Tag Archives: housing project
New community being built from ground up for Pan Am Games new
Simone Abrahamsohn – Property Biz Canada
As the city prepares to host the Toronto 2015 Pan Am Games, the future Athlete’s Village will be created on schedule – and on budget, according to Jason Lester, President of Dundee Kilmer Developments Ltd, the company managing the project.
“What’s exciting, is that the plan was already 20 years in the making,” says Lester. “But, the Games just gave it momentum it didn’t have yet before.”
According to Meg Davis, Vice-President of Waterfront Toronto, the plans for the Athlete’s Village were requested by the province, once the bid for the area renewal – and 32-hectare revitalization – was already underway.
“We got a call asking,’Can you fit the athletes village into the West Don Lands block plan?’ Basically, it meant advancing the West Don Lands [development] by about five or 10 years, getting it to market that much sooner.”
The Canary District is a 35-acre post-industrial site, stretching from Cherry St. to Bayview Ave., with an extended Front St. being the centre of the area.
From 0 to 12,000 by 2020
After almost no activity for 20 years, (and having a population of 0 in 2011) the emerging new district has been steadily forming since the ground breaking in the fall of 2011. About 700 workers fill the site each day, creating the soon-to-be community and most expensive component of the $1.4-billion Games.
After originally being cleared to become a housing project called “Ataratiri”, in the 1980s, (private investors retreated, hesitant due to flooding risk), that project was cancelled in the early 90s after a real estate crash. The new neighbourhood will have a population of approximately 12,000 by 2020.
Over 50 percent sold, the condominium community has attracted various stakeholders, including the City of Toronto, Waterfront Toronto and Infrastructure Ontario.
Residential buildings along Front Street will range between 11 and 15 storeys high, while heights on narrower Mill Street will drop down to eight storeys. Additionally, four architectural firms were asked to design the buildings within the athletes’ village, to avoid a homogenous look and achieve what Dundee Kilmer calls “cohesive diversity.”
Avoiding contract overruns of the past
A funding model has been implemented through a fixed price contract between Dundee Kilmer and Infrastructure Ontario, so that the $514-million provincial cost for the village won’t increase. They want to ensure the budget does not escalate as it did in the past, such as Vancouver’s Olympic village.
“We do a lot of upfront due diligence so [developers] know exactly what they’re getting into. Everything’s out on the table, so that when they sign the agreement they are agreeing to a specific date and … a specific price,” says Mandy Downes of Infrastructure Ontario.
“They don’t get paid until the work gets done, so there is a big financial incentive for them to complete it on time. They take the risk so that the province and the taxpayers are not on the hook for things we are not in control of.”
The up-and-coming new “Urban Village” will include a new streetcar line, created on a rebuilt Cherry Street, connecting to the district from King Street, and through to the neighbouring Distillery District.
The eight buildings currently in development will temporarily be home to approximately 10,000 Athletes from 41 countries during the Games, (while the sporting events will actually take place elsewhere, such as Toronto, Markham and Mississauga) and will be 100% complete once new tenants/owners move in in early 2016.
Plan includes affordable housing
The area will include the first residence for George Brown College, (housing 500 students), along with an adjoining YMCA, housing a pool and fitness centre, 253 units of affordable housing (a project in affiliation with the Fred Victor Centre), including studios as well as 2-bedroom plus den apartments, and townhomes, some as large as 1,475 square feet. Prices start at $200,000.
The almost-800 condominiums, 28 townhomes and 12 retail store and office spaces will be fully operational after the Games. The residential buildings along the extended Front Street East will have more than 40,000 square feet of retail space for rent.
Front Street will extend with four traffic lanes and lead to a Riverfront park. The $15 million, 18-acre park, known currently just as Don River Park, will open to the public this summer.
“There’s always a chance it might be changed to a politician’s name in the future,” says Lester.
“It will act almost like a trailhead to the ravine system on the east side of Toronto, as well as to the waterfront to the south. It’s quick access to the trail system for biking and walkers,” he said.
“There’s probably more parkland as a ratio to the community being built in this neighbourhood than any other community in downtown Toronto.”
