Renovating Union Station

Union Station is sad, dismal, delapitated, shabby place. Another testament to our city's utter lack of ambition and creativity. It's just pathetic.

Why can't Union Station be a hub for fine restaurants, fresh food and architectural treasures like Grand Central?

Here's some info from the Grand Central website:
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The heavens above, the hustle below. That?s the experience you will have at the three Grand Central balcony restaurants and lounges, Cipriani Dolci, Charlie Palmer?s M?trazur, and Michael Jordan?s The Steak House N.Y.C. For a walk back in time, dine in the world famous Oyster Bar & Restaurant, located on the lower level, which opened the same year as the Terminal itself.

And be sure to discover one of the Terminal?s great treasures, The Campbell Apartment. Once the 1920?s era office of businessman John W. Campbell and designed as a hall of a 13th-century Florentine palace, this elegant room is now an outstanding cocktail lounge.

The Dining Concourse, on the lower level of Grand Central, is a cornucopia of food choices. Three sit down restaurants, Junior?s, the famous Brooklyn establishment known for their outrageous cheesecakes, Z?calo, a Mexican favorite of New Yorkers and Two Boots, the most incredible pizza, are among twenty eateries to be found there. Indian to Mediterranean cuisine, hot dogs to pasta, pizza to panini, the Dining Concourse has food for every taste. And you can enjoy that food in the unique ?dining car? seating areas, which are reminiscent of train cars of yesteryear.

The Grand Central Market is New York?s most exciting gourmet European-style food hall. This culinary treat located on the east end of the Terminal is not to be missed. The vibrant colors of fresh fruits and vegetables intertwine with delights from the ocean, the smells of roasted coffee beans and freshly baked goods, and the finest cuts of prime meat, exotic cheese and chocolate confections.

Grand Central is one of the most gorgeous, visually stunning, exciting stations in the world. This is a place you want to linger in and admire for its sheer beauty and energy.

Union Station is neglected, dull, and uninspiring place that just serves a function. Getting people from A to B.

The difference is that New York aspires to greatness, excellence and beauty, while Toronto aspires to the bland, the ugly and the mediocre.

There needs to be major public pressure and a call for dramatic action from the public and journalists if we are to have any hope for greatness in this mediocre, dull city.

People are too opinionated in Toronto. Paint the wall red and people complain that it should have been painted blue. Paint it blue and people complain that it should be painted yellow. Don't paint it at all and people complain that nothing is being done in the paint situation. So the result? Everything gets a fresh coat of plain, off-white paint.

Creativity and funding do not matter when all people do is bitch and complain when so called dramatic action is taken.

Well, I'm complaining too. Most of our city is incredibly ugly, uninspiring, mediocre and neglected. But we need to stop complaining and start taking action to raise standards. Journalists need to help. The public needs to be outraged. This is unacceptable!!

While other cities are putting great energy into making themselves beautiful, we seem incapable of doing so. We are complacent and content with our state of incompetance and mediocrity. This has got to be one of the ugliest, most uninspiring cities of its size anywhere.

Union Station should be a spectacular gem, a vibrant, dynamic, inspiring, beautiful place -- not a tired, old, crappy, badly-lit, poorly-maintained train station!!

When I went to New York City I was surprised and impressed that such a big city could be so clean, harbour such nice people (who are friendly to visitors) and have so much culture.
Toronto always TALKS about its culture and the friendliness of its citizens. But the truth is Toronto is none of those things. The streets of Toronto are so much dirtier than those in New York. After a week in New York City, not one person was rude. In fact they looked you in the eye when they spoke to you. Within half an hour of being back in Toronto, a woman told us rudely to move our suitcases and get out of her way. She didn't know if we were residents or tourists and she didn't care. Toronto these days is not friendly or great. The people just don't care. They're completely ambivelant.

People in Toronto don't care what kind of impression they give off to visitors. That's why places like Union Station are neglected and why the island has nothing on it and why the waterfront is ignored.

And people in this city do whine too much. But we need politicans with great vision to stand up to them, encourage development, bring in jobs and general enjoyment to this city.

