I don't mean to brag, but I live in a pretty sweet neighbourhood. I'm right between Yorkville and the Annex, just off Bloor St. West. The generations-old homes are beautiful, the park down the street is clean and bright (and there's a water fountain, +50 points), the community consists of mainly college students and families, and I'm just a short walk from dozens of shops, restaurants, and - wait a minute.

What happened to that cute little pita place on the corner? Why can't I go and buy incence or some other meaningless crap I don't necessarily need but still very much enjoy? What are these giant barriers? They say, "ONE BEDFORD AT BLOOR", and there's a picture of...

Oh, no...no, it can't be.

THEY'RE BUILDING ANOTHER CONDO?!?!!!!!

*cue horror music*

Yes, you read that correctly. Much to my horror, and I doubt I'm alone in this one, Lanterra Developments and MCE Developments decided it would be a good idea to toss up yet another sky-high human stacker right at the end of my happy little street.

According to onebedford.com, one of the most pretentious overuses of flash I've seen in a while, along with pleasant victorian music playing through my speakers, here are a few brief stats regarding what we have to look forward to come June 2009:

A 32-storey, 262-unit building with a limestone exterior on the first eight floors and precast concrete and glass exterior on the upper floors.

Prices: from $582,900 for 777 sq. ft. to over $2.5 million for a penthouse with about 2,600 sq. ft.

Fees: 48 cents per sq. ft., plus hydro.

Sure sounds pretty. Maybe they should edit that a tad and write in "By the way, this building is going to block out the sun for like a mile around it, so sucks to be those guys on the ground. Tee hee." So much for enjoying a nice sunny afternoon on the patio at

The Duke Of York, now you'll be subjected to staring into some woman's window while she does Pilates with her purse-ready Chihuahua in matching outfits.

I won't lie, I'm a bit of a night owl and I'm rarely outside experiencing this "day star" everyone keeps talking about. But when I go outside for a nice walk, I'm not going to be pleased when half the street is shadowed by some huge "precast concrete and glass" cash grab.

Don't even get me started on the waterfront. I was down there for the Fan Expo, and you can barely see the lake anymore through all the building construction. One of my favourite things about driving to the city when I was younger was looking at the lake as we went along the Gardiner. Now, it's just high-rise after high-rise with no signs of letting up. I wonder what it's going to be like driving along the waterfront with a million windows reflecting the sun and water into your eyes. So much for enjoying the view, have fun simply trying to see.

I guess you can tell by now I'm not into this whole condo thing. I grew up with a huge backyard, and I want my children, if I have them, to be able to do the same. I don't want to have to move an hour out of the city just to experience a bit of open land. There's always High Park, but with a city as large as ours, you'd think we'd have a bit more options.

In a few years, you'll be able to identify Toronto from space - just look for the hundreds of squares with little trees and swimming pools in the middle.

I left the condo's website open on another tab. I'm going to have that damn music in my head all day now. Ugh.

Photos by seekdes via Flickr and Roger Cullman.