Spacing Radio

Spacing Radio

Spacing Radio is the voice of Spacing, Canada's leading publication on urbanism.

  • 46 minutes 23 seconds
    Episode 85: City Accounting for Global Chaos
    With Justin Trudeau stepping down as Prime Minister and the very real possibility of an federal election, Premier Doug Ford mulling over a snap provincial election, and President-elect Trump threatening a trade war, it's almost impossible to predict what 2025 will hold. And yet, Toronto and other municipalities in Canada must muddle through as best they can and create an annual budget. That process has already started in Toronto. To rate Trudeau's legacy (for better or worse) in Toronto, and to identify possible pitfalls and goals for the megacity's newest budget, we've put together a panel discussion featuring CivicAction CEO Leslie Woo and Spacing Senior Editor John Lorinc.
    20 January 2025, 12:00 am
  • 1 hour 8 minutes
    Episode 84: Two Housing Carols
    This time of year, with the temperature below freezing, it feels appropriate to talk about housing. So, we're bringing you two conversations with two authors who have both recently written about that very topic. Carolyn Whitzman is the author of Home Truths: Fixing Canada's Housing Crisis. And Mitchell Cohen wrote Rhythms of Change: Reflections on the Regent Park Revitalization. The first book provides a macro view of housing in Canada, and the second provides a look at a specific development in Toronto.
    24 December 2024, 12:00 am
  • 36 minutes 8 seconds
    Future Fix: l'innovation au service des citoyens
    Découvrez comment Montréal repousse les limites de l'innovation urbaine. Grâce aux témoignages de Maxime Thibault Vézina, Chef de division au Laboratoire d'innovation urbaine à la Ville de Montréal, et de Raphaël Guyard, conseiller sénior à la Maison de l'Innovation Sociale, explorez comment la technologie, des démarches participatives pour adapter la réglementation, et la collaboration entre acteurs publics, privés et citoyens s'unissent pour façonner une ville plus inclusive, durable et tournée vers l'avenir.
    9 December 2024, 12:00 am
  • 20 minutes 49 seconds
    The Future Fix: Generation Restoration
    The City of Toronto has been named a "role model city" by the United Nations Environment Program for Supporting Urban Ecosystems. It's part of an initiative the UN calls "Generation Restoration," part of their Decade on Ecosystem Restoration. To find out why Toronto has been named a role model, and what that city can teach others across the world about fostering and protecting their urban ecosystems, we speak to Kim Statham, director of Toronto Urban Forestry, and Wendy Strickland, project manager for the Toronto Ravine Strategy. Listen to the episode to hear how cities can play a role in ecosystem restoration.
    22 November 2024, 12:00 am
  • 1 hour 1 minute
    Episode 83: The War on Bikes
    With Premier Doug Ford's repeated promises to rip up bike lanes in Toronto, and possibly even other Ontario cities and towns, we've decided to dive deep into why and what that might mean for the future or road safety and city planning. We have a panel discussion featuring Cycle Toronto Executive Director Michael Longfied and Toronto Today Editor Allison Smith. We talk about both the impact of removing cycling infrastructure and why Doug Ford has suddenly made a few kilometres of bike lanes in Toronto a provincial priority. And we speak to Deputy Mayor and City Councillor Amber Morley about she defends the new Bloor Street bike lanes in her ward, and how/if the City can move forward with safe street projects.
    11 November 2024, 12:00 am
  • 28 minutes 51 seconds
    The Overhead: Preserving Community
    We're pleased to bring you another season of The Overhead, and we begin by checking back on a topic we've been tracking from the start: community land trusts. This time, we're focusing specifically on the "community" aspect of land trusts. We've spoken about the benefits of removing certain land from the market, preserving it as affordable housing in perpetuity. But how do land trusts help longstanding cultural communities so they can continue to call their neigbourhoods home? We see different communities turning to land trust model as a way to avoid displacement, or reassert cultural ownership over land they've traditionally called home: in the traditionally Black neighbourhoods of Hogan's Alley in Vancouver and Africville in Halifax, or in Toronto's Chinatown. To answer this, we spoke to Nat Pace, network director of the Canadian Network of Community Land Trusts, and Chiyi Tam, managing director of the Toronto Chinatown Land Trust. As Tam puts it, when we talk about the heritage of a place, we spend a lot of time speaking about the buildings or the character. We lose sight of what really makes a place: "Heritage is the people, it's not the buildings. And affordability is a core function to do heritage preservation work, in and amongst all of our communities — whether that's dragon dancing or whether that's the literal existence of Africville." How can ownership over land help preserve our diverse communities?