I see I don't have to be my usual lonely voice of opposition on this one -- the word has gotten out that Union station is an underutilized dump that reflects poorly on the ambitions and class of its city. The sad thing is that while Toronto has been looking up to NYC for a while, and gotten comfortable about it, many other cities are now kicking T.O. to the curb when it comes to grand old public spaces. Try the Ferry Building in SF, Union Station in Denver, Union Station in DC, Union Station in LA, 30th St Station in Philly, South Station in Boston -- all are a class above Toronto in terms of the quality of the retail and the historic preservation detail. Like the streetcar system, or the commercial streetscapes, or the entire waterfront, it's great that Union Station is still there waiting to be fixed up and restored to glory, but after a while the potential turns to stagnation and sorrow. Poor Toronto.

Why is Toronto such a city of underachievers? Our city ranges from places that are unbearably ugly and neglected to places which are pretty good. But pretty good is not good enough when even tiny eastern European cities without much money are making enourmous efforts to create beautiful cities!! Why is shabby and third rate good enough for us???

Toronto is the economic capital of Canada. We have the money to do great things. We have smart, ambitious, worldly people living in this city. So WHY can we not get past mediocrity?? Why are we incapable of raising the bar higher?

Ugh. This city never fails to disappoint.

I don't think people in Toronto are aware of how beautiful other cities are. Beauty is not much of a priority here.

It's sad. Very sad.

Why don't the people in charge of Union Station aproach one of Toronto's sexy star chefs like Jamie Kennedy or Susur Lee to open an elegant, stylish restaurant in the station to match Campbell Restaurant or Cipriani's New York's Grand Central Station.

That way the first impression visitors would have upon arriving at Union station is that this city has class, style and fantastic culinary arts. Union Station would also become a hot spot for Torontonians working and living downtown to hang out at during lunch or after work.

It's not hard to do this. It just takes someone in charge of Union Station to actually have a good idea and to act on it. Someone at Union Station would have to approach these chefs with a business plan!

But I fear that the yahoos in charge of this renovation are going to put in the tackiest of the tacky fast food restaurants or implement other cheap, pathetic ideas. Why don't we sent a petition to the people in charge to raise the bar and think of elegant, creative, dynamic ideas. I agree that the public needs to take charge and start demanding excellence for our city.

Haven't we lived with crappy mediocrity for long enough?

I believe Toronto does need someone with a vision, like you said Mark. Toronto needs to have some of its own intelligent and wealthy citizens stand up and say that they are not going to take this anymore. We need people with influence and ability and resources to spend their resources, intelligence, and time bettering Toronto.

If you want a good example how Toronto's own citizens are the root of this problem, take a look at the St. Clair streetcar right of way. For years and years, everyone keeps telling the city, we need more streetcar right of ways. We need to focus on transit! So the city/ttc invested a hell of a lot of money into transforming St. Clair into a transit corridor. The plans were made and everything was ready to get under way. Then Toronto's own citizens start bitching about the street car right of way and the plan falls through, costing the city/ttc a hell of a lot of money.

This happens a lot in Toronto, and in Canada in general. Usually the argument comes from one group claiming it's a waste of 'their' taxpayer money. The next time it's another group claiming it's a waste of 'their' taxpayer money. Invest in highways and transit riders claim its a waste of their taxpayer money. Invest in transit and drivers claim its a waste of their taxpayer money.

People need to stop being so selfish. Not everything is going to benefit them all of the time. They need to accept that sometimes things need to be done that will only benefit other people than themselves. And instead of bitching and complaining they can just be happy that another group is getting something they so badly need and take comfort that soon it will be their turn.

Union Station isn't exactly like Grand Central Station, boo hoo hoo. Why can't Toronto be a different city, instead of itself? Waaaah. Let's aspire to be New York.

Let's just aspire to something greater than mediocrity.

Union Station could and should be spectacular. We shouldn't settle for crappy, mediocrity and use it as an excuse for "Toronto being itself."

Please!!