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cbailey6.bsky.social
Colleen
@cbailey6.bsky.social
3.3K followers 510 following 1.5K posts
Scientist, cyclist, knitter. But only 2 out of 3 at any one time. 🔰
📌 Toronto
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cbailey6.bsky.social
This site is at Planning and Housing Committee this week! With the City-owned land and about $20 million in incentives, the City is aiming for about 20-30% of the 458 units to be affordable. (You can see estimates of affordability below: $1404 for a 1-bed, eg.).
secure.toronto.ca/council/agen...
January 20, 2026 at 1:40 AM
cbailey6.bsky.social
I was going to say don't tell Trump that these places exist but then I remembered that he already tariffed them so I guess someone in the administration knows?
One of Trump's tables of Reciprocal Tariffs showing Saint Pierre and Miquelon with a 50% tariff.
January 19, 2026 at 7:56 PM
cbailey6.bsky.social
Laser-focused on the real problem right now: Canadians won't stop electing Gavin Newsom.
A Bluesky post that says: i love the canadians on this website telling us the only way to stop this is to elect gavin newsom too really helpful
January 19, 2026 at 12:44 PM
cbailey6.bsky.social
I guess if you believe that allowing up to 5 extra units in existing 100+ unit apartments, and townhouses on 0.5% of land will incentivize 600 additional units in 2 years, then you can consider apartment infill done, but I don't. www.moreneighbours.ca/news/reports...
The apartment infill initiative was initially split into two milestones: one for an interim report and one for a final report. However, the proposals from the preliminary report were later split into two phases. Phase 1 passed Council in June 2025 (PH22.5) without an interim report, and consisted of 3 items, two of which have the potential to expand housing supply. The first allowed apartment buildings in the R and RA zone with more than 100 units to convert certain common interior spaces into a maximum of 5 new apartments as-of-right. The second change permits townhomes in the RAC zone, a change which applies to 0.5% of Toronto's total land. The remaining items that were proposed in the preliminary report around planning tools and larger-scale apartment infill are listed as future work in this report and make up Phase 2. Although the October update to the HAP Work Plan lists the final report for Apartment Infill as completed, the link goes to another item and there was no apartment infill item at Council after PH22.5 (except PH26.2 Growing Space for Trees, which makes apartment infill more challenging). It is possible that PH22.5 has been marked as a final report and the interim report was eliminated, but its title does not indicate that it is a final report and there is a significant future work section with the previously-identified Phase 2 items that would likely need to be completed in order to incentivize the 600 new permits that were expected to result from this initiative during the 3-year HAF period (the changes in Phase 1 are too minor for this).
January 19, 2026 at 2:22 AM
cbailey6.bsky.social
If this is the Minister's reasoning then it is confusing because these are all other HAF milestones that Toronto got other $ for. Student housing strategy didn't include the promised parking by-laws. And apartment infill was due Dec 2024 and still not complete. www.thestar.com/news/gta/fed...
Prime Minister Mark Carney’s government had previously threatened to withhold $30 million in HAF funding over the vote, but Robertson wrote Friday that the smaller cut took into account Toronto’s progress on other initiatives, such as implementing a renovictions bylaw, drafting a student housing strategy, and enabling more infill apartment housing.
January 19, 2026 at 2:22 AM
cbailey6.bsky.social
$10 million withheld from Toronto's Housing Accelerator Funds. Congratulations to all of the councillors who confidently assured their colleagues that this wouldn't happen when they refused to allow sixplexes in their wards. www.cmhc-schl.gc.ca/media-newsro...
Coun. Parthi Kandavel (Ward 20, Scarborough Southwest), who opposed sixplex permissions in his area, said Thursday while amalgamation was decades past, the difference between Toronto’s old boroughs were still palpable. “Whether its two years or 27 years, the built form hasn’t changed tremendously,” he said. He pointed to density influxes in Scarborough such as the Golden Mile intensification, but argued that further change in lowrise neighbourhoods should come more slowly. “It’s evolving. We need time,” he said, arguing the impacts of fourplex legalization were still shaking out. He isn’t worried about the city having its federal funding yanked because of the walk-back. “Do I think we’re going to lose the money? Heck no,” he said.