    15 October 2024, 12:00 am
  • 51 minutes 34 seconds
    Episode 82: Toronto's political gridlock
    This month, we respond to Doug Ford's stated plan of banning new bike lanes in Ontario municipalities and building an underground highway from Markham to Scarborough. Then we speak to environmental lawyer and cycling advocate Albert Koehl about his book Wheeling Through Toronto: a history of the bicycle and its riders. We talk about how attitudes towards cyclists have changed over time, or even repeated themselves. Finally, we talk to transportation consultant and former TTC Chair Adam Giambrone about the need for a culture change at Toronto's transportation commission.
    1 October 2024, 2:04 pm
  • 59 minutes 9 seconds
    Episode 81: Talking Transit '24
    It's been a while since we had a good, old-fashioned transit talk with friends of the show Tricia Wood (York University urban geography professor and Spacing contributor) and Matt Elliott (Toronto Star columnist and publisher of the City Hall Watcher newsletter). We talk about returning TTC service levels to pre-pandemic levels, what we should look for in the next TTC CEO, what is even happening with the Eglinton Crosstown, and Doug Ford's transit expansion plans.
    12 September 2024, 1:27 am
  • 56 minutes 11 seconds
    Episode 80: Toronto's Drone Scandal
    We heard a lot about drones at the Paris Olympics, but what about in our own backyard? In this episode, Spacing's John Lorinc tells us about a piece he wrote called Eyes in the Sky, which documents the stealthy creep of the Toronto Police Service's use of drones to keep tabs on residents. Next, author and green advocate Lorraine Johnson tells us about an open letter she co-signed urging Canadian municipalities to change their outdated bylaws which prohibit growing habit gardens and other helpful plant species in our lawns and backyards. Finaly, Ingrid Buday founded No More Noise Toronto out of frustration with the city's high-volume noise pollution, especially traffic sounds. The group advocates for new bylaws protecting residents' right to peace and quiet, and gathers its own data to make the case.
    8 August 2024, 12:06 am
  • 45 minutes 42 seconds
    Episode 79: Is Toronto strangled by rules?
    Toronto is often accused of being over-regulated. It's a fair criticism. For example, photographer and urbanist commentator Dan Seljak tells us how he stumbled upon the small Finch Store selling espresso, fighting to stay open in the face of City zoning laws. For more of the story, and how Finch Store was granted a reprieve, we speak to local City Councillor Alejandra Bravo. And we speak to Councillor Gord Perks, chair of the Planning and Housing Committee, about why Toronto works on complaints-based bylaw enforcement, and how we can improve the system for small businesses, special events, and more.
    16 July 2024, 10:51 am
  • 47 minutes 38 seconds
    Episode 78: Bike Month
    It's Bike Month! It's a time we celebrate cycle culture in Toronto and surrounding cities and towns. At least officially. Despite some significant gains in cycling infrastructure, there are still a lot of people and (more troubling) politicians who'd like to run riders off the road. To put this all into perspective, we spoke to Lanrick Bennett Jr., a cycling advocate who, for the last few years, has represented Toronto as the Bicycle Mayor. And, Spacing co-founder Shawn Micallef tells us about the new edition of his book Stroll: psychogeographic walking tours of Toronto. In 2010, Shawn wrote the book as a series of guided walks, with historic background and personal reflections, through different parts of the city. Now, 14 years later, he's retread those steps for a brand new version of the book.
    18 June 2024, 12:19 pm
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