MONITA RAJPAL

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10:26 am

MONITA RAJPAL IS momentarily stumped. Until this point, the face of CNN International’s daily World Report has been answering questions over the phone from London with a bright voice and self-assurance honed through years in live television.

Then a softball question comes and she pauses. The question:Who would you most like to interview? For the North Yorker, who got her start in journalism answering phones for Citytv and now reports nightly for an international audience, the question isn’t a flight of fancy.

Rajpal has interviewed renowned world leaders and politicians for CNN, including Al Gore and former Soviet Union president Mikhail Gorbachev. No one is off the table.

“I wish I thought about that one,” she says with a light laugh before eventually settling on U.S. President Barack Obama. “He is someone who has already started changing the way people think about politics and about the power of your own abilities.”

It is an apt but unintentional choice of words for Rajpal, who grew up in Toronto’s North York community and turned to broadcast journalism after a high school councillor told her that her abilities were too strong to ignore.

Today she lives in London — the hub of international news, she says — and interviews the world’s most influential people and covers the most important stories. Rajpal hosts CNN International’s “World Report,” a live, daily half-hour news show broadcast around the globe.

She is also a presenter on the channel’s new arts and culture program icon.

“I absolutely love it. I feel like I’m the luckiest girl in the world to get to do what I get to do every day,” she says. “I get my news fix because I do love news. I get to be able to anchor the show. And then I get to travel the globe and get to meet some of my heroes.”

As a child, the idea of hosting her own news program was beyond her imagination. Born in Hong Kong, Rajpal moved with her family to North York when she was 14. The area was much as it is today, a suburban paradise filled with rows of homes and shopping centres, with a direct connection to Toronto’s core.

It was the picture of suburban living. Some of her fondest memories come from the nearby Fairview Mall, where she and her friends would roam in packs on the weekend.

“We’d end up with bags and bags of things that we bought.We don’t know how we did.We only had a little bit of money,” she said.

“It was a great place to grow up. It was one of those idyllic suburban areas of Toronto. I would walk to school through the ravine. It was lovely; it still is a beautiful part of the city.

“When I started working downtown, I still lived up there. It was such an easy commute.”

She attended A. Y. Jackson Secondary School and participated in the school’s Amnesty International program.

The vice-principal saw Rajpal giving a presentation to a packed auditorium and asked if she would read morning announcements. “I said great, no problem. It got me out of class 15 minutes early,” she said. That led Rajpal to Ryerson’s radio and television arts program, after a guidance counsellor familiar with her work suggested she apply.

“When I was in high school, to be honest with you, journalism wasn’t something that I had even thought about,” she said. “You go through these meetings with your guidance counsellor, talking about universities and what you want to do. I said I really didn’t know what I want. They said, ‘You are good at writing, you are good at speaking, so why not try journalism?’ So I said OK.”

She graduated from Ryerson in 1996 and secured an entry job at Citytv, working her way up from the bottom.

“I was a receptionist at the front desk. I answered phones. I gave tours of the old building at 99 Queen West. It has changed now. But back then it was one of those iconic buildings in Toronto, and that was the heart of Citytv and MuchMusic,” she says.

“After my work shift, I would go in to the newsroom and try and learn as much as I could. At that time, I just really wanted to learn about the whole process of being a journalist and being in television. It is not just about going on camera. There is so much that is going on behind the scenes.”

Her dedication paid off, By the time Citytv launched its 24-hour news channel, Rajpal had earned a chance to read on air. “I remember it was a Sunday, 5 p.m. My whole family was watching. It was such a surreal moment, but I remember feeling at home on set and in front of the camera. And even when I stumbled a bit, I remember thinking, ‘OK, I got the first stumble out of the way. Now let’s move on.’”

Glen Baxter, the host of In Fashion on the Fashion Television Channel, was working at Citytv when Rajpal made her debut. He said she was a natural from her first day on-air.

