July 17, 2004
About this photo: Mitzi's Café is a queer oasis in a Parkdale/High Park neighbourhood, Toronto West, Ontario, taken By MParé
With apartment rents in Toronto, Ontario going through the roof, it's time to start a new gay neighbourhood. But where should it be?
When out gay men and lesbians moved into rundown urban neighbourhoods in the late 90s and early 2000, they rented apartments no one else wanted, started businesses on blocks where no one else thought businesses could thrive, and had sex under bushes that no one else wanted to have sex under. Neighbourhoods in Toronto West slowly gentrified, with hordes of gays and lesbians making these once dicey neighbourhoods safe for art galleries, florists, card shops, bars, cafes and restaurents.
The closest most gays and lesbians ever come to finding a promised land is moving to a Gay Ghetto -- an urban neighbourhood that is populated by, and reasonably tolerates, a large number of queers. For years, Toronto's gay village was kept lively and relevant by a constant stream of young queer migrants arriving from uptown Toronto, rural Ontario, and new Canadians. And for years, young queers moving there could rely on three things: cheap apartments, low-paying retail jobs, and lots of other young queers with cheap apartments and low-paying retail jobs with whom they could swap spit and various sexually transmitted diseases.
But all that's changing. In downtown Toronto's gay village where dirt-cheap apartments and too-trendy restaurants once peacefully coexisted, rising property values are pushing rents through the roof. The social contract that kept young queer migrants pouring into the village has been ruptured; while the average Toronto apartment rented for $449 in 1990, it now goes for $884 and $1,040 for a two bedroom and a single room for $475, according to Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation. (CMHC) The Gay ghetto is slowly turning into gay retirement community, where the only queers who can afford to live in downtown Toronto are the ones who bought apartments and houses 20 years ago when they were still relatively cheap. Young, straight singles have moved on, followed by straight retirees, marrieds, and young families. Young professional queers are now forced to look elsewhere for housing. The downtown core is on the decline, sapped of its energy and sex appeal for queer youngsters.
Unfortunately, the roots that queers lay, tend to be thin and easily ripped up by the relentless tides of change. And thus the great queer migration begins. Queers set out, like herds of faaabulous reindeer, in search of the next gay village. It happened in New York, it happened in Chicago, its happening in Toronto. Young gays and lesbians priced out of established gay ghetto and are colonizing a new neighbourhood, seeking out cheap rents, live work spaces, lofts, houses and opening trendy restaurants and art galleries.
Toronto's old-guard queers tire of battling wannabes and colossal monthly rents, are abandoning the once sacred cow by the fistful. So what makes a new gay village? An abundance of factors, including accessibility, shopping, nightlife, reasonable rent, and at least one public park with foliage ample enough to conceal midnight indiscretion all determine a neighbourhood's potential as a gay ghetto. (A jerk-off club or two doesn't hurt, either.) Surprisingly, Toronto West fits almost all of these criteria. It does boast a couple of beautiful beaches, a trendy business area, and an abundance of cafes and restaurants. And there is one very large cruisy park in the western edges of the village and more than enough wooded areas to provide bush sex opportunities for the adventurous queer with some bug spray and a few survival skills.
Many gays and lesbians have already begun to call Toronto West home. First it is important to identify the number of public schools, daycare facilities, nursing homes, community centers, churches, and similar establishments that are not only of positively no use to queer people, but may even represent a tangible threat to attaining the critical mass necessary to create a truly gay ghetto.
The number of churches in Toronto West is in itself staggering But an almost equal number of tanning salons and florists heroically stand guard, proud sentinels against the presence of the Lord. Public schools also abound, indicating not only the existence of a large population of breeder types, but illegal firearms and random violence. To most peace-loving queers, weapons-toting ankle-biters are enough of a deterrent to keep them at bay -- until one realizes that the presence of public education facilities also guarantees an unending supply of affordable and easily obtainable party drugs.
But is there actually someplace to party? One of the most fundamental elements of any true gay ghetto is the presence of at least one primarily gay watering hole and/or dance spot. Toronto West has at least 60 not all located on College Street, but scattered throughout the neighbourhoods, and none with a gay bar label.
Although none are exclusively gay, the queer village in Toronto West is home to a few funky queer bars and lounges that that welcome all sexualities: The Cadillac Lounge and Mitzi's Sister on Queen Street West. Toronto West is hopping and chic business district, provides many establishments indispensable to gay life: music, book, and retail stores, hairdressers, galleries, naturopathic physicians and acupuncturists for the immune-impaired, and cafes. Throw in Chinatown's cheap haircuts for $4 bucks, a coffee shop or two, and a few artsy types, and the new gay village, in Toronto's west end, has the urban-decay chic that gays love so much.
