Photo by Jackman Chiu in the blogTO Flickr pool.

Tonight, the Seventh Art Live Directors Series brings you a screening of director Andrew Bujalski's Funny Ha Ha at Innis Town Hall, and The Comedy Bar hosts Dawn Patrol, featuring an all-star cast of emerging Toronto comedic talent. There's also bound to be some laughs at the launch of Robyn Doolittle's Crazy Town: The Rob Ford Story at The Bloor Hot Docs Cinema, where she will be in conversation with Kristine Stewart, CEO of Twitter Canada.

• Crazy Town: The Rob Ford Story
• Andrew Bujalski Live in Toronto "Funny Ha Ha"
• Adam Abbas: Featured Poet at Lizzie Violet's Amsterdam Bicycle Club Open Mic
• Dawn Patrol

Have an event you'd like to plug? Submit your own listing to the blogTO Toronto events calendar or contact us directly.

This Week in Music rounds up the latest news, releases and concerts coming to Toronto.

CMW announces initial lineup
This year, Canadian Music Week has moved from it's usual March slot over to the much warmer May 6-10th. They've just announced their initial lineup of acts, and it includes Tegan and Sara, City and Colour, M.I.A., Neko Case, Television and Ellie Goulding. All the bands that have been announced so far, including a great mix of local acts, are listed on the CMW website. Five-day festival wristbands are $75, and they're on sale now.

Timber Timbre release new song
Timber Timbre will have their new album, Hot Dreams, out on April 1st of this year. Until then, you can enjoy this slow-mo strip club video for their new single, also called "Hot Dreams." Not too sure which is sexier here, the pole dancing or the sax solo. Their album is available for pre-order online.

TURF announces 2014 dates and expanded programming
Mark your calendars! Toronto Urban Roots Festival has announced that it is is taking place from July 4th-6th this year. They've also expanded to three stages, but you'll have to wait til February 14th to know what 44 artists will be playing on them.

Drake sings in Spanish
Toronto rapper Drake joins Romeo Santos on the Spanish singer's latest track, "Odious." Drake takes two verses in the song, one where he sings in Spanish and the other he raps in English. Often accused of being too soft, he's sticking it to the haters by showing off his sweeter side on this song.

St. Vincent debut new video Digital Witness
"Digital Witness" is the first video from St. Vincent's upcoming self-titled album, out February 25th via Loma Vista. Director Chino Moya describes it as a "surreal and futuristic world in which action is synchronized, replicated and repeated." Thumbs up for pastel-coloured everything.

Hot Tickets

Elton John / ACC / February 6 / 7pm / $59 - 171
After five decades, Sir Elton is still going strong. If you can't conjure up a ticket, you might have better luck catching him on one of his Hamilton, Oshawa or London tour stops.

John Butler Trio / Danforth Music Hall / Feb 6 / 7pm / $33.50
In the last four years, John Butler Trio have toured the world, played key roles in fighting environmental causes in Australia, released two live albums, and crafted and recorded their sixth studio album, Flesh & Blood. They'll be playing their sizzling new sounds, and reworked versions of the old favourites.

Down With Webster / Sound Academy / February 7 / 7pm / $30
On January 28th, DWW released their third album Party For Your Life, through Universal Music. They are veterans of the cross-Canada winter tour, and will be taking their new record across their home and native land, with a portion of ticket sales donated to Ronald McDonald House Charities Canada.

Long Winter / The Great Hall / February 7 / 7pm / PWYC
It's a long winter, and these shows come as a saving grace every month. This addition of the festival has The Wooden Sky, The Bicycles performing Young Drones, TEENANGER, Alvvays, HSY, Not the Wind, Not the Flag, Sheezer and more bands, art, performances, and arcade games to experience.

Local Hot Ticket

Rival Boys, The Folk, and Almighty Rhombus / February 5 / Clinton's / 9pm / $5-10
This new monthly music series in partnership with Pabst Blue Ribbon will be taking place on the first Wednesday of every month at Clinton's. This February edition includes Toronto rockers Rival Boys, Guelph sensations The Folk, and Sudbury's hometown heroes The Almighty Rhombus.