“She was working at reception at Citytv, and just a few months later, I am in the newsroom and I look up at the monitor and she is live, reading the news,” he said. “She was reading the news like she had been doing it for a decade. I almost quit my job and started a career in forestry because she made it look so effortless.”

Despite being a world away, Rajpal returns to Toronto, a place she considers home, as often as possible.

Her family — parents, aunts and a married brother with two young girls — still live in the city and, for the most part, still in the Yonge Street and Steeles Avenue neighbourhood where she grew up.

When asked about home, her mind slips between North York and Queen Street where she spent the majority of her five-year career with Citytv. “I do go down to Queen Street, but it has changed since the time I was there,” she said. “It’s nice, but it is also a bit of a shame because Queen Street West had its own character. It was my home.”

She said her Toronto roots deserve much of the credit for her success in journalism, affording her an opportunity to dive into the industry while covering internationally relevant stories.

“I think being in Toronto, because it is such a cultural hub, such a cosmopolitan city, I was able to really be a part of something,” she said.

“Toronto is such a multicultural city. I really feel, as a young professional person who is just starting out, that it was difficult but not impossible.”

PEACHES

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10:18 am

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WOULD YOU BELIEVE that the underground electronic music sensation who has influenced Madonna and M.I.A.,who said no to collaborating with Britney Spears and yes to filming and starring in her own Super 8 biker adult film was once an independent drama and music instructor at the YMCA in North York?

Or would you believe that the woman known to pull off up to 15 costume changes in a single show — from a pink, skin-tight astronaut-meets-dominatrix bodysuit to a double-height black getup that looks like an armoire draped in garbage bags — was once the obnoxious kid with a cute gap tooth who played hide-and-seek at Bayview at Steeles? Peaches: international music star, former Bayview rabble-rouser.

And here’s the funniest part: for all of her wild antics — the obscene gestures, the transsexuals cavorting around on stage — when she rolls into town this winter (Dec. 21 at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre), she’ll be bringing an act that is a complete reversal of what you might expect. But more on that later.

Adolescence for Merrill Nisker, the kid who would become Peaches,was safe, suburban, sheltered. She describes her neighbourhood as “the kind of place where you couldn’t even walk to a 7- Eleven.” By necessity, she made her own fun. At age six, on a dare from the local kids near her cottage on Lake Simcoe, she snuck into a nearby cottage and stole a dish with an American dollar bill in it.

By high school, she was sneaking out of the house to go to places like the Bloor Cinema,Lee’s Palace,the Purple Institute and to hang out in empty warehouses by the railroad tracks just south of the city.

She realized early on that she loved women as much as men. Her science teacher, a woman,wore leather pants and a faux leather jacket and rode a motorcycle, and Nisker found herself smitten. An otherwise mediocre student, she ended up winning the Most Improved Science Award that year.

Diane Flacks, a local comedian who knew Nisker in her early days as a performer, remembers a funny, selfdeprecating, confident young woman with a discernable edge.

“We both grew up in suburban Jewish families, and she was pretty subversive,” says Flacks. “She was willing to make fun of things,even in school, that you wouldn’t necessarily make fun of. Whether it was the program, theatre itself, she was never going to accept it the way it seemed to be.” For school dances,Nisker’s junior high school,Zion Heights,would partner with the predominantly black school to the east, which made for an interesting collision of cultures — some 40 Jewish girls trying to keep up with dance moves that were far from kosher.

“They were awesome dancers. They knew how to do the freak, you know, the kind of dancing that is banned in some junior high schools in America now,” says Nisker.

Instead of shying away, she jumped right in. “You knew you were doing well when you were keeping up with the black kids, you know?”

After high school at A. Y. Jackson, Nisker found herself teaching drama and music to kids at the local YMCA. She didn’t play an instrument, so she taught herself guitar. “I decided I would play songs for the kids,and they would kind of move around as I told stories, and it became quite a popular thing at the schools because I could somehow wrangle the kids into learning and enjoying themselves without them going crazy and ripping each other’s hair out,” says Nisker.

