St. Even
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Chicago Tribune travel reporter goes on "green tour" of Toronto...
The Challenge of Going Eco
By John Keilman | Tribune staff reporter
September 23, 2007
TORONTO - The first snag in what was supposed to be an environmentally friendly visit to Toronto came when an emergency caused police to close a major road that led to my first destination. I had vowed to take nothing but public transportation during my time in this uber-green city, and it was clear a streetcar wouldn't be coming anytime soon.
So, barely two hours into my stay, I hailed a cab.
Toronto is Canada's largest city, a multi-cultural stew of 2.5 million people spread along the shore of Lake Ontario, and it takes its tree-hugging seriously. Trash cans have separate slots for paper and plastic. Street signs warn against letting cars idle for more than three minutes. A massive wind turbine mounted near the convention center generates enough electricity to power 250 homes, and frigid water drawn from the lake is used to cool downtown office buildings.
The city even has its own Green Tourism Association, a non-profit group that maintains lists of activities, restaurants and attractions it regards as ecologically responsible. Shari Simpson-Campbell, the association's director, said more and more visitors are demanding such amenities.
"When people think of eco-tourism, they're always thinking of going to Costa Rica or saving the rain forest, but you have to be a good environmentalist while visiting any city," she said. "If you have sustainable practices at home, why would you leave that at home if you're going somewhere else?"
The association's Web site led me to the Gladstone Hotel, a one-time flophouse transformed into stylish lodgings. It has a lengthy "green policy" that calls for everything from composting to re-using towels to stocking its cafe with all things local, organic and fair-trade. The soap, shampoo and moisturizer in each room are made by a small Ontario company that cultivates its own herbs and collects beeswax from its own hives.
The Gladstone is in Toronto's arty Queen West neighborhood, a collection of galleries, bars and restaurants, and the tattooed folk who haunt them. The vibe was more grunge than green -- the work of graffiti taggers, who presumably did not use soy-based paint, was everywhere -- but signs of environmental consciousness were plentiful. On Queen Street West, the area's main drag, a storefront advertised the "Now House," a project to turn drafty old homes into energy-efficient structures. The Propeller gallery hosted an exhibition of works inspired by climate change. And plenty of restaurants flaunted their vegetarian, seasonal or otherwise-righteous offerings.
That's what led me to the Little Tibet Restaurant. Its menu, posted on the front window, promised organic dishes, and after that guilt-ridden taxi ride I was ready for penance. Only after I was seated did I learn that the organic fare was "a work in progress." The rest of the table chose vegetable dumplings, but I was getting annoyed by my twice-thwarted good intentions. I ordered the lamb.
The next day, I caught a bus right outside the hotel that took me to a subway station, and a few stops later I was standing alongside the Humber River, which winds through western Toronto on its way to Lake Ontario. Following the river, I figured, would give me a true nature lover's view of the city.
Ted Cordina, a former dot-com consultant who now runs Toronto Kayak and Canoe Adventures, met me in a nearby parking lot with boats and a guide -- his 16-year-old son, Mathias. We shoved off, and within minutes, the noise of traffic was gone. A few housetops poked above the trees covering the riverbank, but soon they disappeared, too, and it was possible to imagine that I was drifting through some distant wilderness instead of a vast, heaving metropolis.
We poked around some marshes where tufts of reeds and cattails jutted 10 feet above the water. We spotted deer by the riverside, chewing leaves and staring back with little evident concern. In the distance was a swirling black cloud of cormorants, from which a few of the birds peeled away to dive after fish. The current carried us lazily downstream, but as I neared the lake, I was yanked from my reveries by the sight of the CN tower, Toronto's 1,815-foot-tall concrete-and-steel trademark, looming to the east.
But the long day's journey into green was only beginning. After a bewildering trip on public transportation -- I took the 505 bus, when it turned out I needed the 506 streetcar -- I made it to Kensington Market, the city's crunchiest neighborhood.
It's the sort of place where you'll find vendors selling hemp milk or wallets made from recycled juice boxes. An old sedan parked on Augusta Avenue had been gutted, slathered with a hippie-hued paint job and turned into a planter. A slogan on the back said, "The Revolution Will Not Be Motorized."
I stopped for lunch at the Rice Bar and, at last, got a no-holds-barred organic meal: lime- and ginger-infused rice mixed with black beans, pumpkin seeds and free-range, hormone- and antibiotic-free chicken. It was a hearty and healthy feast that blew my mind as surely as a trip around the corner to the Roach-o-Rama head shop.
