flemmings | (no subject)

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rl_11

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I *said* I hated that luxury condo at Bedford and Bloor, and here's another reason why. Eyesore *and* health hazard.

Though a coworker told me that once he was passing the place-- which advertised itself as being 'for curators, scholars, musicians and kings' to justify the 2 million price tag on its units-- and saw a stooped old guy shuffling past, wearing only pyjamas, with a grubby carrier bag dangling from his hand. Ah the ironic contrast between rich and poor in this town-- until the guy went to the entrance and key-coded himself in. A resident, in fact.

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A resident, in fact.

XD

That made me very happy. I hope he's too eccentric to wash as well and smells up their elevators.

Said condo replaced a bunch of nice 20s buildings which, agreed, had franchises on the street level. But they made for bustle and traffic and people on the streets, and the Chicken Chalet was an institution, with motherly middle-aged waitresses who knew you. Now there's Palladian concrete frontage and a bank with no outside ATM and it sucks. You can't kill Bloor St, but this is trying mightily to do so.

I read an obit in the Economist way back (cannot for the life of me remember the name) of a female city planner who campaigned for "organic" cities and neighbourhoods that were a jumble of all sorts of different buildings and businesses and people. That is exactly the kind of place I enjoy living and walking around in. Tokyo got me down a bit at first (what with all the concrete), but I've come to realise that if you burrow a bit deeper into the area, you often find interesting things. Went to Kawagoe yest, which was a case in point: dreary depressing new buildings everywhere, but 15 minutes north of the station you find the Kurazukuri and Kashiya Yokocho.

That would be Jane Jacobs, probably, who lived in Toronto. Much of TO is exactly that; and more of it is the American model, nothing accessible without a car.

Tokyo is weird that way. I like the mess of architecture in most areas. If you live in the boonies, outside the uhhh Yamanote station foci, look at a map and choose the 'Kyuu' whatever street it is-- 旧, I think- Kawagoe Kaidou or Nakasendou Kaidou, usually a short distance from the wide depressing six lane modern avatar of the thing. The Kyuu Whatever is the old daimyou route from their domains to Edo, and since the daimyou passed along it twice a year, that's where the shops and houses were, and still are.

Inside the Yamanote is different. Between the earthquake and the firebombings it got built and rebuilt and yes, tends to run to concrete and/ or tattiness.

Yes! That's her. I didn't realise she moved to Toronto later on.
Thanks for the note on Japanese cities. I'll keep an eye out for those streets.

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