The city of Toronto launched a new night lighting initiative, highlighting heritage and historic buildings in and around the St. Lawrence Market neighbourhood Friday night.

Perhaps a little overshadowed by Toronto winning the bid for the 2015 Pan American Games, this celebration was somewhat subdued. That didn't stop about 100 of us from getting a small tour of these buildings by local historian Bruce Bell.

St. Lawrence Market, St. Lawrence Hall, the Flatiron building, St. James Cathedral and the south façades along Front Street (south of Berczy Park) now look much more majestic at night now, highlighted with theatrical LED lighting.

Photo: "AGO stairs" by septembergurl99, member of the blogTO Flickr pool.

What's happening in the GTA (and sometimes beyond):

Former Canadian Olympian, Marnie McBean summed it up nicely: "Toronto finally won something." Beating out Lima and Bogota on the first ballot, the Pan Am games will come to the city in 2015. Although the bid organizers are ecstatic about the win, public reaction has been ambivalent. As desirable as new sporting facilities and infrastructure are, many are worried about the price tag of an event that's not as prestigious as it used to be.

A Globe article featuring Amir Gissin, Jerusalem's leading PR man and Israel's consul-general for Toronto, explores his project to "rebrand" Israel abroad by using Toronto as a testing ground for the international community at large. Citing the city's overall size, its large Jewish and Muslim communities, and the fact that it's home to some of Israel's harshest critics (the article mentions the United Church and the Canadian Union of Public Employees), Gissin views it as an excellent testing ground for a PR project that aims to change the discourse that surrounds the country.

The TTC announced yesterday that it'll be limiting the number of tokens purchased at one time to 10 or less. The move is intended to prevent hoarding in the face of a possible (likely!) fare increase in the new year. Was it ever fast, though. The decision on the fare increase won't even take place until Nov. 17th. I also wonder about the effectiveness of such a strategy. If one really wanted to hoard tokens, couldn't he/she just purchase 10 over and over again on separate days? I guess they bank on people not going to the trouble of doing so.

UPDATE: Toronto has won the bid to host the Pan Am Games

By the time most of the city is leaving work today, we'll know whether Toronto has won its controversial bid for the 2015 Pan Am Games. Phoning from the Toronto bid team's headquarters in Guadalajara, Mexico, mayor David Miller is succinct about why he thinks the Toronto games would be a good thing.

"I have to look at that from the city's perspective. Sports has an important part to play, and the way these games have evolved, Toronto will get the benefit of hosting them. We'll have our name known around the Americas, we'll build very strong bonds between Latin America and Toronto, which is very significant with immigration from South America."

Yesterday's "Drop Fees" rally saw hundreds of university students join their peers in separate feeder marches in front of University of Toronto's Convocation Hall. The group of about a thousand then made its way to Queen's Park in order to protest on its front lawn.

Organized by the Canadian Federation of Students Ontario, this year's iteration of the province-wide campaign stressed the need for the government to lower tuition fees and provide affordable education on account of the fact that high tuition fees contribute to poverty in Ontario.

The jury's still out, however, on whether this was the most effective plan of attack.

Photo: "Graffiti Artists At Work" by marty_pinker, member of the blogTO Flickr pool.

What's happening in the GTA (and sometimes beyond):

In addition to pro athletes getting vaccinated ahead of high risk groups, we're now learning that members of the board of directors at Mount Sinai Hospital also got the H1N1 shot in advance. While they claim that they made the decision before they knew that there would be a shortage of vaccine, it doesn't look good that hospital executives have little regard for what are supposed to be strict deployment guidelines. Is it fair to call this vaccination process a fiasco yet?

TTC Chair Adam Giambrone appeared on CP24's new "On the Rocket" show last night, and was interviewed by the Star before taking to the air. He hinted that the insane $126 price tag for the Metropass (proposed for January 2010 implementation) may not have his endorsement (and hopefully won't get approval!) - probably because it makes no sense and they can't spin it to make any sense. Rob Ford would rather see the 22,000 free passes for TTC employee and retiree revoked.

Will Toronto score the 2015 Pan Am Games? We'll learn later today. In the final push to convince the deciding committee members that Toronto is their best choice, we waxed them with showers of Toronto's finest poutine, smoked salmon, and chardonnay.

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Toronto is home to some pretty strange houses and front lawns. And living around Dupont and Christie, I've had a chance to take a look at quite a number of them, clustered as they are in this area. I've often wondered, however, where else I could find such quirky architecture and/or laugh-inducing landscaping. Well, by combining the resource (read distraction) that is Google Street View with the recommendations of blogTO's followers on Twitter, my curiosity has been mostly satisfied. I've just taken a virtual tour of some of the weirdest properties in the city, and I thought I'd share the experience.