The Rice Bar proved just a warm-up for that evening's dinner at Fressen, a vegan restaurant on Queen Street West. I had always viewed veganism -- a philosophy and diet that forbids the use of all animal products -- as too hard-core for my bacon-loving taste buds. But this was a revelation: From the marinated tomato, fennel and chickpea salad to the sweet potato Moroccan stew, the tapas-style dishes left me full and satisfied.
I spent my last morning in Toronto pedaling through downtown on a Sights on Bikes bicycle tour led by Tanya Roberts, an aspiring opera singer who used her ample powers of projection to narrate city history over the clamor of Saturday traffic. She escorted my group past the St. Lawrence Market, site of Toronto's first City Hall and now home to dozens of specialty food vendors; St. James Cathedral, a stately Anglican church fitted with spectacular stained glass windows; and Ft. York, where the invading American army decamped during the War of 1812.
It was a fun, carbon-neutral outing, and feeling newly virtuous, I waited for a streetcar to take me back to the heart of the city. Three of them passed by in the opposite direction and still I waited. When one finally appeared after 15 minutes, my spirits lifted until I saw it wasn't going my way. That was the last straw. I was trying to be a pal to the environment, but my vacation was slipping away on a concrete median. So, alas, I jumped in another cab.
My dwindling resolve wasn't helped when I stopped by Fresh, a vegetarian restaurant, for a final meal before I left town. I ordered a "Tour de Force" protein shake, a mixture of blueberries, soy milk, banana, spirulina, hemp, sprouted flax and maca, a Peruvian root vegetable. It looked like Yoda's swamp, tasted as bland as a raw potato and cost $7.
I was on the verge of calling a Hummer limousine to take me to the airport when I was offered a bite of a wrap. It was simple -- just some tomato, lettuce, carrot, cucumber, sprouts and tofu encased in a wheat tortilla -- but it was delicious. Spirit-lifting, even.
So I hitched up my backpack, walked out to the streetcar stop, and three transfers, one broken bus and a subway ride later, I was at my flight gate -- another green vacationer, saved by soy.
The Challenge of Going Eco
By John Keilman | Tribune staff reporter
September 23, 2007
TORONTO - The first snag in what was supposed to be an environmentally friendly visit to Toronto came when an emergency caused police to close a major road that led to my first destination. I had vowed to take nothing but public transportation during my time in this uber-green city, and it was clear a streetcar wouldn't be coming anytime soon.
So, barely two hours into my stay, I hailed a cab.
Toronto is Canada's largest city, a multi-cultural stew of 2.5 million people spread along the shore of Lake Ontario, and it takes its tree-hugging seriously. Trash cans have separate slots for paper and plastic. Street signs warn against letting cars idle for more than three minutes. A massive wind turbine mounted near the convention center generates enough electricity to power 250 homes, and frigid water drawn from the lake is used to cool downtown office buildings.
The city even has its own Green Tourism Association, a non-profit group that maintains lists of activities, restaurants and attractions it regards as ecologically responsible. Shari Simpson-Campbell, the association's director, said more and more visitors are demanding such amenities.
"When people think of eco-tourism, they're always thinking of going to Costa Rica or saving the rain forest, but you have to be a good environmentalist while visiting any city," she said. "If you have sustainable practices at home, why would you leave that at home if you're going somewhere else?"
The association's Web site led me to the Gladstone Hotel, a one-time flophouse transformed into stylish lodgings. It has a lengthy "green policy" that calls for everything from composting to re-using towels to stocking its cafe with all things local, organic and fair-trade. The soap, shampoo and moisturizer in each room are made by a small Ontario company that cultivates its own herbs and collects beeswax from its own hives.
The Gladstone is in Toronto's arty Queen West neighborhood, a collection of galleries, bars and restaurants, and the tattooed folk who haunt them. The vibe was more grunge than green -- the work of graffiti taggers, who presumably did not use soy-based paint, was everywhere -- but signs of environmental consciousness were plentiful. On Queen Street West, the area's main drag, a storefront advertised the "Now House," a project to turn drafty old homes into energy-efficient structures. The Propeller gallery hosted an exhibition of works inspired by climate change. And plenty of restaurants flaunted their vegetarian, seasonal or otherwise-righteous offerings.