Refurbishing landmark Canary Restaurant
Included in the plans to revive the East end neighbourhood is the refurbishing of the old Canary Restaurant, situated at the corner of Front Street East and Cheery Street from the mid-1960s to 2007.
The 19th Century Heritage building, dating back to 1859, experienced several incarnations, including being the Palace Street School and then the Cherry Street Hotel, before becoming the Canary Restaurant.
As industries moved out and various Waterfront revival plans were put on hold, the kitschy diner remained a fixture. The diner, at one point a popular spot for film crews, will serve as a symbol of the new area’s revitalization.
“It kind of gives you a layer, an anchor in time,” said Bruce Kuwabara of KPMB, the architectural firm involved in the project.
“I think what it does, is it amplifies the meaning and provokes a discussion about history. Little kids will say, ‘Why is this called the Canary District? I like the name, but why?’ And then there’ll be a story to be told.”
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Contact the Jeffrey Team for more information – 416-388-1960
Laurin & Natalie Jeffrey are Toronto Realtors with Century 21 Regal Realty.
They did not write these articles, they just reproduce them here for people
who are interested in Toronto real estate. They do not work for any builders.
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Soft site redevelopment key to transforming Queen Street West
Ward 19 councillor working with community on future of neighbourhood
Erin Hatfield – InsideToronto.com
The Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) Queen Street campus is a leading example of soft site redevelopment.
Sitting on 26 acres of land in downtown Toronto, CAMH wasn’t being used to its potential.
Not only will the current redevelopment transform the face of mental health and addictions care, but is also well on its way to transforming that portion of Queen Street West.
“We are very much concerned with trying to build a positive asset for the community, not just a better hospital,” said Susan Pigott, CAMH vice-president of communication and community engagement.
Plans for the site include CAMH administration offices and facilities as well as storefronts, a client-run cafe, as well as a parking and utilities garage.
“The construction right on Queen West at Lower Ossington is an affordable housing project, it is not part of CAMH,” she said. “It will have storefronts and we know that Shoppers (Drug Mart) is going in there for sure and there are a few other businesses that the developers are speaking to.”
Plans also include an Intergenerational Wellness Centre and green spaces. The plan will also extend the streets, opening the grounds up to the existing grid system.
“We are hoping people will walk right through the CAMH development rather than go around it the way people do now,” Pigott said. “We are hoping that having a welcoming atmosphere and having the streets go through will encourage more intermingling between CAMH and the surrounding community.”
Just across the street from CAMH, an old boarding house was demolished and new condos are taking form there. To the east along Queen, looking at soft sites in the strip of Queen Street between Bathurst and Dovercourt, there are people who see much potential for this already trendy area.
Luke Fraser and Michael Floyd are fourth year urban planning students at Ryerson University. They are members of a team working with Councillor Mike Layton in Ward 19 to analyze sites and consult with the community, with the end goal of creating an online resource for the community that looks at potential and approved developments.
They are also working to outline a community checklist of what neighbours want and need in terms of development in the area.
The men point out a single story TD Bank on a corner lot, a gas station with a large parking lot and an old auto garage that now stands empty, which could all be classified as soft sites and developed into better use of the land they occupy.
It is changing the face of West Queen West, but could this development inspire its neighbours to do the same?
Layton said his ideal Queen West would develop in such a way that the physical characteristics of the buildings respect the historic feeling of Queen West, but provide the level of density required to maintain a main street.
“So that it not only has restaurants and fancy show stores, but that it also can keep the remaining fruit market, the local music store,” he said. “All the little pieces that make up a neighbourhood.”
Along with the physical development of the strip, Layton said he also needs to figure out how to get people moving along the streetcar line faster and balance the needs of the Trinity Bellwoods Park users.
Robert Sysak, the executive director of the West Queen West Business Improvement Area, said the stretch between Bathurst and Dovercourt has endless opportunity to grow to become an even more exciting part of the city.
The large building at the southeast corner of Queen Street West and Bathurst is slated to become a CB2 furniture store that will drastically change that corner, Sysak said. And the lease at Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art, which has a large paved frontage, comes up in 2013, Sysak said.
An old church near Bathurst on the south side of Queen was recently sold and is to become condos, which keep the facade of the building.
“This whole area has so many different opportunities at different spots,” Sysak said.