January 16, 2026 at 8:58 PM
cbailey6.bsky.social
I don't know what's going on but Happy Canadian Senate Verification Day to everyone who celebrates, I guess.
A series of Bluesky posts from the Verified Account Tracker that are almost entirely accounts of Canadian Senators.
January 16, 2026 at 2:16 AM
cbailey6.bsky.social
Don't mess with success!
Graphs of the number of homes in Edmonton neighbourhoods by project type showing a big increase in 5+ unit homes in mature neighbourhoods in the last 1-2 years.
January 13, 2026 at 12:20 PM
cbailey6.bsky.social
But if you do this every year then the budget as it is generally presented to the public isn't in touch with reality. I think that 6 month actuals or even 2024 numbers would give better context than 2025 estimates because those were quite off. Or have the audited variances get more press later.
January 12, 2026 at 7:27 PM
cbailey6.bsky.social
North York has a good start on this.
An aerial photo of a collection of buidlings: several mid-rises in front, but centered in the photo is a high rise where the floors angle down in two different directions, creating a giant angular plane.
January 12, 2026 at 3:29 AM
cbailey6.bsky.social
Every map of Toronto is the same map of Toronto: an ongoing series.
(To be clear, this is not a criticism of the research, which literally notes that there is a correlation with socioeconomic status.) www.thestar.com/news/gta/pla...
Map from the Toronto Star showing the "Best neighbourhoods to play"
January 11, 2026 at 2:23 PM
cbailey6.bsky.social
Wait, did The Onion already publish this piece?
Onion headline from May 8, 1996: Perky 'Canada' has own government, laws
January 9, 2026 at 5:45 PM
cbailey6.bsky.social
Goose_meme.jpg: Why is it becoming increasingly prevalent?
While such overt hostility from the Canadian government has been rare over the last century, it has deep roots and is becoming increasingly prevalent. Canada, long considered a quiet and reliable partner, is poised in coming years to become a serious and present threat to the interests of the United States.
January 9, 2026 at 5:43 PM
cbailey6.bsky.social
Anyway, there's a bunch of wtf in there, so sorry if you didn't want to read that on what hasn't been a great week.
Tribes such as the Wet’suwet’en and the Shishalh which have already developed ties with the People’s Republic and have de facto sovereignty in provincial legal systems should be of particular focus. Unreliable tribal chiefs have been and can be replaced, particularly when their rivals are backed by wealthier interests.
January 9, 2026 at 5:41 PM
cbailey6.bsky.social
If I were writing propaganda to convince people that Canada sucks and needs to be annexed, I would simply not include examples of the US administration lying their faces off and Canadian skepticism proving entirely correct.
The divergence of post-1982 Canada and the United States first came to public attention during the Second Iraq War in the mid-2000s. The Canadian government, true to its highly legalistic worldview, refused to enter the war despite the United States’ request as it did not have the blessing of the United Nations. While it dissipated somewhat during the Conservative Party government of Stephen Harper, it returned with a vengeance under Justin Trudeau.
January 9, 2026 at 5:39 PM
cbailey6.bsky.social
This forecasted opening pressure is less than the actual operating variance from 2024 (2025 variance won't be known for 6 months). This big discrepancy between the predictions of what's needed to balance the budget and what actually happens has been common in recent years. medium.com/@henrikbechm...
January 8, 2026 at 6:24 PM
cbailey6.bsky.social
This is good news. Two years ago, Toronto's budget planned for increased shelter use. Obviously these are difficult problems and solutions take time, but a City claiming a "Housing First" approach to homelessness shouldn't end up with a budget for increased shelter space every year!
Toronto Shelter and Support Services claim to have a Housing First approach to homelessness. A true Housing First approach would aim to reduce homelessness. Instead, Toronto’s budget plans for homelessness and shelter use to increase in the coming years. [Graph of the average nightly occupancy in the shelter system showing a forecast for increased use into 2023 and 2024.]
