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Once celebrated as the city that works, Toronto is a city on the brink.
Featuring: Ilana Altman, Zahra Ebrahim, Anne Golden, Tim Gray, Ken Greenberg, Franz Hartmann, Josh Matlow, Matti Siemiatycki, Enid Slack, Bianca Wylie.
Strained by urban sprawl, crumbling infrastructure, and chronic under-funding, Canada's largest city is coming apart at the seams. Its promise — of livability, opportunity, and innovation — is being undermined by years of inaction and political gridlock.
But all is not lost.
In Saving Toronto, ten leading city builders set out a bold, practical roadmap to turn things around. In their essays, they highlight the city's problems in governance, finances, housing, transport, environment, technology, infrastructure, social cohesion, and public space and offer coordinated responses.
This is a wake-up call — Toronto's future can still be saved.
Featuring: Ilana Altman, Zahra Ebrahim, Anne Golden, Tim Gray, Ken Greenberg, Franz Hartmann, Josh Matlow, Matti Siemiatycki, Enid Slack, Bianca Wylie.
Strained by urban sprawl, crumbling infrastructure, and chronic under-funding, Canada's largest city is coming apart at the seams. Its promise — of livability, opportunity, and innovation — is being undermined by years of inaction and political gridlock.
But all is not lost.
In Saving Toronto, ten leading city builders set out a bold, practical roadmap to turn things around. In their essays, they highlight the city's problems in governance, finances, housing, transport, environment, technology, infrastructure, social cohesion, and public space and offer coordinated responses.
This is a wake-up call — Toronto's future can still be saved.
Price: $21.99
Pages: 232
Publisher: Dundurn Press
Imprint: Dundurn Press
Publication Date:
05 May 2026
Trim Size: 9.00 X 6.00 in
ISBN: 9781459756823
Format: Paperback
BISACs:
POLITICAL SCIENCE / Public Policy / City Planning & Urban Development, Urban and municipal planning and policy, ARCHITECTURE / Urban & Land Use Planning, POLITICAL SCIENCE / Public Policy / Environmental Policy
An eloquent roadmap and agenda for shaping Toronto.
Offers an astounding amount of accumulated wisdom that – if political stars align – could ensure a brighter future for the city.
The beauty of Saving Toronto is that it weaves multiple strands of progressive urbanism together. While there’s no shortage of books about affordable housing, urban transportation, technology or governance, Saving Toronto brings all of these issues — and more — into one package. The book reveals the interdependence of these issues, declaring that “everything is connected to everything else”. Saving Toronto is a valuable and comprehensive primer on the major challenges Toronto is facing, as well as the solutions.
The many good ideas proposed in Saving Toronto are rational, straightforward, and affordable. They will make Toronto flourish and should be championed by political leaders at all levels of government.
Saving Toronto should be read by anyone interested in Canadian cities and the well-being of their residents.
Saving Toronto has re-energized me, quickened my step and brightened my outlook. Greenberg and Golden, two visionary city-builders, have assembled a chorus of voices that inspire passion, purpose and optimism about the future of our city. As soloists, each one dives into specific urban challenges, while offering practical roadmap opportunities that will enhance our quality of life. As an ensemble, the group reinforces the importance of cities to the future of human connectivity, and through engagement and activism, to the future of our planet.
In so many ways, Toronto is the hub of the Canadian wheel, through which people, ideas, and resources travel. Some stay, lots go: it’s a city in perpetual motion. It’s not — despite its critics who accuse it of thinking so — the centre of the universe. But it is the country’s urban crucible, always facing threats and challenges, challenged to tackle them at the neighbourhood, city and regional scale. Greenberg and Golden are old hands at Toronto urbanism, and in this volume they’ve corralled important voices to add to their chorus that the uniqueness of Toronto be set free from provincial impingement and fiduciary dependency, to — the reader hopes — a renewed reign as Toronto the great!
Does Toronto need saving? It’s easy to believe that this bustling, thriving, and unique city is immune to deep-rooted problems we see around the globe, but Saving Toronto makes clear that we are at a critical moment. Ken Greenberg and Anne Golden have assembled a formidable group of urban thinkers who care deeply about the city’s future and offer a compelling path forward. From transportation plans to housing policies, from new governance ideas to emerging technologies, this book delivers a clear-eyed diagnosis of Toronto’s most pressing challenges, along with practical remedies that politicians, civic leaders, and residents alike can put to use.
Offers an astounding amount of accumulated wisdom that – if political stars align – could ensure a brighter future for the city.
The beauty of Saving Toronto is that it weaves multiple strands of progressive urbanism together. While there’s no shortage of books about affordable housing, urban transportation, technology or governance, Saving Toronto brings all of these issues — and more — into one package. The book reveals the interdependence of these issues, declaring that “everything is connected to everything else”. Saving Toronto is a valuable and comprehensive primer on the major challenges Toronto is facing, as well as the solutions.
The many good ideas proposed in Saving Toronto are rational, straightforward, and affordable. They will make Toronto flourish and should be championed by political leaders at all levels of government.
Saving Toronto should be read by anyone interested in Canadian cities and the well-being of their residents.
Saving Toronto has re-energized me, quickened my step and brightened my outlook. Greenberg and Golden, two visionary city-builders, have assembled a chorus of voices that inspire passion, purpose and optimism about the future of our city. As soloists, each one dives into specific urban challenges, while offering practical roadmap opportunities that will enhance our quality of life. As an ensemble, the group reinforces the importance of cities to the future of human connectivity, and through engagement and activism, to the future of our planet.
In so many ways, Toronto is the hub of the Canadian wheel, through which people, ideas, and resources travel. Some stay, lots go: it’s a city in perpetual motion. It’s not — despite its critics who accuse it of thinking so — the centre of the universe. But it is the country’s urban crucible, always facing threats and challenges, challenged to tackle them at the neighbourhood, city and regional scale. Greenberg and Golden are old hands at Toronto urbanism, and in this volume they’ve corralled important voices to add to their chorus that the uniqueness of Toronto be set free from provincial impingement and fiduciary dependency, to — the reader hopes — a renewed reign as Toronto the great!
Does Toronto need saving? It’s easy to believe that this bustling, thriving, and unique city is immune to deep-rooted problems we see around the globe, but Saving Toronto makes clear that we are at a critical moment. Ken Greenberg and Anne Golden have assembled a formidable group of urban thinkers who care deeply about the city’s future and offer a compelling path forward. From transportation plans to housing policies, from new governance ideas to emerging technologies, this book delivers a clear-eyed diagnosis of Toronto’s most pressing challenges, along with practical remedies that politicians, civic leaders, and residents alike can put to use.
Ken Greenberg, C.M., is an urban designer, writer, and former director of Urban Design and Architecture for the City of Toronto. A recipient of an honorary Doctor of Laws from the University of Toronto, he is the author of Walking Home, Toronto Reborn, and Exploring Toronto.
Anne Golden, C.M. and O. Ont., is past president of the United Way of Greater Toronto and the Conference Board of Canada. She gained national recognition as a policy expert for her reports on homelessness, the future of Greater Toronto, and transit investment.
Anne Golden, C.M. and O. Ont., is past president of the United Way of Greater Toronto and the Conference Board of Canada. She gained national recognition as a policy expert for her reports on homelessness, the future of Greater Toronto, and transit investment.
- Preface: Why This Book?
- What We're Up Against
- Making Local Government Work
- Finding the Money
- Fixing the Housing Crisis
- Unclogging the City
- Protecting Our Shared Ecosystem
- Challenging Technology
- Building Solidarity
- Unlocking the Public Realm
- Conclusion: A Call to Action