Driving in Toronto is Difficult

One-way changes direction

Downtown Toronto can be difficult to navigate while driving.  Here are a few things to be aware of.  First, Toronto is full of one-way streets and while this isn't novel for a big city, I've never seen a city full of so many one-way streets that change direction every block or so.  As soon as you get to an intersection in our neighborhood, you have to turn right or left because the street you are driving on changes to a one-way in the opposite direction - see the picture to the right.  I guess they do this so people can't overload the side streets with traffic.  Luckily, Google Maps is up-to-date with all of this information so your directions should be up-to-date.

Getting Car and Renters Insurance

When we were planning for our move from NYC to Toronto, we bought a used car.  We were going to need car insurance again!  I had used Allstate for car and renters insurance when I lived in MN and had retained them for renters insurance in NY.  So, when we bought the car in MN, we had it insured temporarily until our move through Allstate.  When we arrived to Toronto, we tried to just call-up Allstate Canada to have our car and renters policies transferred, but low and behold it isn't that easy.  In Canada, they have separate underwriters than in the US so there is no such thing as just "transferring" your policy per se.  For the renters policy, we were going to have to have our rings re-appraised even though we've had them continuously insured through Allstate since we got engaged.  The experience didn't make us feel like we were being rewarded for customer loyalty so we decided to check out prices with other companies - if we had to start over, it may as well be at the best price.

Did You Know?: Driving in Ontario

If you'll be driving in Ontario, and plan to use your phone, make sure you are set-up for hands-free talking.  No texting or emailing or messing with your GPS is allowed either.  http://news.ontario.ca/mto/en/2009/09/ontarios-new-rules-for-hand-held-wireless-and-entertainment-devices.html