Life in Leslieville

Ah Leslieville, my new hood. I have to admit that after 6 days, 4 hours and 23 minutes it's starting to feel like... well, not home exactly, but definitely a familiar place to get off the streetcar at the end of the day. I promised a few pictures so here's my best shot. Mid-day, full sun, exactly what Regan told me specifically NOT to do. Ok, so i'm a rebel at heart. But you already knew that. It was a warm day, relatively speaking and i could actually bear to take my gloves off long enough to work the camera. If you look closely you'll see my hand trying to provide some shade to cut the glare. Sorry Regan.

The house we live in is over 100 years old so I was curious about the history of Leslieville. I decided to do a little research and was surprised to learn a few interesting facts about my new neighbourhood. Leslieville was originally a village that was built near the brick factories east of Toronto and most of the original inhabitants were working class. Not so surprising since most of the homes in the area are small duplexes built so close together that you can barely squeeze a refrigerator between them. I know this because I had to hang around the house for a bit yesterday waiting for our new fridge to be delivered, and when it arrived the delivery guys were fretting over trying to get it down the walkway and through the back door into the kitchen. They made me sign a waiver, just in case they might happen to scratch it, and they even had to take the doors off the fridge AND the house to get it inside. Scroll up the page and there is photo of the house i live in. Well, half a house. Our side is on the left, with the white downstairs and the brown upstairs. Nice digs eh?

Leslieville was also home to some other major industries over the past century or so, mainly tanneries and metal fabrication and these have left their legacy of contamination. According to Wikipedia "In 2000, the A.R. Clarke Tannery went up in flames, burning for days and unleashing toxic ash on the surrounding neighbourhood. Almost all these industrial areas have now been abandoned and are awaiting redevelopment." Great. I was a environmental planner long enough to know what that means. In planner-speak that sounds like brownfield site awaiting cleanup and approval from the contaminated sites board. There is still at least one industry left in Leslieville. It's right on Queen Street and is highly recognizable to those of us who grew up eating Chinese take-out. Ah, China Lily. It's quite a lovely old brick building actually, and the smell of soy sauce wafting through the air is far more pleasant than other factory odors known to tickle the olfactory.

Speaking of which... Leslieville is also home to Canada's largest sewage treatment plant. Yup, i know, this place is sounding better by the second. You really want to come visit me now don't you? Patrick and i had a good laugh about the fact that we live next to this massive plant. He and i spent the summer of 2007 making personal visits to all the STP's in the Okanagan and then wrote a paper on them. It was definitely for work, not pleasure. I'll never forget the unmistakable smell of raw human waste on a hot summer's day. Fortunately I haven't noticed any odors drifting our way yet... but then, it's still winter.

All this unsavoury history and yet, Leslieville is considered the newest up and coming neighbourhood in Toronto. Seems crazy, but it's true. A stroll through the Leslieville section of Queen Street East takes you by several catering companies and small bakeries, a number of fancy restaurants, yoga studios, meat shops, a cheese market (yum!), coffee shops, niche furniture stores and not one but three "pamper your doggie" stores. All this intermingled with pawn shops, second hand stores, corner stores, a strip club, and even a Value Village. The streetcar runs on Queen so the bell of the cars going by is a pleasant addition to the general din. Leslie Street crosses Queen and heads south a few blocks to Lake Ontario where it then turns into a walking/cycling path that extends on this spit of land out into the lake. My friend Brian (who relocated from Toronto to Vernon a few years ago) told me it's a man made peninsula, formed of waste material that was dumped into the lake over the years. These days it's a nature preserve and Patrick likes to go running there. So far it's been too cold to bother checking it out, but when the weather warms up... oh yeah, baby... man made nature preserve here i come!

Sean mentioned tonight that he finds the neighbourhood quiet. I guess it might be compared to Cabbagetown where he used to live. For me, it's a busy, urban, eclectic mix of people and curiosities. It has a nice blend of ethnicities with no single one standing out above the others. I really like that. I've never lived anywhere quite like this. The small town girl really has hit the big, stinky city.

*I'm having some troubles with the photo uploader, so unfortunately all the photos i took couldn't be uploaded... i'll keep trying so stay tuned!