At night, she played in a trio called Mermaid Café. Their music was Janis Joplin–inflected folk, heavy on the tambourine, harmonica and full of irreverent harmonies about peace, love and tragedy.“Young girls would cry when we sang this song about two gay kids in love and one gets run over by a truck,” recalls Nisker.

Mermaid Café’s success was shortlived, however, as Nisker’s bandmates in that band and successive projects soon left town, leaving her with a budding musical curiosity but no one to explore it with. Not one to let such an inconvenience stop her, she bought a keyboard and a Roland MC-505 groovebox, which allowed her to become effectively a one-woman band.

She started to experiment with new types of music, playing in a few different side projects and eventually shedding the folksy sound for something harder, rawer and more expressive of who she was. In short order, her high-energy stage antics started to attract buzz.

A friend named Leslie Feist would provide accompaniment in the form of sock puppet shows (under the name Bitch Lap Lap), and fans of Carole Pope, Mary Margaret O’Hara and Atari Teenage Boy began flocking to see the flamboyant performer who was known to do just about anything on stage.

“I wanted to show [that the technology] wasn’t rocket science, so that you could leave the machine while it was playing and jump into the crowd and come back or f**k it up or play it with your tongue or whatever,”says Nisker.

Around the same time, Nisker came across a Nina Simone song called “Four Women,” about the power of female resilience. She liked the name of the final character,Peaches,and took it as her own. “I see [Peaches] as a physical extension of myself in a format where it’s one against 500 or one against a thousand,” says Nisker. “When you talk one-on-one with somebody, you’re a certain way, but when you’re one person talking to a thousand people, you act differently.”

Around 1999, Nisker followed her craft to Berlin where, the story goes, she performed a one-off set at a small club, and a record executive who was in attendance signed her on the spot.

Her second album, The Teaches of Peaches, released in 2000, became a cult hit with fans who liked the way she embraced questions of sex and gender politics in her lyrics and onstage. The album sold 10,000 copies in its first three weeks. “A masterwork of rudimentary electronics and explicit lyrics,”wrote Spin Magazine. Her next album reached number five on the U.S. Top Electronic Albums chart,and her most recent album peaked at number five on Billboard’s Top Heatseekers chart.

This year, she was named Electronic Artist of the Year by the Independent Music Awards, a fitting reward after having sold nearly half a million records and, with song titles such as “F**k the Pain Away,” doing so almost entirely without radio support.

Nisker’s embrace of gender politics led to an inevitable backlash, with some associating her embrace of transsexuality (not to mention all other shades under the LGBT rainbow) as evidence that she was a transsexual herself, accusations not unlike those levelled more recently at Lady Gaga,an artist for whom Peaches is often mentioned as an influence. “That Lady Gaga thing, that was me five years ago,when they’re like ‘[Is she a] hermaphrodite?’ You know, that whole conversation was in the press about me, and it’s fun,”says Nisker.

Indeed,the entire Lady Gaga spectacle is very much borrowed from Peaches — from the over-the-top costumes to the sexually charged lyrics — though Peaches is more honoured than angered at the comparison.

“She obviously does specific things that I’ve done but also what other people have done — Madonna, Grace Jones — just taking [from] all the cultural icons, and I’m part of that and that’s cool,” she says. That Nisker can be so blasé about one of music’s most popular mainstream artists aping her style speaks to her success. But it might be that she has simply moved on.

To wit: today, Nisker is gearing up for her return to Toronto where she’ll unveil for a North American audience a new side of herself in the much-lauded Peaches Christ Superstar, in which she sings the entire musical Jesus Christ Superstar — every scene,every character,from Judas to Jesus.“It’s very,very goddamn exhausting, yep. It’s probably the most exhausting thing I’ve ever done,” she says. She also has a new opera in the works,Peaches Does Herself, based on her four albums and incorporating her favourite misconceptions about Peaches. But that’s not to say she is giving up on what got her where she is. In fact, after Nisker rapped with Pink on her album, Britney Spears’s management got in touch, asking about a collaboration. Nisker turned her down. The reasons why vary — some have said it’s because Spears didn’t approach her personally — but Nisker now insists she was just busy at the time and doesn’t rule out a collaboration in the future.

