Opposition to Sidewalk Labs in Toronto

That's really fascinating.

I'm not bothered by developers making money. They're a very important part of the housing system. But what does bother me is when you have buildings poorly constructed, made to be cheap to build but expensive to maintain. Most of the condos along the waterfront meet that criteria.

Even my own building, which on the whole is pretty well built, has to undergo a huge renovation to each unit because the developer used plastic piping instead of copper and it's failing. The developer saved a few bucks, and I'm paying for it years later.

I'm a YIMBY- so long as the developer isn't cutting corners.

I disagree.

Pick any specific measurable metric for what "multicultural" means and Toronto usually comes out on top, or in the top 3. There have been some studies done on the subject. Even just googling "Most multicultural city" will usually give you back Toronto or a top 5 list that includes it.

It's not just marketing bullshit.

1) Your point on source of population growth is not true.

Toronto knows how many people come there as a function of overall migration and is a very active participant in migration policy.

Moving 100K people / year into Toronto is part of the plan.

On a national level, we plan for this, knowing very well how many are going to Toronto.

2) Toronto does not grow 'because it's a great city'. It's only 'great' relative to the options of most of it's poor migrants from Philippines, China, India etc.. Having a 'decent government with basic laws' is not 'great', it's just 'normal'.

(Edit: I grew up in Toronto hence my strong opinion, and wasn't able to put it in perspective until I lived abroad in many places)

Ironically, for all of it's 'multiculturalism', Toronto is actually a very bland, uninspiring, nondescript place where nothing really happens. It's mostly American big box retail, foreign cars, nondescript architecture. Toronto has tons of Starbucks', Tim Horton's.

It actually 'has everything' (i.e. the Opera House, decent public transport, major sports teams) - all the checkmarks, but nothing stands out on a world class scale. Toronto is a grand exercise is 'basic civic function' but almost nothing more than that.

To given an example - Toronto doesn't even have a single Michelin starred restaurant. Not one. Ever. Chicago has about 20. Seoul has about 20. Not that Chicago and Seoul are 'better overall' - but they have enough identity, character, soul, character, productivity (i.e. money) to do notable things.

Can you name a single product or service designed in Toronto that anyone, anywhere else is the world can name? Or uses? Can you name a really important international company HQ'd in Toronto?

Admittedly, being able to incorporate a lot of people very fairly from around the world and get them education, jobs, integrate them fairly well - is in fact something 'notable' for which Canada/Toronto doesn't get enough credit. We should be proud of that. But beyond secular civic issues - Toronto is a 'non place'. This is why people that have established roots in more aspirational places are not flocking to Toronto.

People 'flee' to Toronto to escape crappy conditions.

People from Kyoto, Stockholm and Zurich are not thinking 'oh, we really need to move to Toronto, they have so many Starbucks'. They're not coming.

3) "Where we do agree is in what should be done: zone for tall buildings and dense land use"

I don't really agree at all. I say cut the number of people coming to the city substantially (i.e. normalize the rate of immigration) which would entail obviously a national strategy, and also put some special conditions on foreign speculation.

After the last 20 years of re-construction, Toronto already has enough density.

I don't see any point at all in growing into a massive, vertical city with tons of traffic and density is positive in any way, for anyone frankly.

Then we can talk to Google about some things for which they have great expertise: information management and connectivity (i.e. not building neighbourhoods), and hopefully do it in a way that respects people's privacy.

Surveillance already exists. Cameras and sensors are everywhere in any modern city. Selling that data off to Google to do god knows what with it is the issue. Ofcourse I live in a country with a reasonably well functioning government. They can run a smart city without whoring themselves out to Silicon Valley.

Sorry, but for ostensibly 'so many uniformed opinions' - you have provided no facts at all to validate this position.

... and ironically your comment "Sidewalk labs partnered with them to integrate smart city ideas," is effectively not true, it's far beyond that.

"There is substantial infrastructure, and decontamination projects ongoing for many years" comment I think is possibly misrepresentative as well, it implies 'the work has started' - when really it hasn't - moreover, I did not indicate that 'nothing has been done'.

Again:

1) To the OP's point: this is a strategic, highly speculative project for Google, possibly not money making in the direct sense, and it's likely Toronto could come out ahead in some way (though I doubt it). Google is a massively cash flush entity, looking for ways to spend money.

2) Toronto doesn't have a desperate housing problem - it has a housing pricing problem. The Google project is not really relevant anyhow (it's small and will have less housing than zoning permits)

3) The city should zone and regulate the land for 'whatever purposes are suitable' and then that's mostly it, which is an opinion, but not exactly controversial as this is what most cities, including Toronto, do all of the time.

To your points:

A) Google is not gong to 'integrate smart city ideas' - they want to be considerably more than that, they want to effectively be a municipal of entity: they'll plan, subcontract, 'micro zone' etc.. Their plans go far beyond just tech, or just communications, just consultation - even into the realm of construction materials, architecture, sub-planning, even taxation! See the leaked data [1].

I actually would agree if Google were involved only to 'help with some IT/tech issues' or even 'advising' on developing some aspects of information etc. but this goes way beyond that.

B) The 'Sidewalks Labs' relevant work has not been planned or started, of course some municipal infrastructural activities that have been going on for some time, but that's a general activity. 'Decontamination' is obviously something that would have to be done irrespective of whatever they built (i.e. shops, factories, parks etc.)

Sidewalks Labs hasn't yet even proposed a detailed curriculum of what's going to happen, it's not fair to indicate that 'work has been ongoing for some time' even though some basic municipal activity has been.

[1] https://www.engadget.com/2019/02/15/alphabet-sidewalk-labs-t...