January 8, 2026 at 5:04 PM
cbailey6.bsky.social
The 80% speedup is probably not correct. Lots of changes make it hard to say because numbers before and after July 2023 aren't really comparable. But, even since the City started quoting that 80% speedup, there has been an increase in recent months. www.moreneighbours.ca/news/reports...
The mayor’s letter claimed that approval timelines are 80% faster, but this has been disputed by third-party planners. The evaluation is complicated by provincial penalties that were introduced in Bill 109 then removed in Bill 185, as well a reduced number of applications submitted in 2023 and 2024 relative to previous years. Part of the City's response to Bill 109 was to remove the ability to submit zoning and site plan applications concurrently, which decreases the time from submission to approval for site plan applications but does not necessarily improve overall time for the full application process. This also resulted in a higher rate of site plan application rejections while the system adjusted.
January 8, 2026 at 4:43 PM
cbailey6.bsky.social
Diversity is when no sixplexes in my neighbourhood. www.thestar.com/news/gta/the...
Rather than seeing patchwork policies as creating division, however, Kandavel argued that “having a customized approach … allows for unity” between downtown and the suburbs. The alternative is resentment caused by policies “forced upon” communities that don’t accept them, he said. That message was echoed by Anne Anderson, one of the leaders of the Coalition of Etobicoke Residents Associations, which formed early last year in part to organize against the sixplex proposal. “Forcing a particular solution citywide without taking into account the diversity throughout the city — I think you’re asking for conflict,” she said.
January 4, 2026 at 2:49 PM
cbailey6.bsky.social
Councillor Kandavel is absolutely desperate for Mamdani to look into the camera and explain that he's the exact kind of urbanist-hater that Kandavel is. I don't get it.
https://x.com/parthikandavel/status/2007517822797394380 I wonder if Toronto's anti-car "progressives" realize Mamdani closed his Inauguration speech with an ode to car culture with a live performance by @babbulicious and his viral hit "Gaddi Red Challenger"? Meanwhile, the right wing is melting thinking it's an Islamic song.
January 4, 2026 at 2:50 AM
cbailey6.bsky.social
Toronto is not a city of condos. Toronto is a city of low-rise using condos to maintain some claim on being an actual city. Send tweet.
Map of Toronto land use designations (Map 1 of the Official Plan). 5.2% of the area is red for Mixed Use areas, concentrated downtown. 3.5% is orange Apartment Neighbourhood, spread out around the City. And 35.4% is yellow Neighbourhood, a low rise land use designation.
January 3, 2026 at 2:48 PM
cbailey6.bsky.social
Nothing against the rest of this article, but Toronto does not have an obsession with highrises. Less than 10% of Toronto's land allows highrises. Toronto has a *concentration* of highrises because of our obsession with protecting low-rises. www.thestar.com/news/gta/a-s...
Toronto Star headline and sub-head: ‘A strange relic from another time’: Amid the downtown construction this row of Victorian cottages stands frozen in time Sandwiched between a wave of contemporary high-rise developments, the 1800s homes on Draper Street might just be a testament to how heritage properties can co-exist with modern architecture and Toronto’s obsession with highrises.
January 3, 2026 at 2:48 PM
cbailey6.bsky.social
Arrested development meme. Tobias: Then they think they'll be greeted as liberators. Lindsay: Well did it work for those people? Tobias: No, it never does. I mean, these people somehow delude themselves into thinking it might, but... ... but it might work for us.
January 3, 2026 at 1:56 PM
cbailey6.bsky.social
Pictured: "housing and transit construction."
Two lanes of traffic filled with cars. No construction from housing or transit is visible.
December 29, 2025 at 11:15 PM
cbailey6.bsky.social
Haha. Just kidding. The correct answer was housing and transit. They're responsible for all of the bad stuff in Toronto. The innocent cars are just looking for an affordable place to park and we musn't blame them.
Rather, the position is intended to streamline city bureaucracy and improve how the city manages the problem amid the dual pressures of population growth and development. The biggest cause of Toronto’s congestion is construction, the city has said, due to increased private developments, major infrastructure renewal and building transit such as the Ontario Line.
December 29, 2025 at 11:10 PM