Of course, the feelings of Toronto West's current residents cannot be overlooked in the matter. While, in general, real estate agents and the owners of retail outlets tend to salivate at the thought of a queer invasion, long-standing West Toronto establishments might have a different take on a gay village springing up around, so far the haven't complained.
Surprisingly the village is slowing coming together. Toronto entertainment weeklies and daily newspapers are trying to find "what's it all about?" by calling it Queer West a row of bars College Street. Which begs the question, are bars necessary for gay village to exist? Apparently not, the new queer district in Toronto's westend is a very unique community spread out over four neighbourhoods with the heart its in Parkdale.
Nobody really planned it that way, but it's for real, said Mike Skinner, who moved to the west end two years ago with his partner John Ryan. Mike and John had a few friends over to their home for a party. "We were joking about how it's so gay out here, and somebody said, 'We should call it Queer West Village "
"It's kind of funny because I had wanted to live in an old house, and Mike wanted a new house with no maintenance," Ryan said. They settled for a old-look house with new everything. "It's kind of the best of both worlds," Skinner said. It took awhile for Ryan to spot the trend. First, he and Mike met a gay couple at a party who were moving to west end. Then they met two other gay High Park couples picking out furniture at a design store. When the contract for a house down the block fell through, they told another gay couple, who ended up buying the property.
It is certainly not a row bars. Tourists and first time visitors are impressed by how well integrated the GLBT community is into four west Toronto's neighbourhoods of The Annex (little Korea), Davenport (little Portugal), Trinity Bellwoods/Spadina (little Italy and Queen West Art District, Kensington Market-Chinatown), Parkdale (little Poland), High Park (little Ukrainia). Here there are many bars, businesses, cafes, restaurents and services catering to the gay, lesbian and hetrosexual gay friendly village without the labels.
There are an estimated 400, 000 gays and lesbians in Toronto. Queer West Village, Toronto, Ontario is great name for a new beginning, and puts us on the map of other famous gay villages in North America and around the world."We love it," Skinner said. "We really like the concept that it was going to be a community that was built around getting to know your neighbours."
About this photo: Mitzi's Café is a queer oasis in a Parkdale/High Park neighbourhood, Toronto West, Ontario, taken By MParé
With apartment rents in Toronto, Ontario going through the roof, it's time to start a new gay neighbourhood. But where should it be?
When out gay men and lesbians moved into rundown urban neighbourhoods in the late 90s and early 2000, they rented apartments no one else wanted, started businesses on blocks where no one else thought businesses could thrive, and had sex under bushes that no one else wanted to have sex under. Neighbourhoods in Toronto West slowly gentrified, with hordes of gays and lesbians making these once dicey neighbourhoods safe for art galleries, florists, card shops, bars, cafes and restaurents.
The closest most gays and lesbians ever come to finding a promised land is moving to a Gay Ghetto -- an urban neighbourhood that is populated by, and reasonably tolerates, a large number of queers. For years, Toronto's gay village was kept lively and relevant by a constant stream of young queer migrants arriving from uptown Toronto, rural Ontario, and new Canadians. And for years, young queers moving there could rely on three things: cheap apartments, low-paying retail jobs, and lots of other young queers with cheap apartments and low-paying retail jobs with whom they could swap spit and various sexually transmitted diseases.
But all that's changing. In downtown Toronto's gay village where dirt-cheap apartments and too-trendy restaurants once peacefully coexisted, rising property values are pushing rents through the roof. The social contract that kept young queer migrants pouring into the village has been ruptured; while the average Toronto apartment rented for $449 in 1990, it now goes for $884 and $1,040 for a two bedroom and a single room for $475, according to Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation. (CMHC) The Gay ghetto is slowly turning into gay retirement community, where the only queers who can afford to live in downtown Toronto are the ones who bought apartments and houses 20 years ago when they were still relatively cheap. Young, straight singles have moved on, followed by straight retirees, marrieds, and young families. Young professional queers are now forced to look elsewhere for housing. The downtown core is on the decline, sapped of its energy and sex appeal for queer youngsters.
Unfortunately, the roots that queers lay, tend to be thin and easily ripped up by the relentless tides of change. And thus the great queer migration begins. Queers set out, like herds of faaabulous reindeer, in search of the next gay village. It happened in New York, it happened in Chicago, its happening in Toronto. Young gays and lesbians priced out of established gay ghetto and are colonizing a new neighbourhood, seeking out cheap rents, live work spaces, lofts, houses and opening trendy restaurants and art galleries.
