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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Daily insights for city builders. Published since 2013 by Toronto-based real estate developer Brandon Donnelly.
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Brandon DonnellyWalking back a transit decision
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.
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.
Support Brandon Donnelly
Brandon DonnellyWalking back a transit decision
Subscribe to Brandon Donnelly
Daily insights for city builders. Published since 2013 by Toronto-based real estate developer Brandon Donnelly.
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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