A smarter neighbourhood? A postscript on Sidewalk Toronto

Abstract

With Sidewalk Toronto's Quayside project, Toronto joined other cities where smart city projects have been conceived, initiated, and studied. For nearly two and a half years, newspaper space devoted to this project was central to public reception, perception, and response. With regard to The Globe and Mail and the Toronto Star, there was a conjunction between journalism discourse and planning a ‘smart’ neighbourhood assemblage based on the dual production of urban space. At the core of the Quayside project story was the question of big tech power and the ‘right’ novel neighbourhood assemblage for Toronto. I argue that mediatized controversy played a double role by expressing a propose-and-public pushback dynamic and as curriculum for place-based urban learning.