“Sure I’d write with her, I mean, why not? I rapped with Christina Aguilera and Pink, so I mean, it’s nothing personal,” she says. Plus, she adds, “I like her more since she shaved her head.”

Light up your life

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9:55 am

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DR. ANTHONY LEVITT is the chief of psychiatry at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre in Toronto where he focuses his research on several related areas within the field of mood disorders.

With clocks turning back on Nov. 7 this month and days getting shorter, we tracked down Dr. Levitt for a chat about seasonal affective disorder (SAD).

What time of year usually marks the onset of symptoms?

Patients often begin to feel symptoms as early as October or late September. Full episodes usually occur by December.… Usually by the end of March or April the symptoms are gone. But many people can’t work during those months, as in regular depression, so it impairs function much the same way.

Is it just the lack of light that causes SAD?

We don’t really have evidence that it’s solely the lack of light. We do know that by using light therapy people feel better, but that doesn’t mean that’s what causes the depression. We treat pneumonia with penicillin, but that doesn’t mean a lack of penicillin causes pneumonia.There are a lot of things changing in winter: light, the temperature drops, the wind pressure changes. We do know there are annual events — Christmas, for example — that trigger depression as well.

Annual events occur in spring and summer, too, but we don’t see the same incidences of depression.

That’s a very good point. That tells us that — at least in part — there is some sort of geoclimatic component.

How much sunlight do we need every day?

There’s really no specific number or amount that is right for everybody.

Can’t we just mimic that light by turning on lamps?

Well, not really because light has many different qualities: wavelength, frequency, intensity. Natural sunlight has a broad range toward red and orange. Incandescent light uses more yellow. Of course there are broad spectrum lights.…

As with light therapy?

Yes.There’s research that shows that patients who are exposed to very vivid, broad spectrum light for a few hours every day have a decreased incidence of seasonal affective disorder.So sitting in front of a light box for an hour or half an hour, usually in the morning, is often a popular treatment for symptoms. There’s even a head-mounted version, but we recommend that people don’t move around too much when using it.

Where does Canada fall when it comes to cases by the area?

Well, the further away you are from the equator the higher the rate. Canada does have a higher rate. It’s estimated that two and a half per cent of the population have seasonal affective disorder. It’s higher than schizophrenia; it’s higher than bipolar disorder. In terms of chronic illness, that’s a large number.

What role does excessive alcohol consumption play?

The issue is drinking in moderation. Excessive drinking, drinking large amounts in a short period of time, can affect treatment.But drinking in moderation doesn’t seem to be a large issue.

What if they want to stay away from pharmaceuticals?

There are a number of products in health stores: St. John’s wort, for example; s-adenosyl methionine, also known as SAM-e; and tryptophan, which is an amino acid that seems to have a positive affect on sleep. Some people use melatonin and swear by it.

For someone who is prone to SAD, what happens to that person the rest of the year?

Good question. If you have a mental health condition, you are at risk for others. People with depression also develop some kind of an anxiety disorder as well. And it’s not to say that people with seasonal depression are immune to non-seasonal depression as well.

What steps should people take to prevent SAD?

By making sure you have a system in place that includes light exposure and in the spring and summer months preparing foods that don’t have high-carbohydrate levels, maintaining an exercise regime during the winter months. None of these are foolproof, of course, but they do seem to help. If you know it’s something you are prone to, it’s best to start medication and light therapy prior to the onset.

Want to dine at J.P. Challet's new resto? Get in line

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9:48 am

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After two years in the making, J.P. Challet and Jennifer Decorte’s Ici Bistro has finally opened its doors. The owners of the cozy, colourful space are aiming to dish up a French dining experience that is tailor-made to the customer.

It was a relief for Challet to finally make it to this point.

Ici Bistro might have opened sooner if he and Decourte hadn’t run up against a series of roadblocks, which began with their public fight to get a liquor license. But with this and other obstacles cleared, the restaurant is now booked up with reservations nearly two weeks in advance.