Recently Announced

• Trust / Adelaide Music Hall / March 8 / 9pm / $21
• The Wooden Sky / The Horseshoe / March 22 / 9pm/ $17.50
• Taking Back Sunday & The Used / Kool Haus / April 8 / 6pm / $34.50
• Neko Case / Massey Hall / May 9 / 7:15pm / $39.50 - 54.50
• Motley Crue / Molson Ampitheatre / August 10 / 6pm / $25 - 125

What we got up to last week

• Get to know a DJ: Scuba
• Jay Z runs this town on Toronto tour stop
• Breakout Toronto Bands: Clara Engel
• The top concerts in February 2014
• The top 5 dance parties in Toronto February 2014

Lead photo of MIA

Academy award winning actor Philip Seymour Hoffman played several real-life characters on the big screen: Truman Capote, Lester Bangs, Oakland Athletics coach Art Howe, and even a wayward CIBC clerk from Toronto.

Hoffman, who died yesterday of an apparent drug over dose, according to a preliminary police report, played Bay Street bank banker Dan Mahowny, a character based on real-life embezzler Brian Molony, in the 2003 movie Owning Mahowny.

Molony was a mild-mannered Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce clerk with a voracious gambling habit. As part of his job, the chubby 26-year-old with distinctive thick-framed glasses was authorized to approve loans of up to $35,000, which he routinely issued to himself under fictitious names.

Using proceeds from some 93 fraudulent transactions, Molony would leave his Bay and Richmond office in a limousine, travel by private jet to Atlantic City, and routinely lose thousands at craps, baccarat, "almost anything" at the Caesar's Boardwalk Regency Hotel-Casino, one the largest gaming halls on the east coast.

On one disastrous trip Molony dropped $1.2 million of CIBC cash in a single night.

And he probably would have gotten away with it too if it wasn't for an ill-timed speeding ticket he received returning home from Toronto International Airport in 1982. The cops became suspicious when $30,000 in U.S. funds emerged from a search of Molony's car, a sum that was more than the clerk's annual salary.

$7,000 more was found stashed at the one-bedroom High Park Ave. apartment he shared with his girlfriend, and the scheme quickly unraveled.

In total, Molony embezzled more than $10 million, a crime which netted him six years in prison. Despite his high-profile downfall, he went on to marry his then-girlfriend, quit gambling, and return to work in the financial sector.

The fraud was one of the largest in Canadian banking history and formed the basis of Stung, a 1987 best-selling book by journalist Gary Ross. In 2003, Philip Seymour Hoffman was cast as a character based on Molony. The movie adaptation was one of film critic Roger Ebert's top ten films of the year.

Chris Bateman is a staff writer at blogTO. Follow him on Twitter at @chrisbateman.

This recently opened restaurant in Baldwin Village eschews the current trend toward ramen in Toronto with a Chinese take on the noodle bar. Don't let the interior full of low-density fibreboard scare you off, the food here is both cheap and packed with bold flavours.

Read my profile of Noodle Face Co. in the restaurants section.

Last Friday night, The Garrison played host the sold-out show for Toronto's punk rock upstarts PUP. As the band is set to embark on their first international tour, the enthusiastic crowd bid them a hometown farewell of epic proportions. You never would have guessed that this was PUP's second show that evening; only a few hours earlier they'd performed as the surprise guest opener for AFI at The Phoenix. Talk about stamina.

Before the foursome even hit the stage, a "PUP! PUP! PUP!" chant got the rowdiness underway. It was obvious that these people had attended a PUP show before, they knew that one loud and sweaty adrenaline rush was about to get started. When PUP appeared before the crowd, they set things ablaze with "Guilt Trip," the first track on their debut LP. It was only about 10 seconds on the clock before the mosh pit began, and things never slowed down after that.

Next came the fast-paced anthem "Back Against the Wall," wherein the feel-good insanity kicked into high gear. When the crowd quickly proved that they knew every lyric, microphones swung outwards, and suddenly the yell-along volume doubled. Right on cue, lead-singer Stephen Babcock did a pledge to Joe Strummer of The Clash, leaning his head back to launch a wad of spit in the air. Off he went, jumping into the crowd, his back supported by helpful fans, who never let his guitar cord tangle, and promptly pushed him back on stage just in time for the next verse.

