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Toronto-Astral Street Furniture Program

Spotted on Queen West yesterday: hideous embarrassment vs. Montreal's version:

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Hey, as long as it remained contained to these purpose built surfaces, that would be ok. I think postering on other city property (utility poles, parking meters, etc.) should be considered defacing public property and perpetrators charged.
 
There's a new bin near me by King St, between Trinity and Spadina. Appearance wise, it's clunky, tacky, and cheap looking. Functionally though, I like the pedal. Many people throwing out trash are discouraged by the possibility of touching the flaps on the current bins, which this alleviates. Regarding snow and ice (mentioned in Hume's article) I'm quite certain you can still push garbage through the flaps if the foot pedal breaks.

Overall though, I like the current simple metal bins, they should've taken that design and added a pedal to it. This new bulging, textured plastic street furniture screams Fisher-Price.
 
lesouris said:
Constitutionally that might be a problem. See Ramsden v. Peterborough.
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I understand the freedom of expression implication but in this instance, the city is providing canvasses throughout the city on which you can post advertising or any other bit of information that you want.

If freedom of expression means you can poster anywhere you want, you'll soon see people postering on car windows and other private property. Is graffiti not expression also? It is, yet people do get fined when caught.

There needs to be a balance.
 
MetroMan said:
I understand the freedom of expression implication but in this instance, the city is providing canvasses throughout the city on which you can post advertising or any other bit of information that you want.

If freedom of expression means you can poster anywhere you want, you'll soon see people postering on car windows and other private property. Is graffiti not expression also? It is, yet people do get fined when caught.

There needs to be a balance.
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Well, there's a difference between public property like utility poles and private property. Peterborough has poster collars that were installed on existing poles in the 90s and are well used. I'm not sure but they might have been a response to that Supreme Court decision. Ottawa's version is a stainless steel tube, again on existing poles. In both cases it's a more elegant solution than Toronto's.
 
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MisterF said:
Well, there's a difference between public property like utility poles and private property. Peterborough has poster collars that were installed on existing poles in the 90s and are well used. I'm not sure but they might have been a response to that Supreme Court decision. Ottawa's version is a stainless steel tube, again on existing poles. In both cases it's a more elegant solution than Toronto's.
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Toronto sold its utility poles to Toronto Hydro a few years ago when city council needed to balance the budget. I believe Toronto Hydro is run as a private company. Therefore, the utility poles are private property.

Nonetheless, fines aren't going to solve the problem because the laws aren't enforced. A followup to the street furniture program should be replacing utility poles on high pedestrian traffic areas like Queen st. with ribbed poles that make it difficult to poster or adding this appendage 6ft up around existing poles.

...hey, better yet, get rid of the poles altogether and bury the hydro and communications cables.... one can dream.
 
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Well, there's a difference between public property like utility poles and private property. Peterborough has poster collars that were installed on existing poles in the 90s and are well used. I'm not sure but they might have been a response to that Supreme Court decision. Ottawa's version is a stainless steel tube, again on existing poles. In both cases it's a more elegant solution than Toronto's.
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The old City of Scarborough placed plastic white collars on hydro poles, some of which I think still exist. Problem with those is that they become discoloured as the staples on them rust.
 
adma said:
And virtually unusable as the staples multiply...
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filthy staples. out in the open like that. have they no shame? ;)
 
wyliepoon said:
The old City of Scarborough placed plastic white collars on hydro poles, some of which I think still exist. Problem with those is that they become discoloured as the staples on them rust.
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In the case of both Peterborough and Ottawa, the collars are made of steel so no staples are used. Posters are taped on.

Ottawa
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Peterborough
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Here's some further info on Ramsden v. Peterborough and postering in general, from Spacing - http://spacing.ca/postering/poster-canada.htm. From the article: "cities can only place restrictions on postering if they provide adequate space for it to occur." That's where the poster collars and boards come in - cities are free to ban postering in areas where they're provided.
 
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MisterF said:
"cities can only place restrictions on postering if they provide adequate space for it to occur." That's where the poster collars and boards come in - cities are free to ban postering in areas where they're provided.
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Thank you. Exactly my point. The city isn't taking away people's right of expression of they provide places to do so.

In this case, the city has provided community poster surfaces so they have the right to ban postering on hydro poles, garbage bins and parking meters.

How to enforce? If they got a single individual walking up and down Queen St. in plain clothes, they would get at least one violation every hour or so. I say this because I can walk at any time of the day or night from Trinity Bellwoods Park to Yonge and find at least one or two people with posters and a brush in their hand.

Eventually, people would get the message.
 
I agree! I see these guys with their carts putting up signs almost every time I'm walking along Queen St. It would be very easy to have 2 or 3 guys walking around the city and busting these guys. It really degrades the city and adds to the perception of Toronto being an ugly city.
 
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