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Lloyd Alter

@lloydalter.bsky.social
15K followers 1.6K following 2.3K posts

Author of"The Story of Upfront Carbon," reformed architect and developer, teacher of sustainable design at Toronto Metropolitan University. lloydalter.substack.com

PostsRepliesMedia
Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 8h
Brits have been nice to Canadians as of late. That will change when Shoppers Drug Mart takes over the UK.
Shoppers drug mart takes over boots in UK
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 12h
I walked into a glass door the other day and now have a big black eye. It could have happened to anyone, but it is more likely if you're older and your vision is compromised. As the demographic time bomb continues detonating, we are going to see more of this.
lloydalter.substack.com
Thinking about glass doors makes my head hurt
Actually, walking into one makes it hurt more. This is just one of the problems aging boomers face as their vision is compromised.
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 06/10/2026
And on the same day I write about engineered stone countertops: the New York Times is on it! www.nytimes.com/2026/10/05/u...
nytimes.com
California Prepares to Ban Quartz Countertop Production (Gift Article)
The state would be the first to block an industry that has been connected to a deadly lung disease in workers.
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 05/10/2026
I am not posting a photo of my huge black eye, but those smudges on the glass door of a lovely restaurant in our neighbourhood are where my forehead and nose smacked into it. Seriously, if you have a glass door, put some markers on it. You have to do it for birds, why not do it for people too
smudges on door after banging my face into it.
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 05/10/2026
paging @carintobuilding.bsky.social this bowled me over
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 05/10/2026
Thanks!
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 05/10/2026
I wondered how people who sell engineered stone countertops deal with the problem of fabricators dying or needing lung transplants after inhaling silica dust. They were oblivious. lloydalter.substack.com/p/nobody-at-...
lloydalter.substack.com
Nobody at the home show knows or cares about killer countertops
Engineered stone countertops are the most popular, but making them is killing workers,
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 04/10/2026
Canada could absolutely do this. Instead, we get Carney and Ford pushing pipelines.
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 03/10/2026
This was an extraordinary takedown, everyone should read it and post it everywhere
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 03/10/2026
I think Toronto worked a bit of magic on Kevin. Love his T-shirt
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
You try climbing up a scaffold and lifting bricks for 40 years. It’s why bricklaying is one of the first trades that will be roboticised or eliminated.
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
No never mind it premiered on American Thanksgiving doesn’t count
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interga... Catherine O’hara Sid Caesar Al Waxman
en.wikipedia.org
Intergalactic Thanksgiving - Wikipedia
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
"opponents of environmental justice in the name of climate and clean energy." What on earth does that mean?
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
As a Canadian I wish we didnt have these problems, but they are a feta compli.
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
There is a reason that @thestar.com does a major exposé on car theft a month before the election: to build a sense of fear and push bradbrad's candidacy. It's not just social media, it's all the media.
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
Doug ford’s obsession with burying everything so that it doesn’t slow cars has cost years, billions, and reduced accessibility and usefulness. apple.news/AynZes1NuRmy...
apple.news
Opinion | Is six years too long to wait for a new elevator at the Don Valley TTC station? — Toronto Star
It wasn’t supposed to be in service until 2032 but the plan changed after the Star questioned the timeframe.
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
This is new: boomer on boomer and hit-and-run. Demographics ensure that we will be seeing a lot more of it lloydalter.substack.com/p/we-may-soo...
lloydalter.substack.com
We may soon have 70 million boomers too old to drive, too car-dependent to stop.
As the baby boomer bubble pushes into its eighties, we are driving into a demographic wall.
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
I will be there!
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
I write often about how our homes are lifeboats, but Jessica shows us how to stock the lifeboat with necessary supplies. She writes a useful and thorough survival guide for people in cities and apartments. It’s not for preppers; it has bicycles, not pickup trucks.
lloydalter.substack.com
I hope I never need to use this free survival guide
Actually, Jessica Wildfire has written a guide we should all think about now before we need to use it.
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
I saw that today too, on my way to an x-ray! Very pretty.
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
I would put five on it but I always lose and don’t want to jinx it
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
Don‘t they go translucent when you close the door?
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 28/09/2026
Doctors prescribe blackout curtains, warm-coloured bedside lighting, and covering the small standby LEDs on household electronics to protect the heart.
lloydalter.substack.com
If you’re serious about sleep, learn from Marcel Proust
A new study finds that light in the bedroom at night could be as dangerous as “smoking, hypertension, and physical inactivity.” Proust knew how to deal with that.
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
And amphetamines. I was shocked that they came up with “timbits” given how he died. It seemed inappropriate.
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
@dieworkwear.bsky.social what do you think of the Mao suit look on Xi? He wears suits all day, but to dress up he reverts to form? (I like it)
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
