As a devoted pedestrian, it's always nice to come across walk-friendly ideas.

Just in time for the current four-day Walk21 Conference (tag line: "Putting Pedestrians First"), a report produced by the Public Works and Infrastructure Committee will get some discussion time (and be discussed by City Council). The proposals in the report describes a bunch of relatively easy-to-implement ideas that are supposed to make walking, biking or TTC-ing more doable.

The report talks about widening sidewalks, doing an environmental assessment on that proposed east-west bike lane across the city and increasing the length of time pedestrians can walk across busy intersections.

One of the coolest proposals (well, cool if you get excited about subjects like traffic flows and terms like "traffic calming" like I do) is using the "Pedestrian Scramble" (the above pic of the Shibuya crossing in Japan is probably the most famous "scramble" of all). The idea is pretty simple - keep all traffic lights red for a bit in a busy intersection. With all vehicles stopped, pedestrians are free to cross on all sides and can even walk diagonally across. The scramble phase of the intersection, sometimes referred to as the Barnes Dance (for reasons that Wikipedia is best used to explain), has been proposed for a trial run at two hugely busy intersections - Bay and Bloor and Yonge and Bloor.

The area surrounding the Jane and Finch intersection frequently gets pointed out as an example of a violent, crime-ridden neighbourhood in Toronto. In an effort to help change that image, community leaders in the area have decided to re-brand the area as University Heights.

Actually, Jane and Finch already sits on the western edge of an area called York University Heights, a section of North York that includes York University. While York U is close by, it's not usually associated with the infamous intersection that sits in the largest concentration of criminal gangs in Canada.

To start the re-branding, a Tour de University Heights bike road race has been scheduled for today. The event, announced as Toronto's first official road race in 20 years, was organized by the city, the police and Councillor Anthony Perruzza. Donors like Canadian Tire have given 110 bikes and helmets to kids in the area for the
event.

The 401 highway from Toronto to Montreal and back has been given the Google Maps mash-up treatment (because we can never have too many maps).

Unless you only have love for Toronto, or you like to fly everywhere, you've probably taken the 401 to Montreal and back more than once. And judging by the number of Montrealers who live here (like me), you've probably dragged a U-Haul on the busy highway route before.

I've taken the route at least 50 times and it usually works the same way - grab a double-double, drive past that giant apple, hit Kingston for some fast food, enter Montreal and shout "je suis here".

Now, you can make that trip slightly more interesting. One mash-up will get you service centre information (great for knowing if you're going to hit McDonald's or Wendy's and you'll also get some comments on how busy certain stations are and what stops have a drive-through). If you have a bit more time, you can check out 401 tourist attractions on another map (so you can actually stop at that massive apple or take care of some gambling needs).

I'm no sushi snob - if the sushi/sashimi craving hits, I'll be feasting at an all-you-can sushi place and leave two hours later, fully satiated and ten pounds heavier.

But on occasion, despite student loans and an over-priced coffee addiction, I'll forget the bills, put on a decent shirt, and decide to spend a little more money to experience some innovative, inspired, mouth-watering cuisine - why else do I live in a big city?

Of course, spending big money on a new dinning experience is always a gamble - the food could suck, the service could leave you feeling cold and the bill could force you into bankruptcy.

Read the full review for Blowfish in our restaurants section.

We at blogTO obviously love a great Google Maps Mashup, so here's another mapping tool to distract you from your hard working Friday.

Walk Score, a nifty little site that helps explain why you live in Toronto and not L.A., will rate a street address based on its walk-ability level. My place, near Bathurst and Queen, gets a score of 71 out of 100 (compared to 31 for parts of car-happy Mississauga).

The site uses an algorithm to determine the walk-ability score of a specific address. The easier it is to walk to stores, parks, schools and restaurants, the higher the score. The ratings can be a suburban "Driving Only" (0-25 out of 100) all the way up to a "Walkers' Paradise" (90-100 out of 100).

As mentioned in Tuesday's Morning Brew, an International study by Reader's Digest found Toronto in second place for honesty.

The not-so-scientific but still sort-of interesting test worked like this: A brand new, totally usable phone is left and watched from a distance. Once picked up, those crazy Reader's Digest reporters give the cell a ring and see if the city dweller would pick up the phone and return it to the calling tester who claimed they lost it. The more phones that got returned, the more honest the city was deemed.

As I expected, we're pretty honest. Torontonians returned 28 out of 30 phones found, getting us second place out of populated cities in 28 countries. We lost out to the capital city of Slovenia, Ljubljana - they returned all but one phone to get first place.