Just 2 hours west of Toronto, Prince Edward County is wonderful weekend experience. While close enough to make a day of it, I believe one would be hard pressed to squeeze all the county has to offer into a single day trip.

With so many tasty spots to check out, a whole website – Taste Trail – is dedicated to helping you map out and explore the culture and cuisine of the county, either by car or bike. Our tour included stops at Norman Hardie, County Cider Company, The Waring House Inn, and Black River Cheese Company. After sampling some Sandbanks wine, I will definitely be enjoying some Baco Noir Reserve in the near future. The newest edition to the county’s long list of attractions is the Drake Devonshire, which officially opens its doors in September.

Where to stay? If you are looking for a rustic retreat, Isaiah Tubbs Resort is a great pick. Don’t get too excited, there are no tubs at Tubbs. However, there are some cosy cottages built along the shore of Lake Ontario with camp fires to gather around at night. There are a number of other hotels, inns and B&Bs in the area. Sandbanks Vacations can also connect you to a number of homes for rent around the county.

In case food and wine don’t drive your travel plans, you will be pleased to learn that the county is not just a spot for the foodies and winos out there. Sandbanks Provincial Park is also a site to be seen for those who enjoy nature and the beach, especially in the hot days of summer. With 3 beautiful sandy beaches, walled in by sand dunes as high as 60 meters, Sandbanks is a great place to take in the beauty of the county.

In full road trip fashion, I was not alone on the ride out to Prince Edward County. Four of us drove east in the Ford Fusion Hybrid and, yes, it was Blue Jay blue like the one pictured below – loved it! This car came with a variety of interior and exterior features, providing the driver and passengers with the comfort of a luxury car. With built in navigation, we arrived at our destination without any problems. I was once again impressed by the fuel economy of Ford Hybrid vehicles and continue to ask myself: why doesn’t everyone insist on hybrid?!?!

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We all have issue with some aspect of our city – from access to walkability. Protesting is getting us nowhere and it is now time to propose. This Saturday June 7th, citizens across the Greater Toronto Area will be taking to the streets, the parks, the TTC, the walls, the fences, and their own front yards for 100 in 1 Day Toronto to propose fun, community-first urban interventions.

100 in 1 Day Toronto is a city-wide and citizen-led festival. The movement has helped individuals and groups in Toronto ideate, collaborate, co-create, and promote interventions that will come to life on June 7th. The event has already surpassed its goal of 100 interventions with over 150 going down – from Rexdale on the west side to Highland Creek on the east side, and from the Island in the south to Aurora in the north! Citizens, groups, students, youth, teachers, revolutionaries, and politicians will voice their dreams through actions, performances, games, installations, and space hacks.

More than ever, the public needs to be part of the solution to the challenges cities face,” said John Brodhead, Executive Director, Evergreen CityWorks. “100 in 1 Day is an opportunity for every Torontonian to get involved — share an existing idea, or invent a new one. The time to create a vision for Toronto — is now.”

No pressure to create an intervention of your own, as you are welcome to join in on the fun of any of the others listed at 100 in 1 Day Toronto. Thanks to Projexity, the website displays all of the interventions taking place across the city. The map and accompanying descriptions are an exciting showcase of civic engagement and both demonstrate how 100 in 1 Day Toronto will be a unique opportunity for us to connect with different communities, friends, neighbours, and strangers alike.

Whether you are a walker, gardener, fitness goer, dog lover, foodie, artist or storyteller – with over 160 interventions and counting – you are bound to find something that peaks your interest. Interventions range from small to sophisticated and you can have your pick.

100 in 1 Day began in Bogota, Columbia in 2012 and has been replicated in dozens of other cities across the globe – from Cape Town to Copenhagen. In addition to Toronto, other Canadian cities participating in 2014 include Vancouver, Halifax and Montreal. The video above highlights some of the activities that went down in Montreal last year.

Looking at how 100 in 1 Day has evolved in other cities, it is clear that these interventions have the potential to raise awareness of urban and social issues, inspire ideas, and motivate leaders to consider new approaches to existing problems. The Toronto Community Foundation certainly hopes to help 100 in 1 Day create a lasting impact by granting $10,000 to three interventions in order to give them a permanent place in Toronto.

Stay tuned for all the event highlights:

• #100in1Day
• @100in1DayTO
• toronto.100in1day.ca/

The post ReDefiningTO: 100 in 1 Day Toronto appeared first on Toronto Guardian.

Giver is a TV series that inspires children across the province to get involved and contribute to the places they live, reclaiming and enhancing local playground spaces in parks all across Ontario.

