TORONTO — A television crew shooting a series supposedly set in a typical American city found that the streets here were too clean, so they spread around some synthetic garbage to lend authenticity to the scene. But then the crew members took a break and returned to find that Toronto's ever-present street cleaners had swept in and cleaned it all up.

The story reflects one of the most attractive aspects of this city of 3 million people. It is clean--so clean that litterers are often advised by people who catch them that "we don't do that here."

Toronto is also very safe. Thirty-seven homicides were committed here last year, in contrast with 887 in Los Angeles--and all but four of them were solved. The general crime rate is among the lowest in the world's major cities.

Economic Disparities, Too

Toronto is also rich, so rich as to cause concern that the gap between rich and poor is getting out of hand.

And Toronto is diverse, cosmopolitan, growing, dynamic and, if not beautiful in the sense that Paris is beautiful, nonetheless pleasing to the eye. People live in the city center, and it is as lively at night as at noon. Even the weather is far from fearsome: Omaha is colder in January than Toronto.

All this and more leads Jane Jacobs, a prominent urban expert, to call Toronto "the city that works," and Mayor Art Eggleton to proclaim the lakeside metropolis "North America's supercity enjoying its golden age."

By virtually all accounts, these labels are accurate--for the moment and on the surface. But judging from the clogged traffic, the lack of rental property and the extraordinary cost of housing, Toronto may be in danger of choking on its own success. In the mayor's assessment, it comes too close to wallowing in smugness and complacency and becoming "a rich man's town."

'Toronto the Good'

To understand this, one has to look back. Until the early 1970s, Toronto was considered by many to be dull and conservative, a stultifying backwater. It was known as "Hogtown" because of its stockyards, and "Toronto the good" because of laws so restrictive that cocktail lounges were prohibited and public transportation was shut down on Sundays.

Montreal was Canada's social, fashion and entertainment center, and it far surpassed Toronto as a financial and business hub. Vancouver was livelier and, with its nearby mountains and stunning beaches, was deemed more beautiful.