Design
How an Oven Changed the Fate of a Neglected Toronto Park
Thorncliffe Park is now home to North America's first public tandoor oven, thanks to the efforts of local activists.
Ask a city planner or designer to name some popular amenities for a park, and they'll rattle off a list: children's play area, water feature, shade, seating. "Tandoor oven" will not be on it—unless you're in Toronto, where residents of the Thorncliffe Park neighborhood worked with the city to install a new bread-baking oven in their local park. It's the first public tandoor oven in North America.
The Thorncliffe Park Women's Committee (TPWC) proposed the idea back in 2011, and the answer from officials was an immediate yes. But the city didn't have regulations that applied to tandoor ovens. It took two years to figure them out, and now TPWC fires up the oven to bake naan during community events.