“There will be changes that not everyone is pleased with and where others will be because there is diverse taste but it moves forward, but that is what is exciting about it.”
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Contact the Jeffrey Team for more information – 416-388-1960
Laurin & Natalie Jeffrey are Toronto Realtors with Century 21 Regal Realty.
They did not write these articles, they just reproduce them here for people
who are interested in Toronto real estate. They do not work for any builders.
———————————————————————————————————————
Incoming search terms
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Toronto Real Estate — St. Lawrence Market Neighbourhood
The St. Lawrence neighbourhood of Toronto, Ontario, Canada although still part of downtown Toronto, was the actual downtown centre and city hall location during the 19th century.
The area is bounded by Yonge, Front, and Parliament Streets, and the Canadian National railway embankment. The Esplanade off Yonge St., lined with restaurants, cafés and hotels runs through the middle of the area.
In previous times, the area was sometimes referred to as ‘St. Lawrence Ward’ or more often today as ‘St. Lawrence Market‘, synonymous with the large retail vendor market which is the neighbourhood’s focal point. Saint Lawrence (shortened to St. Lawrence) was so named after the patron saint of Canada.
The area was the site of Toronto’s earliest non-military European settlements. The first parliament buildings in Upper Canada in 1793 were constructed on the southwest corner of Parliament and Front Street.
The buildings have long since gone from the site, but a discovery in 2000 when a quick dig of the property revealed the old parliament building footings, in addition to some pottery from that time. The city and the province now own most of the property, although there is no current preservation or memorial located there.
A Saturday farmers’ market began operation in St. Lawrence in 1803.
The city of Toronto’s first city hall was located on the southwest corner of King St. East & Jarvis St. at the old ‘Market’ building from 1834 (the year of Toronto’s incorporation from the former town of York) to 1844. This building was later burnt down during the great fire of 1849 and replaced with the grandiose St. Lawrence Hall and north section of the market, referred to today as the ‘North Market’.
In response to the city’s dramatic population growth centred around present day St. Lawrence Market, a larger city hall, also housing a police station and jail cells opened in 1845 with a 140′ facade running along south side of Front Street. City Hall was moved out of the area in 1899 to what is now Old City Hall before moving once again to its current location. The former city hall was converted into and expanded into the market gallery or ‘South Market’. The old council chamber is all that remains of the original city hall and is located on the gallery’s second floor.
By 1850, Toronto’s waterfront and wharves were located along the Esplanade, not its current location below Harbourfront. The Grand Trunk Railway line was constructed serving the many warehouses along the wharves. Commercial activity along Toronto’s bustling harbour provided employment and was the primary place of entry to the quickly growing, burgeoning city.
The convergence of the railway lines and the wharves must have worked because in 1873 historian Henry Scadding so eloquently wrote in his book Old Toronto of The Esplanade “It has done for Toronto what the Thames Embankment has done for London”.
However, the rapid deindustrialization of the 1960s and 1970s the area along with the neighbouring Distillery District became used for movie location shoots and rickshaw housing for the homeless, due to the dark, urban and vacant industrial atmosphere that existed at that time.
In the 1980s it was decided by mayor David Crombie to turn the area into a new residential neighbourhood, but one that would not make the same mistakes of the housing projects of earlier decades. The neighbourhood was to be integrated into the city with no clear boundaries. It would contain a mix of commercial and residential as with both subsidized and market oriented housing, mostly rowhouse or low-rise apartments.
The neighbourhood was planned by Alan Littlewood and the influence of American urban planner Jane Jacobs played a crucial role. Many of the developments were not completed until well into the 1990s. Since that time, the St. Lawrence Market neighbourhood has been critically acclaimed as a major success in urban planning. In many ways, it has become the model for the design and planning of new urban communities across North America.
Some of the most interesting architecture in the city can be found in St. Lawrence Market, one notable landmark is the Flatiron building, known for its distinct narrow, wedge shape where Wellington St. merges with Front. Built in 1892, it was the first of this type of building constructed in North America. If viewed from the east, the wedge can be seen in the foreground with the financial skyscrapers and the CN tower rising in the background.
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Contact the Jeffrey Team for more information
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