College and Spadina is our big-city intersection.

“Big city” in the old-school sense, of a time before Toronto’s streets were lined with artisanal cupcake emporiums and exquisite espresso machines run by tattooed baristas. Those are all nearby, but not at this corner.

The sidewalks here are wider than most in Toronto, and so is the street itself. Cyclists look carefully down at the web of tracks they’re riding over and the streetcars make a heavy ca-chunk ca-chunk sound as they pass. The El Mocambo palm tree sign is lit again, a blur of primary colours by the southwest corner.

With much less fanfare The Waverly Hotel on the northwest side is the most vintage — and perhaps most vital — of all that’s here.

Built in 1900, this hotel has continually operated for 113 years, but may soon close as its owner, Paul Wynn, has posted plans to tear it and the adjacent Silver Dollar bar down and build a student residence, telling The Star The Waverly is “rotted out” beyond renovation.

Perhaps it is; a lot of Toronto was built on the cheap, as this was a just a provincial backwater. The fancy stuff got built in Montreal. The Waverly itself became even less fancy during the 1960s as it evolved into what’s known as a “Single Room Occupancy” hotel (SRO). SROs are long-term hotels — affordable places to stay for those who don’t want to put down roots or can’t afford much else.

Much has been said about The Waverly’s cultural significance. Canada’s “People’s Poet,” Milton Acorn, lived here for much of the 1970s, and the Silver Dollar is only slightly less legendary than the El Mocambo.

Places that aren’t fancy can accommodate a lot, and its basement is home to the Comfort Zone, an after-hours electronic music club famously raided by Toronto Police in 2008. It has continued on with parties that go until nearly noon on Sundays, expelling bedraggled patrons into the bright sunshine of a Toronto the Good morning.

However, in a city with a grievous shortage of affordable housing, hotels like The Waverly are most important for the unofficial stopgap role they play in the lives of poor people. Rooms here can be rented by the day, week or month, and many of the long-time residents here will lose their home if the hotel is torn down.

Though rare today, there are still cheap Waverly-like accommodations around town, like the Parkview Arms at Queen and Strachan, across from Trinity-Bellwoods Park. Down on King St. there’s also the Palace Arms. And who lives in the rooms above the Jilly’s strip club in the grand old Broadview Hotel on Queen E.?

These are all located in expensive neighbourhoods now and it seems inevitable the cupcake conversion cycle will affect these affordable places.

If SRO hotels such as these were traditional apartment rental units, the city’s policies restricting conversions and preserving rentals might apply. Vancouver has a bylaw protecting their SRO residences (they call them “Single Room Accommodations”) because of their affordability.

Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading...

With little new affordable housing being built, the loss of the Waverly will make it harder for low-income people to live in Toronto, limiting the opportunity the city offers them and the potential they have to contribute to what’s made this place great in the past.

Wander the streets with the Star’s Shawn Micallef on Twitter@shawnmicallef

Read more about: