Friday Factoids (2006.07)

February 17, 2006 by paul
Filed under: Uncategorized

It occurred to me that I’ve not done any local factoids, so here are some about Toronto. Given it’s suddenly turned quite cold in the past couple of days, I’ll start with a couple weather-related entries:

The warmest it’s been (in Toronto, at this time of year) is +12.5°C in 1994; the coldest is -28.3°C in 1944. (Note: The current weather forecast for Toronto includes a Extreme Cold Weather Alert.)
We still have some way to go to compete with Snag, Yukon, which holds the record for the lowest recorded temperature in Canada: on February 3, 1947, it dropped to -63°C!
Lester B. Pearson International Airport (LBPIA) is located 27 km (16 miles) north-west of downtown Toronto, and has been Toronto’s main international airport since 1939 when it was first known as Malton Airport.
Situated on the northern shore of Lake Ontario (the most eastern lake of the Great Lakes system), Toronto is one of the southernmost cities in Canada (latitude 43°N [the same as northern California and the French Rivera] longitude 79°W).
Toronto is Canada’s largest city; it’s also the fifth largest city in North America (after Mexico City, New York, Los Angeles and Chicago) and 65th in the world.
The population of Canada is approximately 32.5 million; Toronto’s is 2.5 million, and the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) is 4.7 million. (Ottawa is only about 1 million.)
Toronto was created on March 6, 1834, when the settlement of York was renamed Toronto, the Mohawk word for “meeting place”.
Dominating the city skyline is the CN Tower, the world’s tallest free-standing structure, standing at 553.33m (1815’5”).
Yonge Street, the world’s longest street, starts at the foot of Toronto and runs directly through it. The 1,896km roadway ends at Rainy River, a Northern Ontario mining community.
Despite recent reports of gun violence, Toronto still enjoys a lower crime rate than most other large North American cities, making it one of the world’s safest cities.