I hate it when charities send a huge package of shit, even with my name printed on the pen and cards, hoping I will be guilted into a donation. Supposedly if 5% of the people who get these donate then it covers their costs, but how much of this stuff ends in the trash. It should be banned.
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
This is great. I love seeing the falsework holding up the arch
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
Honestly I am often so embarrassed by my generation of sociopaths
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
Paging @norton.bsky.social our future under AI: giving up 75% of everything and putting humans in their place, regulated and on the fringes. @thewaroncars.bsky.social time for thewaronAI
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
The Economist does an exposé on standing desks, claiming that they are no healthier than sitting desks. This is old news; what matters isn't standing or sitting, it's moving. We have known this for a decade. lloydalter.substack.com/p/are-standi...
lloydalter.substack.com
Are standing desks better than sitting?
An Economist article questions their usefulness. In fact, what matters isn’t standing or sitting; it’s moving.
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
Potter at Construction physics is good but you should look at Gary Fleisher. I worked in the prefab industry for a couple of years and this guy really nails it www.linkedin.com/pulse/what-c...
linkedin.com
What Could Possibly Go Wrong When Smart People Decide to Build a Modular Factory?
I’m still amazed by a group of highly intelligent people’s ability to collectively make an incredibly stupid decision. Individually, these people may be successful entrepreneurs, engineers, architects...
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
Penalized is a good autocorrect freudian slip.
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
And every time I go to London I try to drop in at my favourite little museum in the world, Sir John Soane’s Museum. www.soane.org
soane.org
Homepage | Sir John Soane's Museum
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
And it would be on brand for you to visit the London Transport Museum, which has a show running with their wonderful art deco posters, the best transit posters ever made. www.ltmuseum.co.uk
ltmuseum.co.uk
London Transport Museum
Discover the powerful link between transport and the growth of London since 1800 at the world's leading museum of urban transport online, in our Museum and at our Depot - an award-winning day out.
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
I will be there a week later and heading straight to the new V&A storehouse museum www.vam.ac.uk/east/storeho...
vam.ac.uk
Visit V&A East Storehouse · V&A
Make new discoveries, explore untold stories and share ideas at V&A East Storehouse. With half a million works, it’s a sourcebook for your creativity.
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
Maybe there should be, but as you can see from the aerial here, there isn't anything other than a stream of cars turning right from Ian McDonald and paying no attention to me trying to cross. in the middle of a University campus!
roundabout with no signs
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
Finally got to my destination, which I entered like a car on a driveway; the actual main entrance faces... nothing. Gorgeous building, worth the trip, but my mother was right.
TRCA building
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
Past an ocean of parking, as far as the eye can see; Spouse Kelly who went to York 40 years ago said nothing appears to have changed
parking at York University
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
Then the walk went past an open field; I cannot imagine what it is like in winter. I almost got killed in a roundabout with no stop signs or crosswalks and a lot of drivers honking because they don't understand roundabouts.
path to walk
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
The station also had the worst example of hostile design I have seen on the TTC.
hostile bench
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
My late mom had a mantra for living in Toronto: "Never breathe the air north of St. Clair." She was right; I had a meeting that was supposed to be a 13-minute walk from the subway, but I spent that much time just trying to get out of the station and ended up on the wrong side of Steeles.
pioneer village station
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
Hostile design at Black Creek Station on TtC
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
It sure looks like @thestar.com is in the tank for BradBrad, running bullshit headlines and a push poll with loaded negative questions about traffic and safety, two of his favourite hot buttons. All manufactured outrage.
star front pagestar push poll with loaded questions
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
A new initiative in the UK tries to change the way we look at the built environment: “Housing, planning, transport, infrastructure, energy and regeneration aren't separate problems — they're one industry, hiding in plain sight.” Yet we are in separate silos, often working at cross-purposes.
lloydalter.substack.com
“One Built Environment” unites all strands of construction, transportation, and infrastructure
This British report proposes breaking down silos and recognizing that everything is connected. We should be doing this everywhere.
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
I concur, not a good look
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
Why I shop at Home Hardware and try to never set foot in Home Depot
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 21/09/2026
AIstoturfing is a very good coinage!
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
I don’t know how anyone can pitch I Texas with the distraction of the people drinking and partying behind home plate. It’s impossible to watch!
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Lloyd Alter @lloydalter.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
Jan Gehl wrote: “A good city is like a good party — people stay longer than really necessary because they are enjoying themselves." That's why I love PARK(ing) Day- get outside, take back the streets, and party. lloydalter.substack.com/p/its-parkin...
lloydalter.substack.com
It’s PARK(ing) Day because streets are for people
At least in Toronto, this icon of tactical urbanism is still going strong.
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