The bridge is still a long way off: Metrolinx won’t be able to provide another construction window until 2014, well after the bicentennial. That didn’t seem to bother Mr. Shiner.

“I don’t think any American coming up here to celebrate us beating them in the War of 1812 is really going to be upset that we don’t have a bridge to celebrate,” he said.

If there is one thing our American neighbours understand, it’s that aligning stars for poetic symbolism is sometimes more important than the act itself. They are proud to be American and they have the self-respect to believe they are worth it. I am glad that the bridge is getting built… but if the design is continually diminished, I ask myself what really is the point? People ask dumbfoundedly why aesthetics matter; isn’t simply traversing the railway lines enough? No, it isn’t, especially if the bridge connects the city to one of its last remaining historical monuments. A crappy stripped down truss bridge is not worthy of the two landmark historical victories mythologized by the fort: the invading Americans and the wrath of the Gardiner Expressway. Fort York should be recognized and respected as a critical financial and cultural amenity.

Just to wrap this up; this bridge isn’t for the traveling Americans… it is for the people who live in Toronto who are (even if it is probably a tiny spark) proud of their city.

(Source: The Globe and Mail)