Just as the stigma surrounding mental illness has started to dissipate, the College Street location of the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) is facing a crisis of its own. Its landlord, a numbered company owned by Brookfield Asset Management, is playing hardball during a scheduled negotiation in which it is seeking to increase […]

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RE: Bloor “foremost a public space”?(July) Thank you for your editorial “It’s really a village not a freeway” in the July edition of The Annex Gleaner. I can’t agree more! The case for bike lanes on Bloor is strong: the route is flat and unencumbered by streetcar tracks, and many people continue to cycle along […]

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RE: Bloor “foremost a public space” (July) As someone who’s been pushing improvement in Bloor bike safety for at least a decade now, I’m glad that the Gleaner has kept up its coverage. And while I am in total agreement that improvements to bike safety are quite overdue in the Annex, I’m less certain that […]

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Opining on rail safety, daycare, development, health care, and Bill C-51 When residents in The Annex Gleaner coverage area go to the polls on Oct. 19, it will have been less than 18 months since they voted in a federal by-election to replace member of Parliament Olivia Chow, who had stepped down to run for […]

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Transition to green economy, stand up for civil liberties, and be fiscally responsible By Nick Wright I am running for the Green Party in the upcoming Oct. 19 federal election for University-Rosedale because it is the only party with a plan to solve the emerging global environmental and economic crisis and transition to a sustainable […]

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Only the Liberals have a progressive economic agenda By Chrystia Freeland I have a political skeleton in my closet. I was the Liberal member of Parliament for Toronto Centre and am running as the Liberal candidate in University-Rosedale, but the first party I ever canvassed for was the New Democratic Party when my mother, Halyna […]

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44 Walmer Rd. faced changed to its character in 2001 In his Aug. 24, 2015 column for The Globe and Mail, “A pop art prize”, Dave Leblanc points to Alfred Holden’s May 2001 column in The Annex Gleaner about 44 Walmer Rd., a design by renowned architect Uno Prii. Leblanc reminds us that the questions […]

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A tree that keeps fighting back By Alfred Holden, Given up for lost, great elms soldier on. Extinction was predicted. I remember the news stories around 1970, so prone were the trees to deadly Dutch elm disease, which is still very much with us. But if you believe in evolution, or if you don’t, pull […]

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A review from when the Lillian H. Smith Branch was new In the October 1995 edition of The Annex Gleaner, Alfred Holden reviewed the then new Lillian H. Smith Branch of the Toronto Public Library. On this, the branch’s twentieth anniversary, we thought we’d take a look back at what we thought then. You be […]

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Pick a plan, the real enemy is inaction For me, there is very little doubt that carbon needs to be priced. The only question is what mechanism we use as a nation to price it for the most effective carbon reducing strategy. I had the fortune of hosting the “Why Should I Care?” forum on […]

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Harbord Bakery marks 70 years By Annemarie Brissenden For Rafi Kosower, Roslyn Katz, and Susan Wisniewski, VE day will always be a little extra special. Because it was on May 8, 1945, that their parents, Albert and Goldie Kosower, bought “the little bakery next to the fish market [at] the corner of Harbord and Major […]

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Proposal marked by diversity By Annemarie Brissenden The fine-grained retail and eclectic mix of buildings that developed over time along Toronto’s avenues is the inspiration behind Westbank Corp.’s application to redevelop the southwest corner of Bloor and Bathurst streets, which the company submitted to the City of Toronto last month. It’s been two years – […]

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