"It’s been outstanding," says Challet.

For now, Ici Bistro is only taking reservations to fill its 25 seats once every night, but seats at the window, bar and chef’s rail are available without a reservation.

Challet says he’s focusing on getting things right before he introduces more sittings.

"We don’t push ourselves," he says. "We just do what we can do right now and I think we do it well."

Challet describes the French menu as cuisine nouveau classique. The roughly 18 items will change every 45 days, according to what’s in season.

"Many people think that French cuisine is heavy and I just want to prove that it’s not heavy when it’s properly done," he says.

Not only does Challet focus on creating lighter versions of "good food," but the menu gives customers a choice of portion size – two-thirds of a plate or a full plate.

To date, the beef bourguignon and the lobster thermidor have been two of the hottest menu items. As chef and sommelier, Challet has placed an emphasis on food and wine pairings. Current selections include French old world wines and Canadian new world wines. Wine servings are flexible as well, with three and six ounce glasses on offer.

"People seem to be happy to be in control of what they want to eat, what they want to drink, what they want to spend," says Challet.

Ici Bistro is open evenings from Wednesday to Saturday, 538 Manning Ave., 416-536-0079.

Congregation gets new facility from land sale

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10:21 pm

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A local church turned to Diamante Development Corporation to finance a new facility, agreeing to sever their land in exchange for much-needed building funds. Now that construction of the three-storey church is underway, the residential component of the site, a proposed 25-storey condominium, is causing concern among local residents.

“The whole package had to go forward for the zoning, so yes, it was known that it would be used for a condominium development,” said Rev. Shaw, of St. George’s, adding that the church has been a landmark over the years and people wanted to ensure there would be a new one. In addition,Shaw said the new church will also house a community centre and a public garden.

But it remains unclear exactly what form of residential development will be added to the property, as the plans will need the go ahead from the city before Diamante can proceed. “The residential component on the west side of the site will still need a site plan approval,” said Rob Gibson, the project’s senior city planner on application. “We haven’t heard or seen any applications from the residential landowner in terms of when they are going to proceed.”

And that has local residents concerned.

“It exponentially brings traffic, it brings pollution and it brings sewage problems. I don’t mean to be funny, but where does the crap go? It’s got to go somewhere,” said Dave Slotnick, president of the Willowdale Neighbourhood Association.

Coun. John Filion said that although the area has more than its fill of residential condominiums, this project does offer some positive impact to the local area.

“Condo projects are never particularly good for the community, but the reconstruction of the church is,” he said.

Diamante has allowed the church office to remain on their property until construction of the new church is complete.

Eglinton Avenue will never be the same

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10:19 pm

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The station sites have been picked out, the boring machine contract signed, and now locals will soon have a glance at station schemes for the underground portion of the Eglinton light rail transit (LRT), which runs from Keele station to Laird station.

Approximately 40 companies have already packed ideas into a sealed envelope and are waiting for Nov. 11, when the bid competition for designing the underground stations comes to a wrap. “The envelopes aren’t opened until after the competition is closed,” said TTC spokesperson Ryan Bissonnette, who added that a committee will assess each bid and a station design contract will be awarded a few weeks later.

Currently, the TTC has picked out preliminary sites for each station, including the Chaplin entrance at 574 Eglinton Ave. W., the Avenue entrance at 1024 Avenue Rd., the Mount Pleasant entrance at 256 Eglinton Ave. E., and the Laird entrance at 250 Laird Dr. The sites reside on a mixture of private and public properties, some with buildings on them. All sites underwent an environmental assessment that was approved by the province last May.

According to Steve Munro, a transit advocate who grew up in the Mount Pleasant Road and Eglinton Avenue East area, the TTC held several community meetings to build consensus on where stations should be. He said his own local Mount Pleasant station changed locations. “That station was shifted so that entrance locations would not be as objectionable,” said Munro. Another station that changed was Laird, which was originally intended to be closer to Brentcliffe Road. Bissonnette said station construction will begin in 2013.

