Brandon Donnelly — Daily insights for city builders. Published since 2013 by Toronto-based real estate developer Brandon Donnelly. — Page 1553

I care a lot about transit.

I fundamentally believe that it needs to be the backbone of any well functioning and thriving metropolis. As the global economy continues to become an increasingly more urban one, we are seeing the rise of cities at a scale the world has never seen before.

Tokyo is over 37 million people. Jakarta is almost 27 million. Seoul is almost 23 million. And the list goes on . With cities of this size, do we really think it’s reasonable for everybody to be driving around in cars? It ain’t going to work.

Here’s an image from the Guardian, with the title, “Imagine if Paris had as many new cars as Mumbai”:

Now, by global standards, Toronto is a relatively small city, at just over 6 million people in the region.

But that doesn’t mean we don’t have challenges. In my view, the single biggest threat facing Toronto’s long term economic competitiveness is our severe infrastructure deficit. It’s impacting productivity levels, social cohesion, the environment, our global brand and many other things.

Because of this belief, I’ve become interested in the work of CivicAction . It’s a group of non-partisan civic leaders who care about the future of our city. They have 3 areas of focus:

1. Accelerating regional transportation

2. Enhancing the region’s economic performance

3. Fostering inclusion and resilience

They’ve just launched a pledge that allows Torontonians to make their voice heard to elected officials. I just pledged to support  new ways to raise funds for a better transportation network, and I would encourage you to do the same if you care about the future of our city. I know I certainly do.

At the time of writing this post, 2,821 members of the general public and 126 elected officials had pledged.

I’m going to New York City tonight. I’ll be flying Porter from the island airport. And I’ll probably walk there.

I’m a big fan of Porter and, while I’ve noticed some minor slippage over the last few years, it’s still one of the best flying experiences in the city.

But the island airport has always been a contentious subject. Stopping a bridge to the island was a fundamental part of our last mayor’s original election campaign.

Today the contentiousness is around expanding the airport so that it flies further using “jets.” Primarily people appear concerned about noise and that the runway will need to be expanded out and into Lake Ontario to a certain extent.

As someone who lives along the waterfront, I really don’t share the same concerns.

For one, the “whisper jets” are supposed to produce the same amount of noise as the current fleet, which don’t bother me in the least. I hear yappy dogs barking more than I hear planes.

Secondly, I think the island airport is fantastic from an economic development standpoint. If we were in Europe, Toronto would have high speed rail connections to New York City, Montreal, and other cities.

But it’s not Europe and we don’t have those rail lines. What we do have though is short haul flights from the island which, similarly, allow people to leave the city from downtown.

This may not seem like a big deal, but an extra hour can mean the difference been making and missing a morning meeting or whether your trip needs to be overnight or not.

If you’re against the expansion, I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comment section below. Debate is important.

I can’t believe that Ford is still our mayor. In fact, I still can’t believe we elected him in the first place.

In case you missed it, Toronto’s Police Chief announced today that they are in possession of a video depicting Rob Ford smoking crack cocaine. Outside of Canada, it was reported in the Huffington Post , the Guardian , as well as many other places.

It’s an embarrassment for Toronto. It’s an embarrassment for Canada. 

But even after all of this, Ford came forward today and said that he will not resign :

“I have no reason to resign. I’m going to go back and return my phone calls. I’m going to be out doing what the people elected me to do and that’s save taxpayers’ money and run a great government that we’ve been running.”

Toronto is a global city. And yet we have this profound leadership deficit. Today our successes are in spite of our governance. I know that there is a lot talent in this city so, please, somebody step forward.

We need a new mayor.