Development News

Imbibing Vaughan residents will get a mileage break at the end of the month when the Rutherford Market Place LCBO opens at 9310 Bathurst Street.

With a selling area of 5,000 square feet and about 1,500 products (including about 250 Vintages ones), LCBO spokesman Steve Erwin says, "The store should take some sales pressure off of a nearby Richmond Hill location at Yonge St. and Highway 7. It also gives an opportunity for one-stop shopping, since the new Rutherford Market Place, which will also have a Shoppers Drug Mart, Royal Bank and hair-cutting place and a dollar store."

The shop, which is being opened to reflect the higher population density in Vaughan, will also have a portable tasting bar.

Writer: Bert Archer
Source: Steve Erwin

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The Annex space dedicated to one of Toronto's greatest poets just got 12 per cent bigger.

Gwendolyn MacEwen Park, a Walmer Road roundabout just north of Bloor named in her honour six years ago, with a bust of the poet who died in 1987, added two years later, is in the final stages of a refurbishment, reshaping and enlarging occasioned by the city's need to fix a water main in the area.

The budget for the improvement, which includes adding several benches, as well as more grass and flowers, was a little over $300,000.

"We were able to re-imagine the way that little park worked," says Councillor Adam Vaughan, in whose ward it sits. In a city unused to roundabouts, the wide circle of road that surrounded the park was a perennial cause of pedestrian and vehicular confusion, according to Vaughan. To fix that, the new park, which has increased its diameter by about 4 metres, has been made more triangular, a shape Vaughan describes as guitar pick-like. "The edge of the park is closer to the sidewalks now," he says, making it easier for pedestrians, including local school kids, to cross, "but also it feels like when you get to a stop sign, it's a corner."

Vaughan, who knew the poet slightly from his time working in Major Roberts, the old Harbord Street restaurant that later became the Kensington Kitchen and is now Tati Bistro, where MacEwen was a lunch-time regular ("She liked the tortellini," he recalls), is pleased the park in her honour has been improved.

"The cars know what's going on, the pedestrians know what's going on, and Gwendolyn's got more flowers at her feet."

Writer: Bert Archer
Source: Adam Vaughan

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The renovation of one of the city's smallest parks is due to be completed next week, after a new condo and a re-alignment of some city streets provided the opportunity for an update.

Frank Stollery Park, named for the founder of Stollery's clothiers at Yonge and Bloor, is 4,300 square feet in the form of a little sliver at the intersections of Yonge, Davenport and Scollard. It was designed by Mary Jane Lovering, the landscape architect working for the condo's developer, Shiu Pong Developments, which also contributed the estimated budget costs of $600,000 (it ended up running over, requiring the city to pitch in another $80,000).

The park will also be in a slightly different place than it was before. "Partly as the result of the condo, and partly as the result of the city re-aligning Scollard and Davenport," says city landscape architect Marc Kramer, "the whole park was shifted south by about a metre."

There will be about 10 benches added to park, which consists of mostly paved surfaces to accommodate heavy pedestrian use. There are also five oaks and 14 ornamental pear trees being planted, in addition to beds of perennials.

In October, the park will also house one of the city's series of heritage plaques, this one concentrating mostly on the origins and significance of Davenport Road.

Writer: Bert Archer
Source: Marc Kramer

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With all the megaprojects happening on around Bloor and Avenue � the renaissance of the Renaissance, the Bloor-Yorkville street improvement, Museum House and  155 Cumberland � it would be easy to miss one of the most interesting.

The Church of the Redeemer, the little church on the northeast corner of Bloor and Avenue that forced the Renaissance Plaza into the shape it's in, is getting a reno. But it's not the renovation itself that's so fascinating, though it is being done by church architecture specialists, it's the reason for it.

In the 1980s, the Anglican church hived off the upper nave and made it into a community room because they didn't need the seats anymore � the congregation was shrinking. But over the past few years, they've seen it begin to grow again, and realized they needed the space back for all the new bums in pews.

"The ceiling is being raised from approximately 11 feet to approximately 16 feet," says lead architect Elizabeth Davidson of Davidson Langley Architects, "allowing the full height of the stained glass windows to be visible again and providing better integration of the space with the lower nave, as well as improved acoustics. The second area of renovation is the former chapel, which is being integrated into the main nave to allow for an additional 30 - 40 seats."

In total, about 100 seats are being added.

The work began on June 20 and will be completed by Aug. 20.

Writer: Bert Archer
Source: Elizabeth Davidson

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It's 21 years late, but Baywatch has finally made it to Pickering.

This month, the City of Pickering completed a water safety program involving the permanent installation of signs and buoys in Frenchman's Bay to enforce long-ignored federal boating laws.

The project has been nicknamed Baywatch.

As the markers began going up, the Durham Regional Police Marine Unit has started stopping boats for speeding, and to do general license and safety checks.

According to Pickering's mayor, the reduced speeds will also have some positive repercussions on the physical environment.

