Hot Tubbin' for....GGCLC: Greater Toronto Area

Toronto is Vancouver’s older brother. You know, just a little more sophisticated, a little more eclectic, a little more urban, a little more experienced…just not as good looking. I love Vancouver but the vibe of Toronto is electric. I’ve visited as a tourist and this time I feel like I got the insider’s scoop – where I finally saw the real Toronto (once we got there). We left Halifax at 6am, caught the flight to Toronto (a bit of a hiccup with the airline delayed us in Ottawa for about a half hour or so). Once we got there we hit the ground running. Something cool – we had our own chartered TTC bus – awesome, union bus drivers taking us around the city! Holla!

We stop at Toronto City Hall (a protest was just starting as we walked in – some of us left wing rowdies wanted to join in). We went straight into the City Council chambers and met with the Chief City Planner and had a quick presentation about what Toronto’s civic priority is…transportation. I got to sit right in front of Mike Layton’s seat so I felt the connection to Jack. J Mayor Ford minced us and was too busy to meet with the group. That would have been hard – the battles our brothers and sisters in local 500 have had since he’s been in office have been hard-fought.

After city hall it was FINALLY lunchtime at Cassels Brock – one of the city’s largest and most prestigious law firms. They had a nice buffet set up for us with a million dollar view of the city. This was definitely out of my comfort zone – I don’t roll with people who work in firms like that, it almost felt like being on the set of a legal drama…Former Premiers Mike Harris and David Peterson took some questions and answers and what I found really interesting is that when you leave the public service sector – especially at that level – you never really leave. While I appreciated their time, I’m not sure I learned much from them. Then we arrived at the Ryerson University Residences which will be our home for the next 2 days. Then it’s back onto the TTC bus to the city of Vaughan. We have the added treat of Professor Pamela Robinson a professor of Urban Planning at Ryerson, to take us through a Toronto rush hour – talking about the infrastructure of the transit system. We went through many areas of Toronto, watching how the demographics changed from neighbourhood to neighbourhood. We passed over the 401 and saw the bumper to bumper traffic  - holy eff. I thought Highway 1 was bad at home, no comparison. 8 lanes packed. We saw the controversial St. Claire line that sounded very similar to the situation we had in Vancouver when the Canada Line went through. Merchants on St Claire were angry that their area was dug up (like the Cambie Street merchants). The big difference though is that the middle of a busy road is now taken up by the streetcars – which is great for people who use the public transit system but there are still many many people who drive crosstown to work.

At Vaughan City Hall I immediately notice that the majority of the city council has Italian heritage. The Italian community in Vancouver has dispersed over the past 20 or 30 years so there doesn’t seem to be a high concentration of Italians anymore. Then as we walked down the hall there was a display dedicated to the Italian Canadian experience. Something that definitely resonates with me as a first generation Canadian. Mayor Maurizio Bevilaqua  (Abbruzzese like us!) was very generous in his candour. He told us that in “order for everything to change, we have to change everything.” He told us to park our egos at the door and to figure out what it is we’re really passionate about. Then we can take the next step. He and the council have big aspirations for Vaughan – they are trying to build a downtown core from scratch. And someone brought up an excellent point – when people are priced out of the city they work in then it becomes a crisis of community loyalty. You have to pick where you want to live and pay taxes and where you want to work. How do you choose? What are your priorities? From Vaughan we went to the Kortright Conservation Centre to check out the space and the 2 LEED Platinum houses. After we toured the houses it was dinner time (FINALLY) at the conservation centre. It had a wraparound deck that really reminded me of home -  lots of forest and nature. Dinner was nice – burgers and salad, food from their garden. Then it was time for bed at the Ryerson residence.

Morning comes early and because we were going to be going to the Royal Canadian Yacht Club for dinner that night, we had to be dressed up the whole day. So picture 16 people all in suits, walking down the street from res. Hahaha! We made our way to McKinsey and Co. one of the world’s top management consulting companies. We were introduced to the idea of the “trisector athlete” a strategy where the private, public and social sectors get together and work on initiatives. The building we were in was on the campus of the University of Toronto and the deal was that McKinsey got the land from U of T, McKinsey builds the building and then leases it from the university and then at the end of the lease McKinsey will donate the building to the university. These guys are top dogs in their field and it was so out of my world it was really eye-opening to see the level of innovation from just the 4 people in the room. I can’t imagine what it would be like to work there where you would be around that all of the time.

