| Page Views: 1,932 Last Visit to Toronto: April, 2005 | Toronto - World Class On My Doorstep by tpal - last update: Jul 25, 2005 |
If you are my age and grew up in Buffalo, New York, the city of Toronto is a very familiar place. Nowadays we think of our Canadian neighbor as that cosmopolitan international megalopolis to the north that has it all and is everything that we are not...but it wasn't always that way.
In the early 1950's, I can recall my parents talking about all the people from Toronto coming to Buffalo for the "nightlife". Apparently, there wasn't anything to do in the backwater Canadian town on the north shore of Lake Ontario. In fact, the populations of metropolitan Buffalo and metropolitan Toronto in 1950 were almost identical at about 1,100,000. Difference was we were in New York, near Niagara Falls, still on the the jazz and nightclub circuit and...the St. Lawrence Seaway Project hadn't been built yet (a whole other subject).
Well, times have changed a bit. Not necessarily for Buffalo where the area population still hovers around one million but Toronto has grown up some. Metropolitan Toronto now counts its population at over four and half million people and is recognized as one of the great cities of the world. Oh, and last time I looked, there was plenty to do on the north shore of Lake Ontario! |
| Front Street Building Facades |
|  | I imagine that over the past 40 years I have been to Toronto a hundred or so times. The greatest concentration of visits, often weekly, being during the late 60's and early 70's when the Yorkville area was Canada's answer to Haight-Ashbury. Joni Mitchell was playing at the Purple Onion and I could sit inches away from Gordon Lightfoot downstairs at the Riverboat. Today, of course, all remnants of "hippiedoom" have been replaced by toney shops and upscale condos.
Still Toronto draws us back regularly but Buffalonians rarely feel like tourists. It's more like going to Manhattan for a night on the town when you live on Long Island. As a result I've rarely brought my camera and even though I can get around Toronto without a map, I've needed to do some research to build a Virtual Tourist page. The result, therefore, is a sort of "as it happens" page that will grow over time with subsequent visits. It may be a little disjointed but hopefully it will add a little different perspective. |
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tpal's Toronto Travel Tips
 Comments for tpal about Toronto | | | | |
Jim_Eliason Thu Nov 29, 2007 02:50 UTC
great tips! | 1courage Wed Feb 21, 2007 16:21 UTC
lol, yes, my first impression was that this is a real cathedral, than I suddenly realized that this in reality glass corridor. But very spectacular, no doubt about it. | HORSCHECK Sat Feb 25, 2006 15:07 UTC
Interesting page with brilliant photos. Brings back many memoriies of my week in Toronto. Keep up the good work. :o) | Katmosphere Tue Oct 4, 2005 22:23 UTC
Hi there :) |
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