All My Homies Love Stratford

I know everyone has had the same question on their mind these past weeks… what ever did this random girl Bronwyn do on her reading week?! “Oh I am so curious it sets me ablaze to think about all that she got up to those many weeks ago. Well let me enlighten you by introducing you to the small town of Stratford, Ontario. Population: Thirty-three thousand. Hometown of Justin Bieber. It is a quaint collection of old churches and pricey gastropubs, with a massive festival season that brings people in from around the world. Personally, I was struck by how insanely beautiful their little downtown was. I was amazed at how many of the original Victorian buildings still stood, and survived the great stucco frenzy of the ‘30s. 

Stratford is a brisk two and a half hour drive North of Toronto, far enough away that I was tempted to still refer to it as part of the GTA. It has everything you need to enjoy your time there, from pretty stormwater ponds, to kitschy junk shops, to old jailhouses, AND a cat cafe. It even has a historic clocktower in city hall so you can look up and pretend that you’re Marty McFly. Most of the stores that lined the main streets had been around for at least thirty years, and were run by generations of well-dressed families. I believe the words “like a hallmark movie” slipped out of my mouth, to which my loving aunt informed me that they had filmed a hallmark movie on the main streets four weeks before (no NDA signed we’re good). But I digress.

Stratford is a vestige of something I thought had long died out - a small area untouched by megacorporations and their monopolizing presence. It still had a local feel to it. This is not to say the town exists in a bubble of pre-industrialized nostalgia…Kitchener-Waterloo is a couple clicks down the freeway. I just love to glaze little towns that are capable of keeping their local businesses running. 

While my journalistic ambitions are clearly overwhelmed by how poor these pictures are, I hope you can appreciate how picturesque of a little town it was.

My personal opinion is that it has Edmonton beat in almost every category… My professional opinion is that the utter lack of public transit in and out of Stratford isolates it from the rest of the world. The separation might even be why it still has that small town feel to it. There is one charter bus in and out of the city, and the day it shows up on time is the day hell freezes over. If not for the complete lack of transit, it would be a mighty fine place to live. My mighty prediction is that one day the Kitchener-Waterloo-Stratford conglomerate will finally say “Wagwan Shordy” to Toronto and merge in a supernova of culture, community, and hopefully a consistent bus or train line as well. 

So I would like to pose a little urban planning question to you guys… would a Go-Train connection to Stratford destroy the quaint, Victorian atmosphere of the town? Should some things best be left untouched? Or could we balance maintaining the feel of the community while being more accessible to residents and visitors alike?

Thanks for reading this far, and hope everyone came out of this Fall term in one piece…

Meee squatting in reverence of the town square (it was really cold and my feet hurt). 

Written by GAPSS media committee member Bronwyn O.