"I congratulate City staff for spearheading this initiative," Mayor Dave Ryan said in a prepared statement, "and partnering with the police marine unit and other stakeholders to enhance community safety while reducing the erosion of our shoreline."

Writer: Bert Archer
Source: Mark Guinto

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The Toronto City Summit Alliance hosted a roundtable discussion last week underlining the coming traffic congestion crisis.

The report is the result of consultations with more than 100 stakeholders from business, non-profit, academia, labour and all three levels of government, and though this is just the first step, with no concrete solutions proposed, it's a definitive statement of a general understanding of a very big problem for the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area (GTHA).

Participants included Metrolinx CEO Robert Pritchard, TD economist Derek Burleton, and planning experts Marni Cappe and Joe Berridge.

According to the report, between 1986 and 2006, road capacity in the GTHA increased by 56 per cent, while demand increased by 106 per cent. During the same two decades, mass transit capacity grew by 18 per cent, while demand increased by 45 per cent.

According to the report, "The GTHA has become a world leader in forcing residents to waste the maximum amount of time in their vehicle of choice, whether at work or play."

The main thrust of the report is that new sources of funding to increase traffic and transit infrastructure are needed, given that the traditional ones have proven to be inadequate.

Writer: Bert Archer
Source: Rebecca Geller

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All three levels of government announced their support of alternative routes to home ownership last week by giving $2.5 million to fund Home Ownership Alternatives and Option for Homes' latest project, the 643-unit Village by High Park condo tower in the Junction at Dundas and Keele, on the site of the old Canadian Tire.

The funding will provide financial backing for buyers of 108 units in the building.

"These new units will provide quality, affordable housing for low income households and benefit the economic and social well- being of the entire community," said Finance Minister Jim Flaherty in a press release.

"This investment will allow more people to realize their dream of owning a home which is a key ingredient of the City's 10-year affordable housing action plan," said city councilor Gord Perks. The plans calls for assistance for 257,700 households.

With this contribution the value for the average second mortgage offered to help prospective home buyers with a down payment will be $53,000.

Writer: Bert Archer
Source: Sharon Rego

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Last week, Paul Raff Studio completed their design of the new lifeguard stands, to be installed on Toronto's swimming beaches over the course of the next year.

After wining the competition last year, the multi-disciplinary Spadina Avenue firm, which includes architects, artists and graphic designers, began work on what ended up being a very complicated project.

"We worked with Parks and Recreation and Urban Planning," says Raff, referring to the to chief city departments involved in the project, "and the police are the ones who deal with staffing the stands � they all have requirements, including some highly detailed signage requirements."

In the end, Raff says, they came up with a design he describes as "not flashy, Frank Gehry-style design," but one that integrated those signage requirements into the design, "just like the 1950s subways stations of Toronto, where the font on the walls is an integral part of the design of the buildings."

Writer: Bert Archer
Source: Paul Raff

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Non-profit developer Neighbourhood Concepts has begun selling units in a condo tower to be built at Donlands and Cosburn using an increasingly popular financing model that allows middle-income people to afford to get into the housing market.

Potential buyers for the East Yorker, which is being financed by Home Ownership Alternatives, can qualify to use a specially negotiated second mortgage as the down payment, which they only have to pay back when they sell the property. The financing model was developed by Options for Homes, with which Neighbourhood Concepts is affiliated.

"It's a great project," says Home Ownership's vice president Joe Deschenes-Smith. "You know Woodgreen Community Services? They actually owned the adjacent site, and we're buying the land from them as part of the agreement. We'll be doing affordable houses on upper stories and services for Woodgreen on the ground floor."

The 11-storey building will have 134 units, starting at about $200,000. Construciton is scheduled to begin in early to mid 2011.

Writer: Bert Archer
Source: Joe Descenes-Smith

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Work began Friday on the Jarvis Street (or Ted Rogers Way) bike lanes that have been the source both of great anticipation and controversy over the past several months, since an environmental assessment resulted in the recommendation.

The project, which should be finished by the end of the week of July 26, will result in north- and south-bound bike lanes, and the elimination of the reversible middle lane of the formerly five-lane thoroughfare.

The environmental assessment was done to look into ways of improving the Jarvis streetscape and according to Daniel Egan, the city's bike infrastructure man, "there was such an overwhelming response from the bike community to add bike lanes" that they were included in what will ultimately be a larger improvement project, involving sidewalk improvements. "We're sticking with bike lanes now because it's a simple re-striping job," Egan says.

Egan also adds that there is expected to be little impact on car traffic as a result of the elimination of the fifth lane.

The budget for adding the bike lanes is $65,000.

Writer: Bert Archer
Source: Daniel Egan

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The contract to build the new $460-million Women's College Hospital has been awarded to a consortium including architectural firms Perkins Eastman Black and the IBI Group, and developer Bilfinger Berger Project Investments.

Known collectively as the Women's College Partnership, the group will design, build, finance and maintain the project, which is a redevelopment of the current hospital at 76 Grenville Street.

