The South Bayview Bulldog

The Rexall Pharma Plus store at 732 Mt. Pleasant Rd. has closed for good. Customers are being told that their records are over at the Rexall Pharma Plus at 2300 Yonge Street between Eglinton Ave. and Roehampton Ave. Bulldog readers say the scuttlebutt in the Sobey’s next door in the Briton House building is that a Dollarama is set to open in the large storefront. Rexall employees are said to have been offered jobs at the new discount store. The closure of the pharmacy speaks of a strategic defeat for Rexall, which grabbed the site when Shoppers Drug moved across Mt. Pleasant to new premises a few years ago. It also makes one think about the proximity of two Dollarama stores — Bayview and Mt. Pleasant. They aren’t like Starbucks with one on every corner. Rexall Pharma Plus was sold last March to McKesson Corp. of the U.S. for $3 billion by Daryl Katz, owner of the Edmonton Oilers. Rexall Pharma Plus sold to U.S. health-care firm McKesson

This is nothing more nor less than a zillion of the lovable rubber traffic cones lining the extension from Moore to south of the Brickworks apparently in anticipation of re-surfacing work.

https://twitter.com/tpscalls/status/772432788964446208

Mother Teresa, the revered nun known for her work with the destitute in India, has been elevated to sainthood by Pope Francis. Amid tight security, tens of thousands of pilgrims attended Sunday morning’s canonisation mass in St. Peter’s Square in Rome. During the service, the head of the Catholic church paid tribute to Teresa, declaring her a model of mercy.  Euronews

Saturday’s budget of news beyond South Bayview contains an arresting tale of a Mexican teen who suffered a fatal stroke from a hickey administered by his girlfriend.  There are also breathtaking pictures from space taken of Jupiter by the NASA Juno spacecraft. And the CBC has a yarn about the so-called E-game phenomenon, electronic gladiators with millions of fans in darkened E-bleachers. Watch the hickey video.

The sprawling parking lot of RioCan’s Leaside Centre on the southeast corner of Laird Drive and Eglinton Ave. E. has long been destined to become the site of yet another of the “tower cities” that are re-making Leaside and Midtown Toronto.  The development website Urban Toronto details plans to put as many as seven new buildings on the space with one residential tower soaring to a staggering 34 storeys. It easily rivals the massive development proposed by Diamond Corp. at the Dawsco Plaza on at Brentcliffe Road to the east. That four-tower development has been called by Councillor Burnside the Big Daddy of Eglinton density. It appears RioCan has the same thing in mind. Urban Toronto says the Toronto REIT proposes nearly 1,500 new residences on the corner.

DON AVON SOUTH TO VANDERHOOF

There is a retail “podium” proposed that would house. among other tenants, the Canadian Tire store and Petsmart outlet, both long time occupants of the Leaside Centre. It is officially designated 815 Eglinton East. Plans submitted to the City call for the 8.8-acre site to become its own neighborhood. A layout of streets is proposed including the extension of Don Avon Drive from Eglinton south to Vanderhoof Ave. High rise quake set to blow away Eglinton low-rise zoning

These boxes of fireworks will blow up Monday night

David Bryant has posted an open invitation to his fireworks show Monday night at about 9.15 p.m. at, we hear, the Leaside High football field (Talbot Park). Dave is asking visitors to sit on the hill not the football field in the best interest of safety. He posted the photo of the boxes above containing the fireworks — The Bulldog made some them “hotter” than normal. See you there.

Anthony Fiore

Every person who barbecues should be on the alert after a Toronto-area boy swallowed a wire bristle off of a cleaning brush. The wire became detached from the brush and was waiting on the barbecue when meat was placed on it. From there it went straight into 6-year-old Anthony Fiore’s mouth and pierced his throat. The lad has had a painful and terrifying course of treatment at the Hospital for Sick Children but has recovered. His mother is saying that wire-bristle barbecue brushes should be banned but it may be equally critical to see that grills are carefully wiped after heavy cleaning with a brush.

There was no winning ticket was sold for the $50 million jackpot in Lotto Max draw Friday night. Two MaxMillions prizes of $1 million dollars each were won in Ontario.

The link leads to an un-bylined CBC story quoting a professor and a local ethnic reporter which suggests Ontario’s hydro electric planning — using the term loosely — may have cost the Liberals their former stronghold of Scarborough Rouge-River in Thursday’s byelection. That and other pocketbook issues are seen as more important perhaps that the sex education issue. There is a genuinely nutty, upside-down quality to the economics of electricity generation on Ontario which sees consumers paying more for power even though they economize.  Meanwhile, excess generation is sold off to U.S. states for a fraction of the cost per kilowatt hour paid at home. CBC

Planning staff are advising City Council to get ready for a fight at the Ontario Municipal Board to stop a 15-storey mixed use development which would be built beside the Avenue Road LRT station. The site includes Yitz’s Deli and the nondescript shops to the west. The whole parcel is known as 346, 350, 352 and 356 Eglinton Ave. West  It is yet another example of the development earthquake triggered by the LRT. Most of Eglinton is zoned mid-rise — seven to eight storeys — more than enough sun-blocking concrete for the people of these neighborhoods. But the money to be made by going much higher threatens to bring the bylaws crashing down from the Allen Road to the Don Valley.