From then on out, it was free game to go as wild as your heart desired. The crowd surfers were professionals, they were living out the glory of their punk rock youth one dive at a time. I've never seen such diving creativity, one crowd surfer's legs swung in the air like he was running on the ceiling, and another dude launched himself off the stage, doing somersaults and corkscrew flips into the impact-absorbing crowd.

"We just shot a video for this song," Stephen announced, before bursting into the band's first break out single, "Lionheart." This impossibly infectious tune has all of the band's staple sounds. Lots of "woah ohhs," and lightning quick licks that travel through time signature dimensions, but always land on a satisfying downbeat. Over the mics went, toppling into the crowd, turning the entire song into a chanting riot, where you couldn't decipher who was singing, the crowd or the band!

Since they've only released a 10-song LP thus far, they've gotta churn out a few covers to make their set last. "We've played this song a couple times and no one likes it, but this time it will be different" Stephen said, before putting his guitar down and kicking into their cover of Jay Reatard's "My Shadow." This song was not about to fall flat, as the frontman made of by bouncing all over the stage wearing a quintessential scream-rock face, howling into the mic like it were the ears of his worst enemy.

While the whole set had been batshit crazy thus far, it managed to somehow get even more intense during "Reservoir." There were way too many crowd surfers to count, you had to keep an eye out to avoid a Doc Martin clunk to the head. A big leap off the bass drum, and the song came to an end.

For the encore, they gave us two familiar cover songs so we could sweat out the last of the beer we'd consumed. Nestor (bass) and Steve (guitar) switched instruments, and they headed straight into an 80's punk rock classic, "Too Drunk to Fuck" by Dead Kennedys. Stephen strutted around the stage, swinging the mic in big circles, not giving a shit when it hit the ceiling and fell to the floor. And if you didn't recognize that one, chances are the final cover of the Beastie Boys's "Sabotage" registered for pretty much everyone in the crowd.

During the hour-long show, the momentum never faltered. All of us had a rambunctious, smug look on our faces, like we were part of some secret PUP club. If this first night of the tour was any indication of things to come, PUP isn't going to be your little back-pocket punk band for much longer. The secret's getting out there, one sweaty mosh pit at a time.

Photos by Matt Forsythe

What is 34 metres long, 7 metres tall, and buried under Lake Shore Blvd.? The answer is Knapp's Roller Boat, a cigar-shaped vessel that promised to make sea sickness a thing of the past, or so its owner claimed. The hull would meet an ignoble public demise on the shore of the Toronto Bay before it was finally covered over.

The strange ship is one of many peculiar conveyances with ties to Toronto. Over the centuries, the city has seen strange flying machines, UFO-style hovercrafts, fragile hydrogen balloons, and a massive award-winning quad-copter.

Here are five crazy contraptions that floated on our waters and flew in our skies.

KNAPP'S ROLLERBOAT

In 1897, crossing the Atlantic Ocean by steam ship was a lengthy and, in bad weather, stomach-churning proposition. In the days before over-the-counter Dramamine, engineers like Frederick Augustus Knapp believed a "roller boat" - a vessel capable of driving on top of the waves - was the answer to passengers' woes.

Though several were proposed, Knapp was one of only two people to actually construct a working example of the concept. His cigar-shaped vessel, 34 metres long, 7 metres tall, was essentially a cylinder inside a cylinder; a stationary passenger cabin around which a giant paddle revolved.

The ship was welded together at Polson Iron Works, a shipbuilding company located south of the Esplanade between Frederick and Sherbourne streets. In trials Knapp's Roller Boat never managed to travel above a crawl, well short of the 200 km/h predicted by its owner.

After a brief stint as a ferry, the roller boat was sold for scrap and buried under Lake Shore Blvd. by infill. It's still down there, apparently.

THE AVROCAR

Imagine hovering to the store in your own private flying saucer - that was the dream of Avro's top-secret Special Projects Group and the U.S. Army in the early 60s.

It was at Downsview military base in 1951 that Avro aircraft engineer John Carver Meadows Frost - "Jack" to his friends - first conceived of a high-speed, high-altitude flying saucer for military use. Various shapes and designs were tested but none could achieve the stability and pace projected by wind tunnel tests.