In partnership with the Ontario Parks Association, TVO and Sinking Ship Entertainment put a call out to communities across the province to find those in need of a new or improved playground for local kids. During each of the 10 episodes, a group of kids aged 6-12 come together to volunteer their time with host Michael Lagimodiere and the enthusiastic Giver team to build a playground in their community.

“In just three days, six local kids are able to inspire a community to transform an underused space into something that everyone can benefit from. Giver tangibly shows kids that anything is possible when a community pulls together for a common goal.” says J.J. Johnson, series creator and partner at Sinking Ship Entertainment.

The first episode starts right here in Toronto, showcasing the making of the new I Love Toronto Park located in Symington Place. The show continues on to communities across Ontario and will return to Toronto on June 11 to feature the Treverton Park makeover when World Park was born.



Giver has provided a unique opportunity to showcase the importance of play to build community play spaces that will have a long term positive effect on social cohesion, foster positive attitudes toward racial and cultural diversity, and help reduce feelings of isolation or exclusion. Play also helps kids grow to be healthy, happy, and successful through an experience full of creativity, exploration, physical activity, friendship, and adventure. It has been proven to have a significant physical, emotional, social and cognitive impact on a child’s development.

“Giver exemplifies TVO’s commitment to building citizen engagement, and provides a great platform for kids to see how their good intentions combined with hard work can benefit an entire community,” says Patricia Ellingson, TVO’s Creative Head of Children’s and Parents’ Media.

Some of you may know the organization KaBOOM! that works to create more playspaces for children across the United States. Like KaBOOM!, Giver is working to raise awareness around and address the play deficit that exists in our society. In the show, kids, families, volunteers, and local business all play a pivotal role in making the re-imagined park happen for their neighbourhood to meet these issues head on.

Want to join ranks and improve play in your own neighbourhood?

KaBOOM! has identified 12 Ideas to Begin Advocating for Play
Watch Giver on TVO Wednesday Nights at 6:30pm! If you happen to miss any of the shows Wednesday night, it will be repeated Saturdays at 2:00 pm.
Get out and play this spring and summer and enjoy the many parks here in our great city!
Check out Park People Toronto to learn what is happening in and around our parks.

Check out tvoKids for replay videos.

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Often, the first thing people think of when it comes to a library is books. The sharing economy is changing all that and the Toronto Tool Library is a fantastic new addition to the expanding library network in our city. Fact is, sharing is not new. We are all used to sharing amongst those we now – recipes, food, clothes, housing etc. Now it is time to push your boundary of trust to those you don’t know YET. You may be surprised how great it feels!

The Toronto Tool Library, the first project of Toronto’s Institute for a Resource Based Economy (IRBE), wants to help you experience the beauty of sharing. Did you know that the average power drill costs upwards of $80 and is used an average of 6 to 13 minutes in its lifetime? As Lawrence Alvarez, President of the IRBE, points out, “You don’t usually need a drill. What you need is a hole in your wall.” With a Tool Library membership, you can get access to a whole variety of tools – from air compressors to wrenches. They come in all shapes and sizes, ideal for those who either dreamed of having their very own fully loaded tool shed or those who are looking to explore their inner handyman or build something.

The Tool Library creates a space that extends the life of a tool, minimizes cost and eliminates storage for the end user, and, ultimately, helps foster community through its membership and the variety of programs they offer to all ages. It is also tapping into the talent of the community, creating a space for people to share their ideas, knowledge, and craft.

Where are these spaces?

The Parkdale Tool Library is located in the Parkdale Activity and Recreation Centre. The TO Library team signed the lease January 2013, fundraised 5K to renovate, and were pleasantly surprised when 60 volunteers came out over the course of 60 days to help build the space. If you are on the west side check it out!

The publicity around the Parkdale location brought forth an offer from a landlord on Danforth East with a 1900 square foot space and the TO Tool Library team couldn’t say no. And they have done wonders with the space. They have the Tool Library, the Kitchen Library, 3D printers, a very well equipped workshop, a Lasersaur (open source laser cutter they built) and more.

We can look forward to seeing more libraries around the city down the road too. As Lawrence highlights, “We know from our membership and the scarcity of time to travel, people are not commuting far distances to access the library. There are people across the city who need us. We want to take this proven, open source model and build on it.”

The IRBE’s broader mandate to challenge and highlight how people access their resources. Their motto is access over ownership. “This [the collaborative economy] is what we see as a more realistic future, where people aren’t consuming the way they did before and they are sharing things in the community – the wealth of the community and the planet;” explains Ryan Dyment, Executive Director of the IRBE.

