Cheeseworth Cleaners and Ritewash Laundromat

Cheeseworth Cleaners at 645 Mt. Pleasant has closed abruptly taking with it Ritewash Laundromat. Both businesses were essential to the lives of many area residents, especially when the washer or dryer broke down. Cheeseworth’s has been on the street for as long as most people can remember. The phone has been transferred to Dove Cleaners raising the question of whether the location will rise again under a new name. Curiously, the unannounced closure late last week left laundry and dry cleaning stuck inside the closed stores. A sign on the door says it can be picked up at the Dove Cleaners at 1560 Yonge St at St Clair Ave.

Bus shelter at Bayview and Millwood

Apparent weekend vandalism

The TTC bus shelter at Bayview Ave and Millwood Rd has been vandalized. A person or persons smashed a glass wall. The time of the attack is not known precisely but the damage was discovered Sunday.

Toronto Police have issued an alert on a suspicious incident in which a man approached a young person near Donlands Avenue and Milverton Boulevard on Thursday. They say he asked personal questions and requested to take photographs of the young person. No age or gender is given for the potential victim. He/she “managed to get away without harm”.  The suspect is described as male, Asian, 5’6”. He was last seen wearing a black winter jacket and black pants.

Emergency Preparedness Minister and former Toronto Police Chief Bill Blair has laid the ongoing trucker occupation of downtown Ottawa squarely at the feet of the Ottawa Police. “[Police] now have new authorities and I think very effective tools,” Blair told the CBC’s Rosemary Barton on Sunday. “We just need the police to do their jobs and enforce and uphold the law, and to restore public safety in Ottawa.”

Happy lady directs traffic at Southvale and Hanna/Bulldog

Sweet and fat Sumo oranges made it through blockade/Bulldog

Toronto Star is worried/Bulldog

Shell of the Durant Building on Laird/Bulldog

Houses finally built on Rumsey/Bulldog

This good-natured lady was part of the snow clearing crew on Southvale Drive Saturday. She directed traffic away from heavy equipment blasting out those rock-hard piles of ice. Upper right we see some expensive but so sweet Sumo oranges at Longo’s. They made it through the blockade and arrived from California overnight. Sumos have a very short season. Below that is Sunday’s scary Toronto Star headline. Each to his own. At the bottom are shots of the historic Durant Building looking shell-like under redevelopment and four new homes under construction on Rumsey Rd. The lots have been sitting there since 2018.

The CBC is reporting Sunday that police have towed away all the trucks blocking the Ambassador Bridge and that only a handful of protesters remain at mid-morning. CBC

Toronto police are reported to have closed off traffic on streets in a large rectangle stretching from Church to Spadina and Dupont to Queen in response to concerns about further truck blockages. They have also narrowed the Don Valley Parkway to slow possible convoys. As well, the parkway south at Richmond St and Gardiner Expressway at Park Lawn Road are reported closed.

Big rigs gone but uncertainty at Windsor-Detroit

CBC reporter Thomas Daigle is reporting that police attempting to clear the Ambassador Bridge at the Windsor-Detroit crossing have not yet done so and his information leaves it unclear as to their strategy. Other CBC reporting says: “All the big rigs cleared out Saturday morning, with many laying on their horns as they left”.

6 hours after police moved in to clear the Ambassador Bridge blockade, 200 protesters are staying put. Officers are allowing them to come and go as they wish. pic.twitter.com/p25f0Zs49H

— Thomas Daigle (@thomasdaigle) February 12, 2022

Massed police from several departments are said to be moving in on truckers blocking the Ambassador Bridge at the Windsor-Detroit crossing. These reports were filed about noon Saturday by Global News and WXYZ News in Detroit.

Belsize (later Regent) Theatre/Toronto archives

The Regent Theatre at 551 Mt Pleasant Rd. has been sold to Terra Bruce Productions for a reported $7,400,000. The old theatre was built as the Belsize in 1927 and is now set for “design and development” by Terra Bruce according to Alex Vaccari, vice president of Colonial House Capital Ltd. The two firms are at 17 Prince Arthur Ave. Mr. Vaccari said “we passionately believe that breathing new life into this historic space will be of huge benefit to our City, and to the arts community more generally. While it will be an enormous investment of time and resources to bring this beautiful building back to its former glory, it is certainly a project that we are all excited to undertake”. Terra Bruce is called the “creative force and employment generator for the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador” and is responsible for the musical No Change in the Weather which played at the CAA Theatre at 651 Yonge St late last year.

Toronto’s police chief reiterated Friday that he will ‘not tolerate’ encampments or vehicles being used to block roadways during a possible convoy demonstration downtown this weekend but will “facilitate peaceful protest” as much as possible

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Friday that police and all levels of government are preparing to take action against the demonstrators behind the blockades in Ottawa, Windsor and elsewhere.