Toronto's old-guard queers tire of battling wannabes and colossal monthly rents, are abandoning the once sacred cow by the fistful. So what makes a new gay village? An abundance of factors, including accessibility, shopping, nightlife, reasonable rent, and at least one public park with foliage ample enough to conceal midnight indiscretion all determine a neighbourhood's potential as a gay ghetto. (A jerk-off club or two doesn't hurt, either.) Surprisingly, Toronto West fits almost all of these criteria. It does boast a couple of beautiful beaches, a trendy business area, and an abundance of cafes and restaurants. And there is one very large cruisy park in the western edges of the village and more than enough wooded areas to provide bush sex opportunities for the adventurous queer with some bug spray and a few survival skills.
Many gays and lesbians have already begun to call Toronto West home. First it is important to identify the number of public schools, daycare facilities, nursing homes, community centers, churches, and similar establishments that are not only of positively no use to queer people, but may even represent a tangible threat to attaining the critical mass necessary to create a truly gay ghetto.
The number of churches in Toronto West is in itself staggering But an almost equal number of tanning salons and florists heroically stand guard, proud sentinels against the presence of the Lord. Public schools also abound, indicating not only the existence of a large population of breeder types, but illegal firearms and random violence. To most peace-loving queers, weapons-toting ankle-biters are enough of a deterrent to keep them at bay -- until one realizes that the presence of public education facilities also guarantees an unending supply of affordable and easily obtainable party drugs.
But is there actually someplace to party? One of the most fundamental elements of any true gay ghetto is the presence of at least one primarily gay watering hole and/or dance spot. Toronto West has at least 60 not all located on College Street, but scattered throughout the neighbourhoods, and none with a gay bar label.
Although none are exclusively gay, the queer village in Toronto West is home to a few funky queer bars and lounges that that welcome all sexualities: The Cadillac Lounge and Mitzi's Sister on Queen Street West. Toronto West is hopping and chic business district, provides many establishments indispensable to gay life: music, book, and retail stores, hairdressers, galleries, naturopathic physicians and acupuncturists for the immune-impaired, and cafes. Throw in Chinatown's cheap haircuts for $4 bucks, a coffee shop or two, and a few artsy types, and the new gay village, in Toronto's west end, has the urban-decay chic that gays love so much.
Of course, the feelings of Toronto West's current residents cannot be overlooked in the matter. While, in general, real estate agents and the owners of retail outlets tend to salivate at the thought of a queer invasion, long-standing West Toronto establishments might have a different take on a gay village springing up around, so far the haven't complained.
Surprisingly the village is slowing coming together. Toronto entertainment weeklies and daily newspapers are trying to find "what's it all about?" by calling it Queer West a row of bars College Street. Which begs the question, are bars necessary for gay village to exist? Apparently not, the new queer district in Toronto's westend is a very unique community spread out over four neighbourhoods with the heart its in Parkdale.
Nobody really planned it that way, but it's for real, said Mike Skinner, who moved to the west end two years ago with his partner John Ryan. Mike and John had a few friends over to their home for a party. "We were joking about how it's so gay out here, and somebody said, 'We should call it Queer West Village "
"It's kind of funny because I had wanted to live in an old house, and Mike wanted a new house with no maintenance," Ryan said. They settled for a old-look house with new everything. "It's kind of the best of both worlds," Skinner said. It took awhile for Ryan to spot the trend. First, he and Mike met a gay couple at a party who were moving to west end. Then they met two other gay High Park couples picking out furniture at a design store. When the contract for a house down the block fell through, they told another gay couple, who ended up buying the property.
It is certainly not a row bars. Tourists and first time visitors are impressed by how well integrated the GLBT community is into four west Toronto's neighbourhoods of The Annex (little Korea), Davenport (little Portugal), Trinity Bellwoods/Spadina (little Italy and Queen West Art District, Kensington Market-Chinatown), Parkdale (little Poland), High Park (little Ukrainia). Here there are many bars, businesses, cafes, restaurents and services catering to the gay, lesbian and hetrosexual gay friendly village without the labels.
There are an estimated 400, 000 gays and lesbians in Toronto. Queer West Village, Toronto, Ontario is great name for a new beginning, and puts us on the map of other famous gay villages in North America and around the world."We love it," Skinner said. "We really like the concept that it was going to be a community that was built around getting to know your neighbours."
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