Just consider all the unused items you have lying around or in storage and the likelihood of someone else being able to use one or many of them.

It is staggering how much we hold onto things. What’s worse is that we are often paying to do so! In Canada, there are over 3,000 self storage facilities. According to the Self Storage Association (SSA), “The industry has been the fastest growing segment of the commercial real estate industry over the last 40 years.” In the US, the industry raked in $24 billion dollars last year and claims that 1 out of every 10 homes currently rents a storage unit. That’s a lot of stuff sitting idle!!!

Why not use items as you need them instead of spending more money and using more space to own them? As Lawrence highlights, “It is wasteful, inefficient, expensive and burdensome to own. Why not share?”

Want to join the ranks and support Toronto’s sharing economy?

– Check out the Toronto Tool Library ONLINE to learn more about their programs and locations

• Don’t see a tool you need? Add it to the wish list. The TO Tool Library wants to equip itself with the items you need.
• Get a Toronto Tool Library membership or find out about their opportunities to get access without pay by giving your time as a volunteer.

– Want to learn more about the sharing economy and what’s happening? Download the FREE Sharing Guide produced by Shareable

– Did you read the previous posts on the topic of Toronto as a Shareable City and Collaborative Consumption?

The Toronto Tool Library and the IRBE are redefining Toronto by creating new opportunities for people to share and utilize resources in a more economical and sustainable way.

The post ReDefiningTO: Toronto’s Expanding Library Network – TO Tool Library appeared first on Toronto Guardian.

There is an open data movement under way and today – Saturday February 22nd – celebrates international open data day. Across the globe – and right here in Toronto – public servants, citizens, community leaders, students, industry, and technologists are gathering to encourage the release, use, redistribution, and standardization of open data. More so, the community will also be taking action by collaborating to co-create new applications and visualizations, and by engaging in dialogue around the challenges of open data.

What is open data?

Open data does not mean that a government or other entity releases ALL of its data to the public. Not all data gathered from the public is open. Rather, open data is that which is legally and technically open – open to access, in an open format, for free, under a license that allows one to use it, build on it, and then share it.

Who knew Toronto was so open?

Open Data Toronto is going strong and welcomes you to access the 140+ data sets they host in a variety of catalogues – from bicycle post and ring locations to water main breaks. You may even be familiar with some of the mobile applications, visualizations, or websites that have been developed out of Toronto’s existing open data.

Wellbeing Toronto has utilized Toronto’s open data to create a “map-based visualization tool that helps evaluate community wellbing across Toronto’s neighbourhoods.” Visit the map to assess different neighbourhoods based on a variety to indicators – demographics, education, housing, safety, environment, etc. RocketMan is a very popular mobile application that uses real time data to provide commuters accurate times on the arrival of their next bus or streetcar. It is the most downloaded TTC transit app across the GTA. You can find more of the applications developed using Toronto’s open data HERE.

As Richard Pierto, one of the organizers of Open Data Day Toronto, highlights “It is no question that over the last few years many Toronto residents have become cynical and disenfranchised with their government. The hope is that open data will create a new level of transparency and accountability and foster trust between citizens and representatives alike. By leveraging technology we can make it easier and more convenient for people and their government to work together.”

Open data promotes and values access, accountability, transparency, and engagement. And, it is great to see it at work here in Toronto. As the Open Knowledge Foundation emphasizes, open data “can help drive the creation of innovative business and services that deliver social and commercial value.”

Want to join the ranks of open data enthusiasts?

• There are numerous sites out there for you to learn more. Visit Open Data Toronto, Canadian Open Data Experience (CODE), Open Knowledge Foundation.
• A hackathon is taking place at Podcamp Toronto. Tonight the social starts at 5pm at The Foxes Den Bar if you want to get in on the action.
• Sunday Podcamp Toronto will host a recap of Open Data Day. For the full listing see HERE.
• If you check Twitter, search #ODDTO14 or #ODD for more on the conversations from today.
• Open Data Day Toronto is committed to maintaining the momentum and will be hosting a number of Hack Goes On events in the upcoming weeks starting Saturday March 1 at People & Code Offices. The following events will be Saturday March 22 and Saturday April 26.

Open data is redefining Toronto by creating increased transparency and the opportunity to leverage the data available for the greater good. The movement is encouraging experimentation and collaboration and let’s hope it continues to attract passionate amateurs to its cause.

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