{"id":345549,"date":"2021-09-28T21:22:34","date_gmt":"2021-09-28T18:22:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/what-it-will-really-take-to-rename-torontos-dundas-street\/"},"modified":"2021-09-28T21:22:34","modified_gmt":"2021-09-28T18:22:34","slug":"what-it-will-really-take-to-rename-torontos-dundas-street","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/what-it-will-really-take-to-rename-torontos-dundas-street\/","title":{"rendered":"#What it will really take to rename Toronto’s Dundas Street"},"content":{"rendered":"

“#What it will really take to rename Toronto’s Dundas Street<\/strong>”<\/p>\n

\n Toronto\u2019s iconic Dundas Street is about to get a new, more inclusive identity. But renaming a major thoroughfare that runs through the heart of Canada\u2019s largest city is no small undertaking.\n <\/div>\n
\n There are more than 730 street signs bearing the name of Dundas along the route\u2019s 23 kilometres through Toronto. In July, city council voted to replace them all when it decided to change the street\u2019s moniker, whose namesake, the 18th-century British politician Henry Dundas, notoriously delayed the abolition of the transatlantic slave trade by 15 years, dooming more than 600,000 people to another decade and a half of enslavement.<\/p>\n

There is broad support for the move; proponents say a modern metropolis should not be honouring racist, colonial figures. It\u2019s been less a controversy than a sort of city-wide history lesson.<\/p>\n

What, then, does it take to change the name of an extensive arterial road in North America\u2019s fourth-largest city? In dollar figures, up to $6.3 million. The greatest cost will likely fall upon Toronto\u2019s transit system, which has two subway stations and a streetcar route that use the name, as well as dozens of transit maps posted throughout the system; changing it all will cost an estimated $1.6 million. The material and labour to create new street signs and fixes to the Toronto 360 project\u2014pedestrian wayfinding stations sprinkled throughout the downtown core\u2014could rack up between $1.3 and $2.2 million. Dundas intersects with highways, so massive overhead signs will make up a big part of that price tag. Changes to bike-share stations and public parking signage will cost another half a million. The rebranding of Yonge-Dundas Square, Toronto\u2019s wannabe Times Square, will require $300,000.<\/p>\n

READ:\u00a0Burying Sir John A. Macdonald<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

It is, notes city manager Chris Murray, \u201cthe first major road renaming that Toronto has ever undertaken,\u201d so the city is moving with care: \u201cIt\u2019s not like a kilometre of asphalt that you might resurface.\u201d Now that Toronto city council has voted in favour of the change, there will be consultation with an advisory committee made of Black and Indigenous leaders to choose a new name. Residents will see signs replaced in 2023.<\/p>\n

For Toronto-based urban planner Keisha St. Louis-McBurnie, changing the name of a street that honours someone who worked to delay abolition is an important act. \u201cWe\u2019re at a place where what we name things after is deeply intertwined with the futures we want to give our children,\u201d says St. Louis-McBurnie, who belongs to a task force of the Ontario Professional Planners Institute that addresses anti-Black racism in planning. The project requires people to \u201con a daily basis educate themselves,\u201d so focusing on the cost is losing the big picture, she adds. \u201cThese are budgets that are balanced decade after decade. This is an investment we\u2019re making in the city.\u201d Murray echoes the sentiment: \u201cThis is a concerted effort by a modern city to understand its past, but equally important to understand its future.\u201d<\/p>\n

READ:\u00a0A statue of John A. Macdonald rests in purgatory<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Still, the changes could have significant costs for people like Antonio Carroca, owner of Dundas Print, one of around 60 companies with \u201cDundas\u201d in their names. His six-year-old custom print shop\u2014which has struggled as the pandemic drags on\u2014must undergo an expensive rebrand. He faces more than a mere signage adjustment. \u201cI want to do the right thing,\u201d says Carroca. But he relies on Google searches for many of his customers, so changing his company\u2019s name could mean months in web-search limbo, and lost sales.<\/p>\n

While it won\u2019t all be smooth sailing, St. Louis-McBurnie believes the task of renaming will be relatively easy. More difficult, she says, is getting \u201cthe city of Toronto to address zoning and land-use policies, which continue anti-Black racism.\u201d For decades, she says, the city has favoured construction of single-family homes over multi-family affordable housing, which benefit affluent and mostly white residents.<\/p>\n

Still, the project has opened the door to renaming other streets and neighbourhoods with dubious namesakes, which could have a significant combined symbolic effect. Change will not come, though, without more years of debate about history and expenses. The dropping of Dundas may be one step toward creating a more equitable home for Toronto\u2019s 2.7 million residents, but there is still a long road ahead.<\/p>\n\n

This article app<\/a>ears in print in the October 2021 issue of<\/em> Maclean\u2019s magazine with the headline, \u201cRevitalizing the road.\u201d Subscribe to the monthly print magazine here<\/a>.<\/em>
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