Map of the Week: Golf

Link to the map

---

This week, we look at spending on golf by census tract.

Within Toronto, high golf spending is centred in the high-income corridor along Yonge St., especially Rosedale and the neighbourhoods centred on the Bridle Path, and the Kingsway. In the 905, high rates are found in shoreline Oakville, Port Credit, Kleinburg and King Township.

Ten census tracts had average annual household golf spending over $1,000:

5350264	Bridle Path	$2,083
5350266	York Mills	$1,664
5350265	Lawrence Park	$1,538
5350140	Caribou Park	$1,520
5350087	Rosedale	$1,217
5350229	Kingsway	$1,048
5350514.01	Port Credit	$1,039
5350125	Rosedale	$1,037
5350230.01	Kingsway	$1,022
5350601	South-central Oakville	$1,004

Map of the Week: Where the dogs are (part two)

LUCAS OLENIUK/TORONTO STAR

Here is the second part of our dog map series - a series of maps, one for each of Toronto's top 20 dog breeds. (If you missed Part 1, which gives an overall picture of dog ownership in the city, click here.)

In 2008, these were:

You can start with our top-rated breed, Labrador retrievers, and work your way through all the maps, or use the links below to go to one directly.

Some breeds have clear patterns, while others don’t. Purebred Labs are centred in the high-income areas along Yonge St. south of the 401, while mixed Labs are spread out across south Etobicoke, Riverdale, the Beaches and part of the coastline part of Scarborough.

Pit bulls form a rough V across the city, with strong pockets around Bloor and Dufferin and Queen and Coxwell. (The ban on pit bulls seems not to have had much of an effect on their numbers over the last four years.)

As an aside, two dogs in the database are listed as a Siberian husky/wolf cross, one near Bathurst and Sheppard and the other near Brown’s Line. An animal described as a ‘wolf cross’ lives around Birchmount and Sheppard. Hopefully none of them have to live in small apartments.

---

1:  Labrador retrievers | 2:  Golden retrievers | 3:  German shepherds | 4:  Parson Russell Terriers | 5:  Shih Tzus | 6:  Beagles | 7:  Pit bulls | 8:  Labrador retriever mix | 9:  Miniature schnauzers | 10:  German shepherd mix | 11:  Bichon Frise | 12:  Miniature poodles | 13:  Yorkshire terriers | 14:  Cocker spaniels | 15:  Siberian huskies | 16:  Border collies | 17:  Standard poodles | 18:  Soft-Coated Wheaten Terriers | 19:  Rottweilers | 20:  Boxers |

Map of the Week: Where the dogs are (part one)

Two maps this week, both based on a version of Toronto's dog licence database released by the City:

---

BERNARD WEIL/TORONTO STAR

Toronto neighbourhood dog ownership map

Dogs, at least the ones known to the City's license system, cluster along the lake shore east of downtown and in the neighbourhoods along Yonge St. south of Hwy. 401.

The list is led by Lawrence Park (M4N), followed closely by the Beaches (M4E and M4L).

(Urban observation has it right on this one - there really are a lot more dogs in the Beaches than elsewhere in the city.)

---

NATHAN DENETTE/THE CANADIAN PRESS

Where dog ownership is rising and falling, by Toronto neighbourhood

The dog ownership rate has generally risen across the city over the last four years. In absolute numbers, there were just under 49,000 licenced dogs in August of 2008, compared with 36,000 in 2004.

These numbers, of course, reflect the number of dogs which are properly licenced. It's hard to know how much of the change reflects better enforcement, and how much is due to an actual increase in animals.

The dog licence rate has fallen in 24 postal areas, and it would be interesting to know why. The strip of blue on the map running from the Beaches west through downtown and then northwest through the old city's west end looks very much like the pattern in the 2004 pit bull map.

---

Thanks to  Andy Bailey, the Star's computer-assisted reporting specialist, for boiling down the spreadsheet to a manageable form.

Next week: maps of Toronto's most popular dog breeds.

Discover Halton's waterfront

Another entry from noodler Brett Smith in Patrick Cain's absence.

This map of Halton's waterfront is the first in a summer-long Toronto Star series, starting Aug. 2 and appearing on coming Sundays, that will examine the highlight and blights of the GTA's 125 kilometre waterfront.

Use the map to discover what's been gained and lost along the Ontario Lake Shore. By the end of the series, it should serve as a west-to-east guide to the Greater Toronto Coast.

Map of the week: GTA anglers

JIM WILKES/TORONTO STAR

Not a map of fishing spots, but of people across the Greater Toronto Area who took out fishing licenses last year with the Ministry of Natural Resources.

The MNR issued just over 659,000 fishing licenses to Ontario residents in 2007, about 148,000 of them to people in the GTA.

As we saw with the camping permit map a few weeks ago, there are lots of outdoor enthusiasts in Durham Region. Fishing was most popular in L1H in southeastern Oshawa, followed by L1Y, north of Pickering and Ajax. In most areas in Oshawa and Whitby, over 5% of the population bought a fishing licence last year, compared with a GTA average of 2.75%.

The whole downtown area of Toronto has a very low proportion of anglers, although the area had at least an average proportion of campers.

Map of the week: Where the campers are

This week's map (link) is much simpler than last week's, and to a certain extent inspired by the weekend's heat wave: the percentage of the population in the GTA that received a provincial park camping permit last year, by postal area.

Durham Region is strongly represented.

Pickering, Ajax, Whitby and especially Oshawa are full of campers, it turns out, as is the Yonge St. corridor between Richmond Hill and Newmarket. There are also outdoorsy neighbourhoods downtown, where the Ontario park system is popular in High Park, the Beaches, the U of T area and the Islands.

The GTA's most enthusiastic campers can be found in M8X, in the Bloor St. W. and the Humber area of the former city of Etobicoke, where 4.4% of the population was issued a park permit last year.

The Ministry of Natural Resources issued almost 271,000 park permits last year, of which about 74,000 went to GTA residents. About 14,000 park users came from Quebec, and 4,500 from Manitoba. Over 16,000 came from the U.S., the largest groups from New York and Michigan.

Nerd box

This week, we’re displaying most of the suburban (but not rural) communities in the GTA. There are a total of 177 postal areas displayed, with just over 2,000 individual points. With this big a map, we’re pushing the limits of how many polygons GoogleMaps can display. (The issue isn’t the number of polygons so much as the points it takes to display them, which is why the maps are roughly drawn.)

It may take 10-15 seconds to load.