The design was later tweaked to have low-altitude, all-terrain capabilities but still stability and control issues persisted, largely due to the lack of a traditional tail fin, rudder and stabilizers. Videos show the Avrocar hovering about 1-metre above the ground, but it never got any higher.

The science was sound: modern hovercraft use a similar method of lift, albeit with a separate set of engines for propulsion. Faced with a lack of progress and escalating costs, the U.S. Army eventually pulled out and the Avrocar project was canned in 1961 having never captured the nation's imagination like the Avro Arrow.

STEINER'S GAS BALLOON

More than 40 years before the Wright Brothers managed the first powered flight at Kill Devil Hills, North Carolina, the gas balloon was king of the skies. Unlike modern hot air balloons, the incredibly fragile flying sacks used lighter-than-air gasses to lift the basket and pilot off the ground.

Height was regulated by the amount of gas in the balloon and landings affected by the gradual reduction of ballast. The direction of travel was entirely at the mercy of the wind.

Professor John H. Steiner, a German-born aeronaut, brought his hydrogen balloon to Toronto and a vacant patch of land at Front and York in August 1859. For a few weeks, Steiner took wide-eyed and weak-kneed passengers on tethered ascents to 152 metres, about the height of the CIBC tower at Yonge and Bloor.

Steiner flew out of Toronto for Oswego, New York later that month. It was a characteristically eventful 9-hour trip that ended in a crash landing in a swamp. By successfully completing the crossing, the aeronaut became the first person to fly across Lake Ontario.

MCCURDY'S BI-PLANE

John Alexander Douglas McCurdy was Canada's first licensed airman and the first person in the British Commonwealth to make a controlled ascent in a powered flying machine. A Nova Scotian by birth, the unflappable J.A.D. was part of Alexander Graham Bell's Aerial Experiment Association, a team of aviators determined to develop the first working airplane.

The group wouldn't be the first in the air, but McCurdy would be at the controls of the Silver Dart, the first plane to fly in the Commonwealth when it took off from the frozen surface of Bras d'Or Lake, Cape Breton in 1909.

McCurdy used his experience to make several exhibition flights in an improved bi-plane in 1911. At an aviation meet at Donlands Farm near Todmorden Mills that same year, McCurdy lost control of his aircraft on takeoff and crashed in a nearby field, wrecking the $2,000 frame.

McCurdy walked away uninjured but the strange machine with its Gnome rotary engine and rear propellor was a permanent write-off.

"ATLAS" THE PEDAL-POWERED HELICOPTER

The dream of a human-powered helicopter flight was so elusive that in 1980 the American Helicopter Society pledged $250,000 to anyone able to build a machine capable of a minute's stable flight, three metres off the ground.

The prize was named in honour of Igor Sikorsky, a Russian aviation pioneer and one of the society's founders, and was finally claimed in July 2013 by a team of engineering graduates from the University of Toronto in a sprawling, pedal-powered device named Atlas.

The machine - technically a quad-copter - was developed Todd Reichert and Cameron Robertson and powered using a specially adapted bicycle. It's frame is 58 metres wide and each of its four rotors is 20 metres across. In all, the entire machine weighs just 55 kgs.

Atlas hovered within a 10 x 10-metre square, per the 33-year-old award's criteria, at the Ontario Soccer Centre in Vaughan and has since gone on to set new records for endurance human powered helicopter flight.

Chris Bateman is a staff writer at blogTO. Follow him on Twitter at @chrisbateman.

Image: Library and Archives Canada, City of Toronto Archives, Toronto Public Library, Wikimedia Commons.

We Canadians have developed plenty of sneaky tricks that help us get what comes easily (and inexpensively) to the mailboxes of American shoppers. There's the cousin living in the States who flies your online purchases home, the P.O. box you opened in a town just across the border, or the forwarding service that mails you what couldn't be shipped to Canada.

Christine Carlton and Aynsley Wintrip Harris saw that desperation among Canadian shoppers - and then they spied a business opportunity. Last year, the two longtime friends (and former university roommates) pooled their years of experience in communications and high-end retail to launch The September, a for-Canadians, by-Canadians e-commerce site stocked with the highest-of-the-high-end designer shoes.