As for the underground tunnel, last August a $54 million contract was made between Metrolinx, the provincial agency managing construction of the LRT line, and manufacturer Lovat Inc. for four boring machines. The machines will be nearly 200 feet in length and will start tunnelling next spring.

Yonge & Wilson TTC site under fire

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10:18 pm

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Debate surrounding the proposed new centralized TTC headquarters continues to mount, as information on price and zoning are revealed. The TTC has signed a conditional offer to lease the site to be constructed at Yonge Street and Wilson Avenue with Build Toronto, the city’s arm’s-length real estate agency.

“It’s a positive first step for us, and although it’s conditional, obviously we’ll work through those conditions,” said Bruce Logan, director of communications and public affairs for Build Toronto. He expects it will take several months to finalize, even though the process was already supposed to be completed, and that the deal hinges on community approval, financing and zoning conditions, he said.

In addition to a city-mandated public consultation meeting scheduled for December, Build Toronto is planning a workshop on Nov. 24 for members of the public to help inform Build Toronto’s decisions prior to submitting a finalized site plan for the property at 4050 Yonge St.

“This is important to us and important to the residents,” said Logan, adding that his company had already been meeting with local ratepayers associations for several months. “We want to get their input on what they’d like to see, how they might use the building, areas they’d like to see designed, and things they’d like, for example, retail or restaurants they might like to see in there.”

Paul Baker, president of the South Armour Heights Residents Association, remains skeptical. “The only reason Build Toronto is holding the meeting is the residents’ associations started to scream,” he said. “The whole thing does not pass the sniff test, and that’s just the development issue. This is a mess that has been brewing for a while.”

One of the most contentious issues is the proposed price and rent of the development. Joe Mihevc, current vice-chair of the TTC, who voted against the lease, said his main concern is that the lease is too expensive.

“We are not going to save the money that we wanted to save by having a centralized lease in one location,” he said. “We’re not going to save the money that we wanted to, and that’s why we went through this whole process.”

Current TTC chair, Adam Giambrone, who voted in favour of the lease, disagrees. “It allows us to consolidate staff around the city in one location instead of spending 15 to 16 million a year on lease payments, rental space,” he said, pointing out the lease also represents a net positive for the city because profits from Build Toronto go back to the city through a dividend payment.

Coun. Karen Stintz said she hasn’t seen any specific numbers, because she’ s not allowed to attend in-camera TTC meetings, but she’s aware of the cost-related concerns. “I did hear it would become extremely expensive office space once developed,” she said but added the height, density and use of the building remain unresolved issues for her ward.

Coun. Mihevc expects the proposed headquarters will be re-examined once the new city council and TTC board come into effect, but Giambrone remains confident the lease will go through regardless. To cancel the lease at this point, he said, would mean lots of financial repercussions.

“I can’t imagine a new mayor wouldn’t want to review it,” said Mihevc.

Film centre expansion moves ahead

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9:53 pm

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A settlement was reached at an Ontario Municipal Board hearing on Oct. 7. between the Canadian Film Centre (CTC) and the neighbours who had appealed its expansion plans.

The agreement marked the fourth of five approvals the CFC needed from residents with property adjacent to the film centre, who hold the rights to approve any new construction on the site. Jane Pepino, the lawyer who represented the neighbours, said her clients made their concerns very clear.

The appeal was mounted based on concerns about how the development would increase traffic and affect land intended for park usage.

“They wanted to be absolutely 100 per cent sure what CFC was proposing because there had been some confusion about how big, how many buildings and where they were going to go,” Pepino said. “They wanted to ensure that CFC ‘didn’t nibble away’ at the property and add more buildings and lease properties in the future.”

Barry Patterson, director of marketing and communications at the CFC, which is located on E. P. Taylor’s former estate and specializes in advanced film, television and new media training, said they were delighted to resolve the issue.

“We’re extremely happy, four out of our five neighbours have now signed the restrictive covenant and we are proceeding with the project based on that,” he said.

