1 to, say, $2.2 (million) but they’re looking at putting in places that are only $500,000.”
Not surprisingly, social media took hold of this and #DensityCreep quickly started trending on Twitter. BuzzFeed ran a piece called, Toronto Real Estate Is So Preposterous People Are Protesting Condos That “Only” Cost $500K. And somebody even bought densitycreep.com (their site is .ca) and redirected it to NIMBY on Wikipedia.
There’s so much I could say about this. But you all already know what I’m thinking. So I’ll end with this quote from the article:
“The simple fact of the matter is that the creation of a more sustainable, equitable, and affordable city requires the development of midrise and other more dense housing options along major roads, subways, and streetcar lines in already built up areas,” says Christopher De Sousa, director of the School of Urban Planning and Regional Planning at Ryerson University.
We have work to do.
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