I asked the two founders about Canadian e-commerce, the less-glamorous sides of the luxury accessories biz and, of course, shoes.

What's the inspiration behind The September?

Really, the idea came from recognizing the gap in the market. I, for one, was spending more and more time shopping online, just because I didn't have the time to go out as much as I probably would have liked to. Your options are really limited to U.S. and international sites, and of course when you shop those sites, you have duty, shipping, and taxes -- all of that adds up significantly. I reached out to Christine and said 'Why is this? why are there so few options for Canadians?' So we decided we should look into it and see if we couldn't make it happen ourselves.

Why focus on shoes?

It was sort of the first thing that came to mind! It's certainly a shoe 'moment,' you know, the last couple years. I think a lot of it started with Sarah Jessica Parker and Sex And The City - she short of made shoes iconic. We just felt it was the best place to start.

What has been your biggest challenge in launching the site?

I would say, for us, a lot of the challenges have been around technology. As much as e-commerce is firmly established globally, I think it's somewhat in its infancy in Canada. We just don't have as many options in terms of partners for technology and e-commerce sites, et cetera. And also, of course, it's not our forte...I would say technology has been, I don't want to say the biggest challenge, but the biggest learning (curve) for us.

Who do you consider your competition?

I think our competition is international, you know. If you're asking purely about e-commerce, then our competition would be somewhat international. Otherwise, it would currently be brick and mortar stores. But we like to think that in terms of e-commerce players in Canada, we don't have competition! (laughs) That's the beauty of it.

What styles have been flying off the shelves? Did they surprise you at all?

There's always what we call the 'usual suspects'. Michael Kors sold very well - it's a very well-established, recognizable brand. In terms of what the surprise was, I would say we had a tremendous amount of success with one of the newer brands we launched, Aquazzura. It's done very well, and they had a great selection at a great price point. I would say that's definitely a surprise winner.

How are you building a community around the site, so it's not just a one-way shopping experience?

We thought it would be interesting and a little bit different to profile Canadian women - not celebrity Canadian women, but more everyday Canadian women who have exceptional style. Over the course of the month we feature the same person, and each week her story changes out. She might be a mother, and we talk about how she dresses day to day, doing the things she does with her children.

She might also be involved in a charity, so we can explore that. If she travels, we can tell a travel story and get recommendations from her on how to experience a destination. What we found is that people are really responding to it. People tell us that they read every word, and look at every photo, and that's fantastic.

Also, we use Facebook, we use Twitter, we just started Instagram, and we will be launching Pinterest very shortly. It's all about leveraging that inspiration that is built around those style profiles.

What's your office space like?

We're at Dupont and Dundas. It's an old rubber factory - in fact, hockey pucks used to be made here. It doesn't get any more Canadian than working out of a hockey puck factory! It's a very small space - we're working out of less than 500 feet. (The stocking and shipping is outsourced to Brampton.) We love the Junction neighbourhood. It's new to both of us, and it's a great neighbourhood we've enjoyed exploring.

What's ahead for 2014?

We have deliveries coming in regularly. Every week to two weeks, new shipments will arrive, and come June, which is really the beginning of the fall season, we'll be adding in more brands. So I think customers can expect to see more newness every time they come back to the site.

One of the things that's always been important to us was really to get in front of our customer as much as we possibly can. As a digital business, you have certain challenges with regards to developing relationships with your customers. So we're planning a series of intimate customer events where we can be face-to-face with them, where we can show them some products and allow them to touch and feel and try it on, and then encourage them to visit our site from there.

On Friday night the Mod Club was jammed to the brim with hip hop heads ready to soak in the launch of Naturally Born Strangers, a full length record by local icons Rich Kidd, Tona and Adam Bomb. This project was created in collaboration with clothing company TheLegendsLeague and the event included a pop-up shop featuring a new line exclusively available that night. With a blitz of media coverage and sponsors like Noisey and Jameson Whiskey officially on board for the event, the buzz surrounding the show was undeniable.

