Chris Selley: Sign a Toronto neighbourhood over to Google. Maybe our politicians will learn something

If you’ve followed Toronto politics for any length of time, if you’ve sat through the interminable, often farcical city council meetings, then you know the cynicism it can produce. You know in particular that hard data supporting or not supporting any given decision is lucky to get a look-in, never mind carry the day. And if you were in that sort of mood, Tuesday’s press conference at Corus Quay might have sent your eyes to rolling. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Premier Kathleen Wynne and Mayor John Tory were on hand to hail Sidewalk Labs’ new mixed-use development on the Toronto waterfront, in a 12-acre parcel of land at the foot of Parliament Street known as Quayside. Sidewalk, a Google subsidiary, thinks it can use new technology and great reams of data to create a neighbourhood that demonstrates innovative solutions to problems from which successful cities like Toronto suffer — congestion, unaffordable housing, woefully inadequate public transit. (Google announced Tuesday it will move its Toronto headquarters to Quayside to “anchor” the area.) And there is no better place to demonstrate all this than Toronto, apparently. -- More...