The new hospital will be 630,000 square feet, with the first phase scheduled to commence construction this summer, and the second phase slated for completion in 2016. The project will be funded by Infrastructure Ontario.

Marilyn Emery, the hospital's president and CEO, described the project in a press release as a "state-of-the-art facility will be an easily accessible hub of programs, clinics and services that integrates care, research and education � all based on how women lead their lives. It will be a hospital designed to keep people out of the hospital."

Writer: Bert Archer
Source: Tom Boreskie

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Two options for a new sports complex to be built in the Port Lands have gone to city council for discussion, one of which, a stacked, four-storey design, goes with the strong recommendation of both the Waterfront design review panel and a public meeting held late last week.

The site at the corner of the on Roadway and Commissioners Street, has been the focus of some controversy, including enthusiastic comment from several mayoral candidates who oppose the project entirely, more or less on the grounds that it would suburbanize Toronto's newest urban neighbourhood.

But John Campbell, Waterfront Toronto's president and CEO, says that if council approved the four-storey version, that won't be a problem.

"If you were in Toronto in the 70s when the Eaton Centre was built, there was no attention paid to the outside of the building, and it sterilized Yonge Street," he says. "My concern is to make sure the arena doesn't do the same thing. This will be an urban street in the future."

Though he says the city is still costing out the entire project, Campbell says that Waterfront's contribution will be $34 million.

The four-storey design is by Bob Goyeche of RDH Architects.

Writer: Bert Archer
Source: John Campbell

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Last week, the province took the first step towards making Ontario Place something other than a focus of nostalgia for people who remember when it meant something to them back in 1979.

Ontario Place Corporation, an agency of the provincial Ministry of Tourism and Culture, issued a request for information, or RFI, seeking interest from developers interested in handling the planned re-birth of the 96-acre site, most of which was landfill, which opened in 1971.

According to Hugh Mansfield, whose firm is handling the public relations, the RFI outlined five specific categories to be addressed in any new design, which he ranked in order of importance as education, culture, retail and dining, entertainment and a showcase for the province's efforts towards sustainability.

"There were a couple of contributing factors," Mansfield says of the motivation and timing of the project. "Attendance has dropped off dramatically, down 60 per cent from the mid-80s." He says that when the Place first opened, it drew between 2.8 and 2.9 million visitors a year, a number that's hovered for the past half dozen years at around a million, half of whom just go to the amphitheatre, and the majority of the rest of whom stick to the water park.

There is no budget set yet, but Mansfield says they expect the project to be a public-private partnership, which he says may include naming rights, but will not result in any sale of provincial land.

The deadline for the RFI is Sept. 10, after which an RFQ (request for qualifications) will be issued, followed by an RFP (request for proposals). The winner of the contract will be announced in July, 2011.

Writer: Bert Archer
Source: Hugh Mansfield

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A crew of about 50 is at work on the Burano condo tower being built at the intersection of Bay and Grenville. The seven levels of underground parking have been completed, and last week saw the pouring of the concrete for the third floor, the first to peak out above the hoardings of this long-planned, long-delayed project, a sister project to the completed Murano tower across Bay Street.

The 48-storey, 451-unit building, with 10,000 square feet of rental space to be available along Bay, is being built on the site of the old Addison on Bay Cadillac dealership, part of the facade of which is being incorporated into the new design by Peter Clewes.

"Later this summer, workers will begin reassembling and installing" the facade, says Beth Shropshire, spokeswoman for developer Lanterra, "which was dismantled and safely stored to be reutilized, along with the original doors to be added next year."

Occupancy is scheduled for next summer.

Writer: Bert Archer
Source; Beth Shropshire

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The very slow process of replacing two of Toronto's better designed slab apartment buildings has finally reached the demolition stage. The north tower is expected to be gone by the end of this month, and the south tower by the end of August.

The Tweedsmuir Apartments, at 310 and 320 Tweedsmuir Avenue near Bathurst and St. Clair, were completed just months before the death of their designer, Peter Dickinson, in 1961 and have been mostly vacant for several years, with the last 25 tenants moving out last year.

The old towers had a total of about 250 rental units. The new configuration, designed by Page + Steele and owned and managed by Morguard, will house about 600, 350 rentals in the first and 250 units in the second tower which will, according to market conditions when it's completed, be either condos or rentals. There will be 146 units in the first rental tower set aside for tenants who had lived in the building as far back as about 1995, according to Morguard's director of development Brian Athey.

"We've worked very closely with our neighbours, especially the schools, to work out the times of days we take deliveries," Athey says. "We've co-ordinated with the school to do the heavy take-down of the south building while kids are on their break."

Demolition is expected to cost about $2 million, and construction of the first tower should begin in the spring of 2011, with a 2013 occupancy.

Writer: Bert Archer
Source: Brian Athey

Do you know of a new building going up, a business expanding or being renovated, a park in the works or even a cool new house being built in the neighbourhood? Please send your development news tips to [email protected].