Just after midnight a video clip of Charlie Chaplin's monologue from The Great Dictator was projected onto the stage while dramatic music filled the room. After a couple minutes the visuals transitioned to violent riot footage as a group of men wearing black hoodies, with their faces hidden, walked onto stage. The scene was gloomy and the music was too, as "Buttered Chicken" boomed through the system. Before long the man in the middle stepped forward and revealed his identity to be Rich Kidd with a strong introductory verse. Tona and Adam Bomb would step forward similarly to showcase their raps before the track culminated into a hype moshpit-esque display on stage.

The rest of the performance included more dramatic transitions of projected videos, which conveniently allowed time for wardrobe changes so the performers could give some shine to different pieces from TheLegendsLeague collection. Standout tracks included "A Gun and A Pack of Sandwiches," "Tie Breaker," "Jim Morrison," and of course "Jameson Avenue," which was lined up with a crowd pleasing video montage of Rob Ford mishaps. Aside from some minor sound issues during the first part of the set, which unfortunately took away from the power of some choice verses, the Naturally Born Strangers put on a compelling show.

One thing undeniably apparent throughout the entire evening was the level of passion for the project from all members of this collective. After speaking with Brian Espiritu, designer and owner of TheLegendsLeague, he explained that the concept developed rather naturally. Espiritu is also credited as an executive producer on the album for providing creative direction and inspirational input.

All three veteran rappers easily command attention on the record, while Rich Kidd's gritty production style and modern sample selection ties it all together. The same dynamic was apparent on stage and it was evident that everyone involved had a certain level of mutual respect for one another's drive and creative abilities.

Photos by Kadeem Ellis

The inaugural Canadian Arts & Fashion Awards took place Saturday, February 1st at the Royal York Hotel. It was a swank affair, and attendees opted for dark shimmering suits and dresses in honour of the formality of the event. DSquared2 were the big winners on the night, taking home two awards. The stylish gathering had everyone out in their finest.

Check out all the looks in our style section.

Phil's Original BBQ joined the deadpool last Friday. College Street locals and barbecue fans will remember the restaurant as once being amongst the best spots to head for ribs or brisket, but it appears that the influx of new competition and now established BBQ joints (such as The Stockyards and Barque) hit this smokehouse hard.

An eviction notice posted by representatives of Phil's landlords on Friday morning indicates rent in arrears totalling $31,652.76. The locks have been changed and personal property has been ordered out by this week. The notice also states an intention to recover damages for breach of contract.

In operation since 1991, when owner Phil Nyman sold his home to finance the restaurant, Phil's Original had the distinction of being one of the few survivors of The Curse of Restaurant Makeover. While the decor received the show's customary slapdash refit, Chef David Adjey didn't want to mess with the food. So did Phil's ultimately just not prove hip enough for BBQ-crazed Toronto?

The month of January was a cold one but this isn't the kind of city that hibernates. Torontonians proved to be a resilient bunch even despite the polar vortex and this month was spent staving off cabin fever with pants-less subway-riding, boards games and eating up carb-laden comfort foods.

Here are 30 wintery highlights from this month in photos.

The best cappuccino in Toronto can be found at cafes where baristas are well trained and always on their game. Delicious and deceptively simple, the cappuccino is considered by some to be the most difficult coffee preparation to master. Traditionally 5-6 fluid ounces, broken into thirds of espresso, hot milk and steamed microfoam, the trouble is getting that harmonious blend of coffee and creaminess. Too little milk and you can quickly careen into macchiato territory, too much and you have on your hands a full-blown latte.

Fear not. As the city becomes increasing serious about their coffee, we see and taste cappuccino making on the rise. The humble beverage, named for the colour of Capuchin friars' hooded frocks and first popularized by Venetian coffee houses as the "Kapuziner," is having a moment here in this coffee-crazed town.

Here's where to find the best cappuccino in Toronto.

See also:

The best Americano in Toronto
The best cafes in Toronto (west side)
The best cafes in Toronto (east side)
The best late night cafes in Toronto
The best cafes in Toronto for free WiFi

Photo by Fox Seventyseven in the blogTO Flickr pool

Tonight, Israeli video artist and sculptor, Sigalit Landau gives a talk as part of Ryerson U's Converge series which is free to attend (RSVP required). Director Chelsea McMullan's My Prairie Home premieres tonight at the Bloor Hot Docs cinema, with a Q&A and performance by Rae Spoon, plus an after party at The Steady Cafe & Bar. Another film option is the screening of director Andrew Bujalski's Mutual Appreciation. There's also a new monthly 'erotic' storytelling event that will surely give a new spin on the term "oral tradition" -- Tell Me Something Good happens tonight at The Beaver.