In the negotiation process, the centre’s $9 million overhaul was scaled back to meet the requests of the other property owners.

The expansion to the gatehouse is now set to be one storey instead of two, and the number of additional parking spaces was slashed from 36 to 24.

The plan to construct a new actors’ conservatory on the section of the land currently home to an unused pool and cabana hasn’t been changed. General updates to existing buildings will also be done, in order to meet programming and space requirements.

Since the CFC faces a deadline to spend $7.5 million in stimulus funds by March 31, 2011 or forfeit any unspent money, they have been working hard to keep the Windfields Campus Improvement Project on track.

The one remaining hurdle for the CFC is a final neighbour who has yet to sign off on approval. As a result, city council passed a motion to help expedite the process, including the right to take away the final neighbours rights, deeming it a matter of public interest. “The city will likely begin the process of expropriation in the next few weeks. A notice would be sent to the owner and published in the paper,” said Patricia Trott, from the city’s strategic communications division.

This involves taking away the rights the resident has to comment on any changes to the CFC’s site until the construction phase is complete, in order to stay on schedule.

The motion was supported by Coun. David Shiner, a member of the CFC’s board, who said the centre, which was founded by filmmaker Norman Jewison in 1988, plays a large role in keeping the city in the forefront of Canadian entertainment.

Trott anticipates it will take several months to process and said it still requires final approval from the new city council.

Bloor construction headache is over for local retailers

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9:51 pm

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Just as holiday season shopping is about to set in, Bloor Street retailers have received a gift of their own: for the first time in more than two years, there is no construction on the strip of Bloor between Avenue Road and Church Street.

David Markowitz, the president of Davids shoes, said he is looking forward to seeing business return to normal and said he believes the holiday season will bring a resurgence.

“The place is going to be illuminated with all sorts of holiday spirit,” said Markowitz, who added that the local tree-lighting ceremony on Nov. 17 will also help make the area more attractive. “It’s coming back to being the place to shop, the place to be seen.”

The reason behind the construction is the Bloor Street Transformation Project, a $20 million effort to upgrade the streetscape. Construction began in 2008, but plans for the project started a decade earlier. Briar de Lange, general manager of the Bloor-Yorkville BIA, said there were several challenges from the beginning, such as putting together a viable plan and finding funding.

“There was lots of legwork, lots of studies had to be conducted, many preliminary designs had to be done,” said de Lange.

She said one of the most noteworthy improvements to the area has been the planting of 54 trees. She added that there is still some more work to do before the project is officially complete, including planting more trees.

“We still need to put the icing on the cake, so I don’t want to paint a false impression,” she said.

However, the upgrades have not been without some expensive hiccups. Construction was slated to end last year, and city council had to approve $4 million in overrun costs after running into some construction surprises, such as a $2.1 million invoice for work by Toronto Hydro.

Plenty of ‘fresh’ goodies in the Village

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9:48 pm

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Growing up in India, Tsering Tenzin and her family worked closely with local craftspeople. Now, with their new Yorkville shop, the family continues down the same path. Terra Pura sells organic and Fair Trade jewellery and accessories, supporting local craftspeople around the world. “We wanted to give back,” says Tenzin (130 Cumberland St., 647-347-0681).

It was a fine arts thesis that put Alexandria Pellegrino on track to becoming a cake baker. “I was using a lot of edible mediums,” says Pellegrino. Her carefully crafted thesis prompted her to take cooking classes where she met Jessica Smith. In 2008 they started Cake Opera Co. This month they open a storefront for their business (1136 Eglinton Ave. W., 647-347-2626).

It started as a way to de-stress, but Janet Schreiber’s love of baking was enough for her to swap veterinarian school plans for cooking school. Later, acting on passion, she opened Eglinton Way Phipps Bakery Café. Twenty years later, it’s still going strong. “What we do here makes people happy and that makes me happy,” Schreiber says (420 Eglinton Ave. W., 416-481-9111).

