Lecture 5: Inner Suburbs

**Sewell article goal (**“Introduction,” in *The Shape of the Suburbs)*

1950: Celebrating the rural nature of Toronto’s outskirts

**The Don Valley Conservation Report:**

* Wants to maintain the land of the areas outside of the inner city
* This wasn’t possible because people needed to live somewhere
* How were they going to conserve the area without building houses for people to live in

**Urban Sprawl**

started in 1953 - the era of suburban growth

* There was no proper planning for the growth
* Government planners should be aware of the change that is inevitable
* They put out a report that stated everything was not going to change, but that was impossible

**Sprawl in the GTA**

* Low-density expansion into the suburbs (outside of the city)


* The government wants to try to contain sprawl
* Economic burden on the economy - need money to build from the ground up
* Cheaper to update/renovate the systems that are already there
* High-density development is cheaper than expanding outward

**The Greenbelt**

The conservation area where they forbid any construction within this area - to maintain the natural environment - North of Toronto

**Toronto’s Inner Suburbs (1946-1980s)**

1. North York
2. Scarborough
3. Etobicoke

**Toronto’s Outer Suburbs**

Beyond the inner suburbs - Halton, Peel, York, Durham regions

**Rankin & Mclean article goal ( “Governing the Commercial Streets of the City: New Terrains of Disinvestment and Gentrification in Toronto’s Inner Suburbs,”)**

* Mount Dennis: from a manufacturing hub to a disinvested immigrant reception area


* Current redevelopment pressures in Mount Dennis are associated with:


1. Public transit expansion
2. Vacant manufacturing land

**Eglinton Line**

Above-ground transit system - do not have the money and resources to build underground

* As soon as this system becomes available the value of the land will go up and Mount Dennis will be more accessible

**Disinvested Streets**

Gentrification in connection to commercial streets

* displacement of the “marginalized” as a result of economic restructuring

**Mount Dennis**

Is in the poorest riding in ON with a majority of the population made up of immigrants and visible minorities

* Most small businesses in Mount Dennis are owned by immigrants
* The intersection of class and race in Mount Dennis

**Racialized Class Projects are defined by:**

1. Erasure of racialized people from redevelopment plans and visions
2. Mobilization of white privilege to manipulate the planning function
3. Stigmatization of commercial spaces serving low-income, racialized immigrants

**Revitalization of disinvested city spaces:**

1. Is led by white and wealthy actors
2. Further marginalizes low-income and racialized groups

**Inner Suburbs Income**

The lowest within the city of Toronto - on the decline