• CONVERGE Lecture Series presents Sigalit Landau's "The Work of a Bridge Maker"
• My Prairie Home - Toronto Premiere with Rae Spoon & filmmakers
• Rae Spoon :: Karaoke Afterparty!
• Andrew Bujalski Live in Toronto - Mutual Appreciation
• Tell Me Something Good - A Sexy Storytelling Slam at The Beaver

Have an event you'd like to plug? Submit your own listing to the blogTO Toronto events calendar or contact us directly.

The company behind the Presto card readers due to be fitted to Toronto streetcars, buses, and at subway entrances is making a case for new automatic fare gates that would replace the current turnstiles.

TTC Chair Karen Stintz tested a prototype fare gate manufactured by Scheidt-Bachmann at the Direct Energy Centre yesterday. The German company, which has a contract to supply Toronto with the first wave of Presto card readers, is making a pitch for additional sales.

Currently, the TTC and Presto plan to retrofit all the existing turnstiles with touch pads, but that could change if the gates make financial and technical sense.

"There's a whole bunch of questions that need to be answered," says TTC's Chris Upfold, including whether the gates could withstand the deep freeze of a Toronto winter. "If the maintenance of the older turnstiles is more expensive on a year-on-year basis than a new turnstiles then maybe over the course of 15 or 20 years it would make sense to buy new."

Some turnstiles on the subway date back to the opening of the Yonge line in 1954. Quality design, simple mechanisms, and regular maintenance have kept The Canadian Beaver Co. machines working so long, TTC spokesman Brad Ross said last year.

Is the impending arrival of Presto a logical time for the TTC overhaul its fare gates or is this a case of "if it ain't broke, don't fix it"?

Chris Bateman is a staff writer at blogTO. Follow him on Twitter at @chrisbateman.

Image: Twitter

January came to a close with zero red cards on record in Toronto, though a number of kitchens seem to be battling to keep pests out. Also noteworthy is the conditional pass awarded to North York General Hospital, though curiously there is no specific information for this establishment's yellow card. I smell an X-file.

Here's the rest of this week's DineSafe roundup.

Acme Burger (735 The Queensway)
Inspected on: January 30, 2014
Inspection finding: Yellow (Conditional)
Number of infractions: 3 (Minor: 2, Significant: 1)
Crucial infractions include: N/A

Templeton's (319 Augusta Ave)
Inspected on: January 30, 2014
Inspection finding: Yellow (Conditional)
Number of infractions: 3 (Significant: 4)
Crucial infractions include: N/A

Flame Shack (506 Queen St E)
Inspected on: January 30, 2014
Inspection finding: Yellow (Conditional)
Number of infractions: 3 (Minor: 1 Significant: 2)
Crucial infractions include: N/A

Gelato Pizza (1316 Queen St W)
Inspected on: January 28, 2014
Inspection finding: Yellow (Conditional)
Number of infractions: 5 (Minor: 2 Significant: 2 Crucial: 1
Crucial infractions include: Operator fail to ensure food is not contaminated/adulterated

Sakura Sushi (394 Bloor St W)
Inspected on: January 27, 2014
Inspection finding: Yellow (Conditional)
Number of infractions: 6 (Minor: 1 Significant: 5)
Crucial infractions include: N/A

Georgy Porgy's Bar & Grill (1448 Lawrence Ave E)
Inspected on: January 27, 2014
Inspection finding: Yellow (Conditional)
Number of infractions: 4 (Minor: 1 Significant: 2 Crucial: 1)
Crucial infractions include: Operator fail to maintain hazardous food(s) at 4C (40F) or colder.

Pho Orchid (124 Chestnut St)
Inspected on: January 30, 2014
Inspection finding: Yellow (Conditional)
Number of infractions: 3 (Minor: 1 Significant: 2)
Crucial infractions include: N/A

A mishmash of goods is on offer at this new shop in Bloordale Village, including - but not limited to - vintage clothing, antique trinkets, loose-leaf (and takeout) teas, organic soaps, local artwork, and handmade jewellery. It's a lot to house under one roof, but it all just works.