It was straight to the next meeting – David Miller, former Mayor of Toronto. He spoke to us directly about green initiatives in the City while he was mayor. I really liked him – he was genuine, smart, and passionate about the city and making things better. He sees the big picture – he sees the need in the community and finds ways to make things better for the taxpayers and the ones who need the help. Toronto identified that the concrete apartment buildings are not energy efficient so they decided to wrap them in a plastic like material to hold it in. In order to do this they hired people from the community (union jobs), got the material from a Canadian company. He built new TTC lines and had Bombardier build the cars. Canadian company – not only provides more TTC jobs but also the jobs at Bombardier and the other manufacturing plants in the supply chain. He was a mayor who made things happen. I found that inspiring – municipal public servants can really make a difference in their communities. Maybe there’s a place for me there one day J.

After David Miller we went down to the Digital Media Zone at Ryerson. It was abuzz  - you could feel the creativity and innovation. Lots of young entrepreneurs doing some pretty awesome things – like Soapbox and Greengage. We also went to the downstairs area of the DMZ and met with young innovators working on robotics to help paraplegics walk again. These are the people we should be proud of – they are innovative, brilliant, driven and enterprising.

After the DMZ it was a lunch meeting with one of the VPs of Ryerson. I have to say I was impressed – it is the hardest school to get into in Ontario. The programs are diverse and right in the middle of downtown Toronto. We learned of all of the progressive initiatives and partnerships. It was inspiring to know that some educational institutions aren’t mired in history and hubris. They have what sounds like a very interesting graduate program about labour relations where Buzz Hargrove (CAW) is the chair. Most campuses allow the right wing to set up their business schools so it was great to hear that labour was involved in this initiative.

Whoops – I forgot about the RC Harris Water Filtration Plant – it was very cool. It’s been around so long that it’s an iconic piece of the city – you might remember the reference from In the Skin of a Lion…we toured it with the director of the facility and got a lot of technical information. Needless to say it was cool to see the water come in from Lake Ontario and know that it would be the same water we got from the taps.

Ok…then we were supposed to meet with Dalton McGuinty, premier of Ontario but the house was rising so it was not meant to be. Instead, we met with 3 deputy ministers of Ontario. 

A quick subway ride to the waterfront lead us to our next stop – on a boat! With the director of Waterfront Ontario to discuss the development of the waterfront and what it means to the downtown core. I learned that Toronto has the most cranes of any city in the world and I definitely believe that. You should see all of the construction. I’ll also throw out props to one of my study group members who stopped to buy popsicles for all 30 of us. It was a beautiful afternoon on the water, looking at the Toronto skyline on our way to the Royal Canadian Yacht Club for dinner (one of the last places to have an official dress code).

When we got off the boat we were greeted immediately by wait staff with glasses of wine. It was really nice because some of the Ontario alumni were there as well as Ian Anderson the conference director. It was pretty surreal – this was a very old venue with lots of history, a great view of the city, great company, great wine. I felt very lucky to be a part of this. Dinner was nice – I finally got to sit with some labour folks (nurse from NB and a corrections officer from NWT) and talk labour. Dinner was delicious – soup, salad, chicken and a berry dessert. With wine of course!

After dinner we were so appreciative of the amazing work of our tour organizing chairs of the GTA area that we presented them with a frame of our handprints and a thank-you message. They seemed to like it and it felt nice to recognize them in this way.

Once dinner was over we went to a pub to meet with other Ontario alumni for a few minutes. We were so tired by the end we walked back to our residence and ran into student protesters. A few of us approached them to show our solidarity and were immediately brought back down to earth when they questioned the point of the conference. We had a good discussion and left with red squares on our jackets.

All in all it was an insane schedule – but it definitely gave me a better perspective of how Toronto works. I am looking forward to me next visit to see all of the changes. 

Toronto City Hall

Toronto skyline 

Ontario 2  - at the Royal Canadian Yacht Club