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 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 DonnellyWhat would you do if you were Mayor?
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Brandon DonnellyWhat would you do if you were Mayor?
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Let's assume that you're Mayor of your city and that, for whatever reason, you have no need to pander to voters. You're a benevolent dictator. You can do whatever you think is best overall for the city and it will just happen. What would you do? This is more or less the question I asked on Twitter this morning, and I think it's only fair that I answer my own question. So here is a non-exhaustive list of items that came to mind while thinking of Toronto:
Substantially increase the pay of public sector workers throughout the city and bonus them based on measurable outcomes. Forget things like time limits on development applications; instead align incentives. For example, if we're trying to get more shovels in the ground on affordable housing, incentivize people based on building permits issued. I'll never forget what Roger Martin told me while I was at Rotman. When he became Dean of the school, Rotman was a whatever business school that wasn't faring all that competitively in the rankings. One of the problems he discovered was that the school's professors were getting paid far less than those at Wharton, Harvard, Stanford, and so on. So if you were a star, why would you ever want to teach at Rotman? He immediately matched the salaries of those top-tier schools and then, not surprisingly, the top-tier talent arrived. You get what you pay for.
Immediately price roads and congestion, and direct, to the fullest extent possible, the funds toward transit and cycling infrastructure. At the same time, the planning and building of transit would be depoliticized. There would be a reccurring funding stream and a plan that we're continually building out. Minimize protracted debates. Never stop building. There's a lot of talk this mayor election about solving traffic congestion. I have yet to see a plan that will actually work. Accurately pricing congestion likely won't be popular, but I can guarantee you that it will be highly effective.
Ensure that property taxes are sustainably covering the costs of operating the city and then, at a minimum, peg all future increases to CPI.
Make any new housing development less than 12 storeys as-of-right. That would mean, no rezoning process and no site plan approval; just straight to building permit.
Empower the private sector to build affordable housing through incentives and subsidies. Affordable housing isn't feasible to build on its own, which is why nobody is doing it. Inclusionary zoning also won't get us there. Make developers want to build it and they'll do it.
This is, again, a completely non-exhaustive list. But if I had to summarize the overall ambition, it would be to make Toronto a truly exceptional and remarkable city. We should never be happy with mediocrity.
What else would you do? Leave a comment below.
Photo by Aditya Chinchure on Unsplash
Let's assume that you're Mayor of your city and that, for whatever reason, you have no need to pander to voters. You're a benevolent dictator. You can do whatever you think is best overall for the city and it will just happen. What would you do? This is more or less the question I asked on Twitter this morning, and I think it's only fair that I answer my own question. So here is a non-exhaustive list of items that came to mind while thinking of Toronto:
Substantially increase the pay of public sector workers throughout the city and bonus them based on measurable outcomes. Forget things like time limits on development applications; instead align incentives. For example, if we're trying to get more shovels in the ground on affordable housing, incentivize people based on building permits issued. I'll never forget what Roger Martin told me while I was at Rotman. When he became Dean of the school, Rotman was a whatever business school that wasn't faring all that competitively in the rankings. One of the problems he discovered was that the school's professors were getting paid far less than those at Wharton, Harvard, Stanford, and so on. So if you were a star, why would you ever want to teach at Rotman? He immediately matched the salaries of those top-tier schools and then, not surprisingly, the top-tier talent arrived. You get what you pay for.
Immediately price roads and congestion, and direct, to the fullest extent possible, the funds toward transit and cycling infrastructure. At the same time, the planning and building of transit would be depoliticized. There would be a reccurring funding stream and a plan that we're continually building out. Minimize protracted debates. Never stop building. There's a lot of talk this mayor election about solving traffic congestion. I have yet to see a plan that will actually work. Accurately pricing congestion likely won't be popular, but I can guarantee you that it will be highly effective.
Ensure that property taxes are sustainably covering the costs of operating the city and then, at a minimum, peg all future increases to CPI.
Make any new housing development less than 12 storeys as-of-right. That would mean, no rezoning process and no site plan approval; just straight to building permit.
