Scarborough is like the guy/gal that was overlooked in High School, maybe they dressed a little odd, had a slight chip on their shoulder and occasionally got in trouble at school. Then you run into them 15 years later and they have a great job, finally learned to dress properly and you notice they have a great sense of humour. You kick yourself for not seeing this all 15 years ago.
That is Scarborough. A bad reputation followed it for years.
In 2008, Toronto’s unofficial uncle, Norm Kelly blasted the media for creating a panic in the way it was reporting crime. He noticed a media standard of biased reporting on crime; when any crime is committed in T.O., the news tends to say what intersection the crime occurred. When a crime is committed in Scarborough, regardless of the location, the media tends to say “Scarborough”. There is a lot of space between Victoria Park & Danforth and Port Union & Lawrence, and most of it is pretty great.
It is important to note that 23% of the 2.65 million people in Toronto reside in Scarborough.
So yeah, a quarter of Toronto are citizens of Scarborough. Scarborough seems to have gotten the shaft in the PR campaign of cool neighbourhoods in Toronto.
After a decade of renting downtown, I knew I would buy a house in my “hometown”. After years of studying urban development, I was calling southwest Scarborough (Cliffside, Birch Cliff, Oakridge) the “Brooklyn of Toronto”. I wanted to get in before anyone realized this. Why?
Scarborough is one of the most culturally diverse places in the world. Growing up in East Scarborough ensured I was well-versed in other cultures and ate a lot of great food. No bog deal but economist and foodie Tyler Cowen called us the “best ethnic food suburb I have seen in my life” so yeah, we eat well in the East.
Transit can be a bit tragic if you are super East, but even that is a temporary problem for the ‘burb. I am a big fan of public transit, and don’t drive, so I just narrowed my search to near Vic. Park station. So this Scarberian is walking distance of a subway. Green spaces are valued in Toronto, and Scarborough has a lot of them. We have the Don Valley and the Rouge Valley running through, as well as countless parks, ravines and creeks.
Yep, food, culture and nature. It sure does suck here…