Homelessness

• The flagship location of the coffee chain revived the long-dormant retail concept of the automat: a restaurant where food and drinks are served by technology, rather than human staff.
• The new coffee automat consisted of a touchscreen for placing orders, a window that allows customers to watch a robotic arm prepare their coffee, and a slot that dispenses the completed order.
• Toronto has seen the arrival of numerous autonomous business concepts, ranging from Aisle 24’s cashier-less grocery stores to PizzaForno’s 24/7 pizza vending machines.

No card, no phone, no service

• Checkout is accomplished through a touchscreen interface paired with a point-of-sale device that only accepts debit, credit or smartphone payments.
• Since these underbanked individuals often hail from low-income communities, they are already disproportionately burdened by the transaction fees associated with debit payments.
• This not only presents an obstacle for the communities mentioned above, but also impacts seniors, who still lag behind in smartphone adoption.

Automation and accessibility

• This poses a potential problem should a customer require immediate assistance — specifically, assistance related to a disability.
• The Canadian National Institute for the Blind notes that touchscreen payment terminals often lack haptic feedback or other accessibility features, creating a barrier for Canadians with vision loss.

Disappearing public amenities

• Lastly, the automation of these retail locations often closes off taken-for-granted public amenities.
• In large North American cities like Toronto, spaces like public parks, shopping malls and subway stations are increasingly being designed without expected amenities like sitting areas, drinking fountains and public bathrooms.
• This general divestment from providing public amenities slots into a broader trend within Canadian urban planning towards defensive architecture, often disproportionately targeting youths and those experiencing homelessness.

Mathew Iantorno does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

• These projects are part of a broader initiative to provide veterans with dignified, permanent housing solutions coupled with comprehensive supportive services.
• Our goal is to empower veterans through architecture that reflects respect, dignity, and care.
• In Florida, the Tunnel to Towers Foundation has secured an 8.7-acre land donation from Manatee County in Bradenton.
• The partnership with LEO A DALY extends beyond these projects, with the firm providing expertise in site evaluation, zoning reviews, capacity studies, and design services.

• View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20240213175095/en/
  Kids receiving new athletic shoes at a recent Shoe Giving Event as part of the Soles4Souls 4EveryKid program.
• (Photo: Business Wire)
  “While our relationship with Caleres goes back many years, this partnership has gone to new levels, especially thanks to Famous Footwear,” said Soles4Souls President and CEO Buddy Teaster.
• Under 4Opportunity, Soles4Souls and its partners in low-income countries work with individuals to start and grow their own businesses.
• The Trust commitment combined with the round-up initiative in stores and online brings the total donated to more than $2 million.

• But few are saying much about social housing — the kind that’s needed for low-income households in greatest need of affordable rental housing.
• Social housing is non-market housing, either publicly owned or non-profit, and substantially subsidized to ensure low-income renter households pay no more than 30 per cent of their gross income on rent.

Failed private sector experiment

• We have synthesized research that tells the story of a 30-plus year experiment, aligned with the rise of neoliberalism, to rely on the private sector to respond to all housing needs.
• Read more:
  What exactly is neoliberalism?

Create a minimum of 50,000 new rent-geared-to-income social housing units each year for 10 years, starting now. These units should be targeted for the lowest income renter households and those experiencing homelessness, and should have rents permanently set at no more than 30 per cent of household income.
Invest now in the acquisition, construction, operation and maintenance of new and existing public, non-profit and co-operative-owned housing that meets the unique and varied requirements of low-income renters and people experiencing homelessness.

Read more:
Housing co-ops could solve Canada's housing affordability crisis

Just scratching the surface

• We estimate that because 33.5 per cent of households are renters, 194,300 of this supply should be rental.
• This amount is relatively consistent with calls to double the number of social housing units to more closely align with the OECD average.
• New and existing social housing supply also requires investments in ongoing subsidies to support the costs of operating the housing while charging rent-geared-to-income rents.

Calls for change ignored

• Private-sector solutions were the focus of cost-shared federal/provincial/territorial initiatives beginning in 2001 through the Affordable Housing Framework Agreement.
• The shortage of truly affordable rental housing across Canada has only worsened because governments have not been willing to invest in social housing.
• But as demonstrated by Finland, a country that has remained committed to social housing investment, it pays off in the long term.

Lessons from Finland

• There are many strategies needed simultaneously to address housing affordability.
• But calls are all too often ignored by governments turning to the private sector for low-cost quick fixes that continue to fail those in greatest need.

Shauna MacKinnon receives funding from Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council