That's what led me to the Little Tibet Restaurant. Its menu, posted on the front window, promised organic dishes, and after that guilt-ridden taxi ride I was ready for penance. Only after I was seated did I learn that the organic fare was "a work in progress." The rest of the table chose vegetable dumplings, but I was getting annoyed by my twice-thwarted good intentions. I ordered the lamb.
The next day, I caught a bus right outside the hotel that took me to a subway station, and a few stops later I was standing alongside the Humber River, which winds through western Toronto on its way to Lake Ontario. Following the river, I figured, would give me a true nature lover's view of the city.
Ted Cordina, a former dot-com consultant who now runs Toronto Kayak and Canoe Adventures, met me in a nearby parking lot with boats and a guide -- his 16-year-old son, Mathias. We shoved off, and within minutes, the noise of traffic was gone. A few housetops poked above the trees covering the riverbank, but soon they disappeared, too, and it was possible to imagine that I was drifting through some distant wilderness instead of a vast, heaving metropolis.
We poked around some marshes where tufts of reeds and cattails jutted 10 feet above the water. We spotted deer by the riverside, chewing leaves and staring back with little evident concern. In the distance was a swirling black cloud of cormorants, from which a few of the birds peeled away to dive after fish. The current carried us lazily downstream, but as I neared the lake, I was yanked from my reveries by the sight of the CN tower, Toronto's 1,815-foot-tall concrete-and-steel trademark, looming to the east.
But the long day's journey into green was only beginning. After a bewildering trip on public transportation -- I took the 505 bus, when it turned out I needed the 506 streetcar -- I made it to Kensington Market, the city's crunchiest neighborhood.
It's the sort of place where you'll find vendors selling hemp milk or wallets made from recycled juice boxes. An old sedan parked on Augusta Avenue had been gutted, slathered with a hippie-hued paint job and turned into a planter. A slogan on the back said, "The Revolution Will Not Be Motorized."
I stopped for lunch at the Rice Bar and, at last, got a no-holds-barred organic meal: lime- and ginger-infused rice mixed with black beans, pumpkin seeds and free-range, hormone- and antibiotic-free chicken. It was a hearty and healthy feast that blew my mind as surely as a trip around the corner to the Roach-o-Rama head shop.
The Rice Bar proved just a warm-up for that evening's dinner at Fressen, a vegan restaurant on Queen Street West. I had always viewed veganism -- a philosophy and diet that forbids the use of all animal products -- as too hard-core for my bacon-loving taste buds. But this was a revelation: From the marinated tomato, fennel and chickpea salad to the sweet potato Moroccan stew, the tapas-style dishes left me full and satisfied.
I spent my last morning in Toronto pedaling through downtown on a Sights on Bikes bicycle tour led by Tanya Roberts, an aspiring opera singer who used her ample powers of projection to narrate city history over the clamor of Saturday traffic. She escorted my group past the St. Lawrence Market, site of Toronto's first City Hall and now home to dozens of specialty food vendors; St. James Cathedral, a stately Anglican church fitted with spectacular stained glass windows; and Ft. York, where the invading American army decamped during the War of 1812.
It was a fun, carbon-neutral outing, and feeling newly virtuous, I waited for a streetcar to take me back to the heart of the city. Three of them passed by in the opposite direction and still I waited. When one finally appeared after 15 minutes, my spirits lifted until I saw it wasn't going my way. That was the last straw. I was trying to be a pal to the environment, but my vacation was slipping away on a concrete median. So, alas, I jumped in another cab.
My dwindling resolve wasn't helped when I stopped by Fresh, a vegetarian restaurant, for a final meal before I left town. I ordered a "Tour de Force" protein shake, a mixture of blueberries, soy milk, banana, spirulina, hemp, sprouted flax and maca, a Peruvian root vegetable. It looked like Yoda's swamp, tasted as bland as a raw potato and cost $7.
I was on the verge of calling a Hummer limousine to take me to the airport when I was offered a bite of a wrap. It was simple -- just some tomato, lettuce, carrot, cucumber, sprouts and tofu encased in a wheat tortilla -- but it was delicious. Spirit-lifting, even.
So I hitched up my backpack, walked out to the streetcar stop, and three transfers, one broken bus and a subway ride later, I was at my flight gate -- another green vacationer, saved by soy.
