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This paper investigates the characteristics of areas with numerous group homes (residential care facilities) that cater to a variety of user groups. An overview of patterns of locational concentration precedes the results of an ecological analysts for the Minor Planning Districts of the City of Toronto. The pattern of ecological correlates among the three group home types analyzed supports results obtained elsewhere, but cautions against referring ecological associations Identified for one sort of facility to other facility types. The conclusion questions the suitability of present areas of locational concentration of group homes as host environments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we examine the management of human-double-crested cormorant conflicts in urban nature areas using the Leslie Street Spit in Toronto, Ontario as our focal study area. We examine the management perspectives of various stakeholders and how they shift over time in response to site ecology and stakeholder input. We categorize management perspectives on a spectrum from complete human domination to near absence of human intention. Two broad management categories emerge from this framework: interventionist and laissez-faire. Interventionists recognized need for management of cormorants, laissez-faire argued for no management of a cormorant colony that has deforested 24% of the site through their nesting activities. We conclude that for urban nature areas, particularly those with a unique, rare, or contentious ecology, a hands-off, laissez-faire management approach is not conducive to improving human-nature relations. Rather, for urban nature sites nature management must promote a respectable balance between human and non-human life, for the long-term benefit of both. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Air quality is a major concern for the public; therefore, the reliability of accurate models in predicting the air quality is of a major interest. In this study, a Gaussian air dispersion model, known as the Air dispersion model for Road Sources in Urban areaS (ARSUS), was developed to predict the ground level concentrations for a contaminant of interest. It was demonstrated that this model could be used successfully in place of or in conjunction with ambient air monitoring stations in determining the local Air Quality Index (AQI). The ARSUS model was validated against the US EPA ISC3 model before it was used to conduct two studies in this investigation. These two studies simulated weekday morning rush-hour tailpipe emissions of CO and predicted ground level concentrations. The first study used the ARSUS model to predict ground level concentrations of CO from the tailpipe emissions for roads and highways located in the vicinity of the Toronto West ambient air monitoring station. The second study involved an expansion of the domain to predict ground level concentrations of CO from tailpipe emissions from highways in the City of Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The predicted concentrations were then compared to the data collected from the Toronto West ambient air monitoring station. The results of the ARSUS model indicated that the air quality in the immediate vicinity of roads or highways is highly impacted by the tailpipe emissions. Higher concentrations were observed for the areas adjacent to the road and highway sources. The tailpipe emissions of CO from highways had a higher contribution to the local air quality. The predicted ground level concentrations from the ARSUS model under-predicted when compared to the observed data from the monitoring station; however, despite this, the predictive model is viable. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article is an exploration of the ways that gay men negotiated and created urban spaces in 1950s Toronto. A significant part of this everyday encounter was the proliferation of tabloid journalism that exploited and mapped out transgressive domains of same-sex erotics for its readers. Using a variety of sources, such as oral histories, government documents, and these local newspaper tabloids, the author traces the contours of same-sex urban spaces, their conceptual and geographical linkages, and their relationship to the larger society within which they are set. Ultimately, the author shows how the securing of these spaces was deeply implicated in existing class and gender hierarchies that simultaneously served as places of resistance and domination. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Presents a study that estimated the urban metabolism of the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) in Ontario. Background on the use of urban metabolism analyses in quantifying the overall fluxes of energy, water and wastes into an urban region; Analysis of inputs to the GTA urban ecosystem; Results and implications.

Reports on a study that examined and compared the responses of six municipalities in the Greater Toronto Area, Ontario to the challenges of global economic changes. Transfer to the municipal governments of administrative and financial responsibilities for local services; Tendency for municipalities to compete with each other for economic advantage.

Public policy objectives concerning urban population distribution often are achieved through residential land use regulation. Control over population distribution also can be exerted indirectly through the ,;election of employment sites. If population policy goals can be expressed as a target for each zone of the urban area. then it is possible to determine that spatial distribution of employment for which population distribution comes as close as possible to these targets. Using the matrix structure of the Garin-Lowry urban development model, a goal program is derived which determines the basic employment distribution which minimizes deviations from desired zonal populations for Metropolitan Toronto. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]