Elizabeth Schindler already offers Gerry Weber clothing at her namesake Avenue Road store. However, after years of seeing how well the European designer’s clothing fits women, she says she is ready for the next step. Which is why she just opened a Gerry Weber store in Summerhill. The shop will exclusively sell the clothing line (1177 Yonge St., 647-258-7727).

Designer Sumi Jung first realized men had problems dressing when she attended business seminars. “Their jackets were too long, pants too short,” she says. Now, with a new location of her custom-shirt store, Fresh and Prestige, she’s teaching them to dress well (101 Yorkville Ave., 416-644-0078).

Local emission complaints linger

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LOCAL CABINET MAKER Raywal Kitchens has its next hearing date on Dec. 3 to face charges laid by the Ministry of the Environment. But some of the residents affected by noise and odour issues coming from the industrial operations along Green Lane and John Street said they have already given up on help from the ministry.

Alena Gotz, a member of the Aileen-Willowbrook Ratepayers Association, said that instead of continuing to fight individual companies, they’ve turned to the town and are pressing for a broader plan to revitalize the neighbourhood. With Canac Kitchens gone, they’re hoping to see the area up-zoned to bring in commercial and residential development.

“The associations are talking to each other and we are building umbrella organizations to get the powers that be to listen to us, rather than make decisions about us without us,” said Gotz.

Specifically, residents are interested in the idea of bringing a low-rise retirement village to the former Canac site. But any commercial or residential development that fits in with the character of the neighbourhood would be acceptable, said Gotz.

The town has already undertaken a revitalization study of the area, said outgoing councillor, Erin Shapero.

The current situation stems from decades-old decisions that permitted residential development in close proximity to sites designated for industrial uses, she said.

As a result, residents have encountered noise and environmental pollution over the years. After the biggest industrial presence, Canac Kitchens, was shuttered more than two years ago, attention shifted to Raywal Kitchens.

Kate Jordan, a ministry spokesperson, said that the cabinet maker’s alleged offence dates back to 2008. The charges have to do with failing to guarantee that the facility was in compliance with the province’s odour requirements. In the interim, complaints have decreased, she said.

“We have been working with the company and the community for several years to make sure that odours from Raywal’s facilities are not causing an adverse impact to the neighbourhood,” said Jordan.

The ministry has only received three complaints regarding the cabinet maker this year, compared to 13 last year and 39 in 2007.

Bevan May, Raywal’s CEO, said his company plans to defend itself in court.

“We have every expectation that the matter will be dealt with and we’ll essentially succeed in our defence,” he said.

May pointed to the change Raywal has made in the formulation of its finishes as one of the most significant strides it’s made in the last few years.

“We simply are not facing the number of complaints that we had before,” he said.

Gotz said she believes the odour isn’t as noticeable lately due to a decrease in shifts at the facility. Also, residents have cut off communication with the company and the ministry, she said.

“It’s not because there is no smell. There is smell,” she said.

After ten years of dealing with these issues, Shapero said that at this stage, the province needs to step up.

“The MOE [Ministry of the Environment] has not been very strict with them, so I would say it’s definitely a problem of enforcement,” she said.

Thornhill’s Milos Raonic faces off against Nadal

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EVEN THOUGH HE lost his recent match against Rafael Nadal at the Japan Open, Milos Raonic won his opponent’s respect. He held his own, losing 6-4, 6-4 to the world’s top player.

Following a Davis Cup victory, Thornhill’s tennis star has continued to enjoy success this fall, rising to become Canada’s highest-ranked male singles player.

Hatem McDadi, vice president of tennis development for Tennis Canada, said that it has been exciting to watch the young player progress.

“It’s been incredible for Canadian tennis,” he said.

Raonic will be rounding out the year on the ATP tour playing in Valencia and Paris before a short break and off-season training. He’ll start next year down under, with his sights set on qualifying for the Australian Open.

McDadi remarked that Raonic has serious potential to become Canada’s highest-ranked tennis player ever.

“He has such a big game that he can play with the best in the world, with his serve and his power,” he said.