Read my profile of Odd Finds General Store in the Fashion Stores section.

Unlike Vancouver, Toronto has remained relatively untouched by the proliferation of laneway houses. But the idea makes sense: this city has roughly 250 kilometres of laneways, many of them in neighbourhoods with sky-high property prices, almost all of them still fronted by graffiti-covered garages and backyards.

Vancouver's regulations require all houses built on public laneways to be under two stories - the upper floor can only be 60% of the height of the ground floor - and at least five metres from the back of the nearest home. They are typically just 55 square metres and since 2009 more than 800 units have been given the green light, suggesting a serious appetite for small-scale urban living out west.

Lanehouse on Bartlett doesn't look like a Vancouver lane house - it's a cluster of lofts and townhomes that just happen to be squeezed onto a service road off Bloor between Dovercourt and Dufferin - but, should it get the green light, the project could set a precedent for building on Toronto's often overlooked back roads.

Tucked away off a quiet residential street, the property in question is currently occupied by a low-rise former boiler factory that the developers plan to extensively renovate. A separate block would be built at the expense of an existing home on the main portion of Bartlett Ave., giving the overall building a distinct "L" shape.

In promotional literature, the condos in the converted industrial unit boast 5.5-metre ceilings, rooftop patios, "and skylit cathedral master baths." Life in the new block promises an extra floor but little private outdoor space.

Should it get built, Lanehouse on Bartlett, which mostly consists of two-bedroom lofts, would increase the density of the lot above what is currently permitted. Planning staff are currently evaluating how the increased height and vehicle traffic will affect the surrounding neighbourhood.

As writer Rick McGinnis wrote back in 2010, laneway developers in Toronto also have to prove that sewage, water, and electricity connections can be safely accommodated when sometimes there are none. Garbage and fire trucks need easy access and the neighbours can't be cast in eternal shadow, looked in on, or kept awake at night - stipulations that have lead to creative design tweaks in the past.

Despite the challenges, the space is there. A 2003 study estimated that laneways in Toronto could accommodate 6,150 new homes and generate upwards of $11 million a year in new property tax revenue plus some $30 million in development charges.

The property is currently working its way through the approval process at city hall, and a final report is due in later this year. Should Toronto encourage more of this type of development? Is it time planning staff drafter a set of guidelines like Vancouver for building in laneways?

QUICK STATS:

Address: 50-52 Bartlett Ave.
Type: Condo
Height: 11.88 metres (3 storeys)
Site area: 1261.7 square metres
1 bedroom units: 2
2 bedroom units: 14
Average property size: 186.14 sq. m. (inc. outdoor space)
Parking spaces: 17

Chris Bateman is a staff writer at blogTO. Follow him on Twitter at @chrisbateman.

Images: Curated Properties

Next stop, Sir John A. MacDonald Station. What? Councillor Denzil Minnan-Wong moved a motion at this morning's executive committee meeting asking whether Toronto's main transit hub could be renamed for Canada's first prime minister.

"There is no greater Canadian than our founding father and first Prime Minister, Sir John A.
Macdonald," Minnan-Wong, the Chair of the Public Works and Infrastructure Committee, wrote. "As the bicentennial of his birth approaches, the City of Toronto has a unique opportunity to recognize his contribution to our country."

MacDonald, a father of confederation, was instrumental in the formation of the Canadian Pacific Railway and was an early advocate for women's suffrage and aboriginal voting rights.

The original wooden Union Station, located on Station Road, was so named because it marked the meeting point between several privately-owned railways - the Grand Trunk Railway, Northern Railway and the Great Western Railway. The name stuck as the building was replaced and subsequently moved.

Will the change happen? Probably not. Minnan-Wong says the extensive renovation of Union Station is a good chance to consider a new title, but 156 years is a long time to grow attached to the status quo. And, really, wouldn't be silly to mess with a bit of established history like this?

City staff will investigate the idea and report back before July.

Chris Bateman is a staff writer at blogTO. Follow him on Twitter at @chrisbateman.

Image: Gerald Querubin /blogTO Flickr pool.