Picture This

So let’s say you’re a gal or a fellow who, having enjoyed a night of refreshments and frivolity at a King West bar, are just now stumbling into the night. And let’s say one of your buddies perks up with the modern lament that, alas, no one came equipped with their PowerShot to capture the evening’s merriment for the subsequent enjoyment of all.

Fear not, contemporary partier.

It could be that your own municipal government is looking after all of your visual capture needs for you.

Toronto police chief Bill Blair recently announced that he wants to up the closed circuit television surveillance activity on city streets, and nominated the area west of the already-buzzing King West Entertainment District as a site of particular interest for these extra eyes.

The police force had purchased 77 cameras for the G20 summit in June—cameras which the government pledged to dismantle when the insanity had retreated. At the summit’s close, the cameras were, in fact, taken down. But now the Chief wants to buy 52 of them back.

The cameras, Blair contends, serve as a deterrent in the club district, as much as they do tools for subsequent investigations of a crime. Their further application as Facebook fodder for late-night clubbers remains to be explored.

“It’s unnerving,” says Jerry Howath, a 34-year-old downtown dweller who counts the Foggy Dew Irish Alehouse and Pub, at 803 King W., among his favourite haunts. “Big Brother is clearly alive and well, and catching you on film in King West.”