Empower the private sector to build affordable housing through incentives and subsidies. Affordable housing isn't feasible to build on its own, which is why nobody is doing it. Inclusionary zoning also won't get us there. Make developers want to build it and they'll do it.
This is, again, a completely non-exhaustive list. But if I had to summarize the overall ambition, it would be to make Toronto a truly exceptional and remarkable city. We should never be happy with mediocrity.
What else would you do? Leave a comment below.
Photo by Aditya Chinchure on Unsplash
Liberalize licensing and cut red tape to empower small entrepreneurs across the city in various industries. A perfect example in my mind is street food. Toronto is the most diverse city in the world with some of the best restaurants, and yet the only thing you can buy on the street is a stupid hot dog. If we empowered small entrepreneurs to setup shop on our streets, we would easily have the best street food scene in the world. And I am positive that there are countless other latent opportunities in this city that are being held back by dumb and archaic rules.
Make dramatic improvements to our public realm with an eye toward becoming the most beautiful and livable city in the world. Finally pedestrianize Kensington Market, remove the elevated Gardiner Expressway, make it so that we can swim in the Lake, build beautiful public washrooms all across the city that are actually open and aren't gross, and the list goes on. And yes, "beauty" should be requirement so that we don't end up with shit like this.
Focus on art, design, culture, and innovation as central pillars of Toronto's brand. Miami is a good example of what this approach -- along with favourable taxes and nice weather -- can do for a city. I've said this before, but here's just one example: Toronto is in many ways the birthplace of the cryptocurrency Ethereum. Why is nobody talking about this? Why are we not celebrating and leveraging this? It's a missed opportunity. Broadly speaking though, I think just having and doing three things can be effective in promoting new ideas for these pillars: have reasonably affordable housing, be a city that young people want to live in, and remain open and tolerant to immigrants.
Stop thinking of the night-time economy as a nuisance and instead think of it as a powerful economic development tool. I recently responded to this "night economy survey" that the City of Toronto released and the obvious bias is that nighttime things are seen as a terrible nuisance. In other words, "tell us how do we make all of this less annoying for grouchy voters." My response was to extend last call to 4am and to start thinking of it as an opportunity to draw in young people, tourists, and whoever else. This complements my previous point.
Liberalize licensing and cut red tape to empower small entrepreneurs across the city in various industries. A perfect example in my mind is street food. Toronto is the most diverse city in the world with some of the best restaurants, and yet the only thing you can buy on the street is a stupid hot dog. If we empowered small entrepreneurs to setup shop on our streets, we would easily have the best street food scene in the world. And I am positive that there are countless other latent opportunities in this city that are being held back by dumb and archaic rules.
Make dramatic improvements to our public realm with an eye toward becoming the most beautiful and livable city in the world. Finally pedestrianize Kensington Market, remove the elevated Gardiner Expressway, make it so that we can swim in the Lake, build beautiful public washrooms all across the city that are actually open and aren't gross, and the list goes on. And yes, "beauty" should be requirement so that we don't end up with shit like this.
Focus on art, design, culture, and innovation as central pillars of Toronto's brand. Miami is a good example of what this approach -- along with favourable taxes and nice weather -- can do for a city. I've said this before, but here's just one example: Toronto is in many ways the birthplace of the cryptocurrency Ethereum. Why is nobody talking about this? Why are we not celebrating and leveraging this? It's a missed opportunity. Broadly speaking though, I think just having and doing three things can be effective in promoting new ideas for these pillars: have reasonably affordable housing, be a city that young people want to live in, and remain open and tolerant to immigrants.
Stop thinking of the night-time economy as a nuisance and instead think of it as a powerful economic development tool. I recently responded to this "night economy survey" that the City of Toronto released and the obvious bias is that nighttime things are seen as a terrible nuisance. In other words, "tell us how do we make all of this less annoying for grouchy voters." My response was to extend last call to 4am and to start thinking of it as an opportunity to draw in young people, tourists, and whoever else. This complements my previous point.
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