Toronto loses local flavour as bars, restaurants close
Canada lost 400,000 jobs in accommodation, food services since virus hit
They came from around the world and brought their cuisines with them, cultures mingling to give Toronto its distinctive flavour.
Others brought the party, turning up the volume and letting the liquor flow, providing phosphorescent, rollicking refuge for anyone who danced to their own rhythm.
Even as the city calcified into a Brutalist concrete streetscape, these restaurants, bars and nightclubs scraped by on slim margins in the face of rising rents and the creep of commercial development.
Then came COVID-19. As dining rooms and dance floors were emptied, many establishments had no choice but to permanently shut down, and businesses run by and for members of immigrant, racialized and queer communities seem to be among the hardest hit.
“Restaurants and bars … are the places where commerce happens, but also where a community is formed,” said Matti Siemiatycki, an associate professor of geography and planning at the University of Toronto. “These are safe spaces where people can come together and feel comfortable and safe amongst their own group. And then over time … people outside the community come and learn about (other) cultures.”
Between June 14 and 20, the number of people working in the accommodation and food services sector was down by one-third compared to February, according to Statistics Canada, amounting to roughly 400,000 job losses since the outbreak hit.
This financial fallout could have a ripple effect in cities like Toronto, which touts its eclectic food and drink scene as a key economic driver, Siemiatycki said. Over the course of generations, newcomers and outsiders have turned Toronto into a patchwork of cultural neighbourhoods — Greektown, Chinatown, Little Jamaica and many more — and the city prides itself on this diversity, he added.
But in recent years, many independent eateries and bars have been priced out of the neighbourhoods they helped invigorate, he said. The pandemic appears to have accelerated the disappearance of these communal spaces, putting Toronto at risk of losing its kaleidoscopic vibrancy.
“A Toronto without its restaurants, its bars, its cultural hubs, its venues, will be a duller, worse-off city.”
The Wexford Restaurant in Scarborough is saying goodbye to its regulars after more than 60 years of slinging bacon and eggs, fresh-squeezed orange juice and piping hot coffee.
Since his father and uncle founded the diner in 1958, George Kiriakou said the Greek immigrants saw their menu grow alongside the multicultural community.
The restaurateurs sponsored local sports teams, high school scholarships and a street festival, Kiriakou said. The Wexford has attracted many prominent patrons over the decades, including local politicians, prime ministers and athletes, and once hosted the Stanley Cup.
The family may have kept the grill going for a bit longer, but Kiriakou said he didn’t want to see his nearly 80-year-old father behind the counter given the risks of the coronavirus.
Chef and activist Suzanne Barr feels the forces of commercial greed and systemic inequality conspired to prevent her from fully realizing her vision for True True Diner.
Since opening last September, the spot near St. Lawrence Market served up soul food fusing her Afro-Caribbean roots with flavours from the American South. The walls were decorated with photos of the U.S. civil-rights movement as a tribute to the historic role diners have played as hubs for social change.
Barr said she set out to ensure True True Diner lived up to that legacy, working with community organizations to empower and employ Black people, Indigenous people and people of colour, newcomers and people with disabilities.
After COVID-19 forced the restaurant to shut its doors, Barr said she and her husband proposed ways the business could pivot, including initiatives to feed people in need.
But their business partners weren’t on board, she said, and True True Diner was shut down. The partners did not return requests for comment.