PUTOTO
Active Member
I have been living in Toronto for a few years, and I found this city very windy. Comparing to many places I’ve visited and lived before including New York City, Chicago, Montreal, Tokyo, and Seoul, this city seems to be the windiest. And it is sometimes unpleasant (or uncomfortable), and distracting.
Statistics say, Toronto's average annual wind speed is 14.7km/h (at Pearson Int'l Airport) and 17.2km/h (at Toronto Islands). Comparing to Chicago 16.6 km/h, NYC (at Central Park) 15.0 km/h, Los Angeles 12.1km/h Vancouver 11.8km/h, and Montreal 11.5km/h, Toronto Is a windy city. In Canada, St. John's looks like the windiest place, but among the major cities Toronto becomes the windiest one. It is quite a contrast to NYC and LA, America’s two major financial and cultural centres, being two of the least windy places in the nation.
I found a few reasons why the windy weather is uncomfortable and disturbing.
First of all, wind makes cold weather during winters not only feel much colder but also drives me crazy with the random blowing of wind. In other words, while steady -15C without the wind is tolerable for some reason, -5 with wind randomly blowing (let’s say -15C with wind chill) made me very painful and much uncomfortable both physically and mentally.
Secondly, wind always blows away hairstyles. It might sound like a minor issue, but you can’t deny when somebody says it is impossible to put up nice hair in Toronto like Lady Gaga because of the windy weather condition. No matter how nicely you decorate your hair it will become something different with staying outside a few minutes with the wind.
Lastly, when it's raining you can't even use an umbrella to cover yourself because the wind will at some point blow it away or destroy it.
By having more days of the windy weather than any of the “four cultural capitals of the worldâ€, New York City, Tokyo, London and Paris, Toronto forces its people to be in a very unfair condition. I highly doubt thinkers would like this kind of windy weather since all they hear through their ears are not the sound of people, or the inspiring sound of city, but just “noise of the windâ€. Artists and architects would not like strong wind randomly and constantly blowing, either. In fact, no one I’ve talked to really liked the windy condition in Toronto. It makes people distracted and somewhat feel disturbed. It seems that there are even some people slightly stunned or sick after getting constantly hit by wind blows for a while.
I know there are always ways to make an improvement, instead of just living with it saying vague excuses like “it’s okayâ€. But, how exactly can we do about it?
Here are some things that I can come up with.
1) Building mountains! -it sounds difficult or seems even impossible, but technically it’s possible.
Places like Banff with a lot of surrounding mountains have very little wind (annual average 8.4 km/h). So, we can build some mountains in a proper location to block the wind, near the city of Toronto. Japanese and many others have created a lot of artificial lands in their oceans, and Germans trying to build a mountain near the city of Berlin. Their objective is to create a natural habitat for the mountain’s wildlife and at the same time, become a recreation space for everyone in the city.
Yes, we live in an era that making a land in the ocean and building a mountain on a flat landscape are possible things. I believe we also can easily make mountains near Toronto for our purpose if we wish.
Berlin's Mountain Project
Kansai International Airport in Osaka, Japan
2) Building wind barrier like structure along or above streets to block the wind directly comes down high-rise buildings. I found some of these have already been installed on some buildings, but it was very ineffective in my experience. But if it has some partial effect, then it is worth putting some effort than not doing anything at all.
3) We can also put a big building in the middle of a windiest street. I think the Met life building in New York City is a good example. This way, the wind might not be able to travel directly through the wind tunnel. It will also give a very nice impact on the city street view depending on the architectural success.
the MetLife Building, New York City
4) Planting full of BIG & strong tree with big leaves on sidewalks –It is what I think is the most effective and positive idea.
If you visit cities like Tokyo, you'll find there are a lot of side trees on their streets and many of them are huge. We need that kind of trees along the sidewalks where people are directly exposed to strong wind. Leaves of large trees will certainly protect pedestrians from the direct hit of wind and gust. In addition, it is good because, as we all know, plants are very environmentally friendly and proven to be very good for human health. Since Toronto is getting lots of pollution from the south west of Sothern Ontario in the US and Hamilton area, it sounds like never a bad idea to have more trees in the city to support higher quality of lives of Canadian people in the cultural and financial capital of the country. Toronto some times gets hot as well during summer and expected to have more of them as the globe gets warmer. But leaves will grow out as the temperature goes up, and lots of trees on the sidewalks will provide shades and protect people not only from the nasty wind, but also from the dazzling sunlight.
Shinjuku district, Tokyo, Japan
Office Buildings in Nishi-Shinjuku, Tokyo
5) We could just move this important place for the nation to somewhere nicer.
One option could be just giving up and simply moving this “capital†to a probably better location than Toronto. But I love Toronto so much, and I won’t be a supporter of this idea.
6) Making the underground path at least twice as long as now.
Even with planting a lot of trees, we can't do anything about the wind attack when leaves of the trees are gone for winter. It usually gets windier from late fall-winter-to early spring. But we can not afford to have people stuck in their houses instead of being active and contributory to the economy and culture. But in the same time we can't afford to let the people walking on the city under the harsh winter air and wind, either.
I found the underground path in Toronto very helpful. The only sad thing was that it ended very soon and I had to walk in the freezing and windy air in downtown. I’m sure there were many people went through similar situations to mine. So, I think we really need more extended underground path. And it will also be smarter to build more underground transits than above ground ones.
We can’t emphasize too much the importance of the cultural and financial capital of Canada. We can't afford to make it and its citizens leading the country go crazy or unnecessarily or unfairly disturbed or uncomfortable by bad weather with the nasty wind. We need to put an effort on making every aspect of the city environment and the quality higher and better as much as we can. I believe "aiming perfection†ends up being imperfect, but it gets close to perfect. That’s the attitude that we need
I personally love Toronto so much, and I don't want to leave or dislike this place because of the nasty wind + bad weather. In fact, there are many things that we can do about it. What do you think?
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