Legalize Basketball Hoops

"It took one viral video — boys throwing a basketball at an empty backboard in broad daylight — to halt a long-standing city practice," reports Jennifer Pagliaro.

The city spent about a decade removing rims from city-owned basketball courts until the video woke the public up to the punitive and counter-productive nature of the practice.

The practice began in 2008 as a response to noise complaints from residents living near city basketball courts. City spokesperson Brad Ross said in a statement that noise complaints will be addressed on a case-by-case basis in the future.

“Having a big city is a balancing act all the time,” Mayor John Tory told reporters Thursday morning. “I think that what happened, as often happens in cases like this, is that balance was lost, in that I can understand 10 o’clock at night people maybe — or 11 o’clock at night — saying that they’re concerned about noise. But at 6 o’clock in the evening or even 9 o’clock in the evening at this time of year we should be doing everything we can to get as man kids as possible to be playing basketball in our public parks.”

Tory said residents can’t assume they will live free of noise in a city like Toronto and said there is a need to have “healthy, positive” activities for youth.

Focusing on noise might only tell part of the story, however. Pagliaro also notes that rims were originally removed as a deterrent against "drug dealers."