Employment : Development News

Development in Toronto and East York overshadowed growth in Etobicoke York, North York and Scarborough last year, but North York’s Committee of Adjustment was pretty darn busy.

In its 2015 annual report, Toronto City Planning department paints a picture in numbers of how much the city is growing and changing. In the district of Toronto and East York, encompassing the “old” city of Toronto including downtown, there were 93 new development projects, 1,408 applications to the committee of adjustment for smaller changes to properties and an impressive 1,833 applications for heritage permits. In North York, there were 63 new development projects, 1,216 applications to the committee of adjustment and 135 heritage permit applications. In the west, in Etobicoke York, there were 53 new development projects, 871 applications to the committee of adjustment and 114 heritage permit applications.

Things were more sluggish in Scarborough, which saw 45 new development projects, 485 applications to the committee of adjustment and 65 heritage permit applications.

But it’s not all about the numbers. The report highlights projects the city sees as game-changers. The Scarborough Civic Centre Library opened last year and construction began on the Guild Inn/Bickford House revitalization, which will bring a new banquet hall, restaurant and community centre to the heritage site about the Scarborough Bluffs. The Steeles–Redlea Regeneration Area Study has been established to create a planning framework for the parameters for future growth of one of the city’s newly designated Regeneration Areas.

On the waterfront, there’s the second phase of revitalization focusing on the port lands, the new Fort York bridge (which will begin construction soon) linking King Street West and Liberty Village to the Fort York neighbourhood, and the launch of Project: Under Gardiner, which will use a $25-million donation from the Judy and Wilmot Matthews Foundation to create public spaces beneath the western Gardiner from Strachan Avenue to Spadina Avenue.

Further north, there’s the Finch and Sheppard Light Rail Transit (LTR) Corridors, where the city is working on an updated planning framework to leverage infrastructure investment prior to the opening of the transit routes.

Just this week, Infrastructure Ontario and Metrolinx just invited three consortium teams to submit proposals to design, build, finance and maintain the Finch West Light Rail Transit (LRT) project.

Writer: Paul Gallant
Source: City of Toronto

The city is moving ahead on a proposal to a Toronto District School Board property into a hub for food and learning.

As Yonge Street reported in the spring, the 7.3-acre site at the corner of Bloor Street and Dufferin Street) is home of Bloor Collegiate Institute, Alpha II Alternative School and Kent Senior Public School. But the TDSB has designated the property for redevelopment and the city has put together an idea that would turn it into a community hub focusing on food and agriculture.

City council voted this week to enter into discussions with Toronto Lands Corporation (which is tasked with handling underused TDSB real estate), the Toronto District School Board, the province and FoodShare, a non-profit that works with communities and schools to deliver healthy food and food education, and other groups to come up with a plan. FoodShare’s HQ is already in the neighbourhood. The total property involved in a deal would be 10.4 acres and include Brockton High School, though a portion of the property would likely be sold to private developers to generate some revenue from the project.

“The property is strategically important for all four of the city’s defined municipal interests in school properties, and in particular is recommended as the setting for a flagship urban agriculture centre/community food hub, as requested by Council in 2013,” states the city’s agenda item. “Such a hub would promote linkages between education, community economic development and a healthy, sustainable urban food system.”

The staff report points out that there is a significant shortfall of licensed infant child care spaces in
Ward 18, where the property is located, as well as a shortage of parkland, both of which could be remedied with the right kind of facility. Since the provincial government has made the creation of community hubs one of its signature priorities, the city is hoping there will be increased motivation (and possibly cash) to make it happen. “Hubs can provide co-located services that are managed and delivered separately, or the hubs may be coordinated to respond to specific needs, populations, or sectors,” states the report. “Community hubs are advantageous in Toronto for many reasons, including potential cost-savings, service alignments and integration, the ability to target priority populations, bringing services to residents in their neighbourhoods, providing better customer service, and maximizing the use of and repurposing of public property. Every community hub will be spatially and organizationally unique, to reflect local conditions and community needs.”

An urban agriculture centre would provide education and training around growing food, provide economic opportunities and pathways to employment in the food processing and catering sectors, improve the city’s green infrastructure and create a vibrant public space.

The TDSB will review an updated report on the proposal next month.

Writer: Paul Gallant
Source: City of Toronto

UPDATE: The headline and story have been amended to reflect council adopting the item at its Sep. 30 session.

Last week city council voted to develop a proposal that would transform the school lands near the intersection of Bloor and Dufferin Streets into a community hub.
 
The Toronto District School Board (TDSB) declared the lands surplus in 2013 and moved to sell off 7.3 acres of the 10.4 acre parcel of land, including Kent Senior Public School, Bloor Collegiate Institute, Alpha II Alternative School and assorted green spaces.
 
Last spring, the city expressed an interest in buying part of the land, but the Toronto Lands Corporation, which handles property no longer required by the TDSB, only wanted to sell the full 7.3-acre parcel. Things have changes since then. The provincial government has made the creation of community hubs a priority and the TDSB has expressed a new interest in exploring hub possibilities rather than selling the property outright.
 
“There would be significant benefits of moving forward with a community hub model on the Bloor-Dufferin School Lands site as there already have been discussions and interest on the part of the City, the Toronto District School Board, the Toronto Catholic District School Board, the community and social service agencies,” states a motion by Councillor Ana Bailão, who represents Ward 18, where the property is located.
 
City council supported Bailão’s motion unanimously. The hub proposal is expected to go to council’s executive committee on September 21.
 
Writer: Paul Gallant
Source: City Council

Toronto City Council has accepted a compromise from Markham-based SiteLine Group that would provide light industrial space in proposed condo development to make up for the demolition of a Dufferin Street building where more than 150 people currently work.
 
As Yonge Street wrote earlier this month, SiteLine plans to erect a large mixed-use complex at 390-444 Dufferin Street, where a low-rise industrial space now provides a home to small enterprises like the Akin Collective, the Brockton Collective, Canadian Salvage Timer and Design Republic. The city had originally rejected the proposal because it turns designated employment lands into mostly residential lands.
 
Facing an Ontario Municipal Board (OMB) hearing this week, SiteLine offered a compromise that would dedicate about 18,000 square feet of the development to light industrial uses, with a separate loading dock, elevators and HVAC in the north section of the complex. That’s roughly equivalent to the amount of employment space in the existing building. A portion of that space would be part of a city-run small-business incubator providing below-market rents, a new concept from the city’s Economic Development department. The original incubator offer was for 10 years. The remainder of the proposed two-building, three-tower development would be comprised of 369 residential units.
 
That offer raised the ire of some attendees at a community meeting earlier this month. Residents said they were losing more than they were gaining, and worried that just 10 years of an incubator would not be enough to jumpstart businesses in the area. So the city continued to negotiate with SiteLine. Late last week the two parties struck a deal that would increase the lifespan of the incubator to 25 years.
 
“We’re not happy about how it’s ended, but there is a bit of a consolation prize in this incubator and that the city’s Economic Development department is keen to proceed with that,” says Charles Campbell, a member of the Active 18 Community Association, which was granted party status at the OMB hearings.
 
Active 18 had wanted SiteLine to at least double the amount of space dedicated to industrial employment because it was changing the official designation of the property, and because many of the existing tenants may not survive the transition.
 
“It’s not going to be as affordable as the old warehouse space and it’s going to be of a different sort,” says Campbell. “It’s not going to be dirty, messy, smelly kinds of work. It’ll be for more high-tech kinds of things. We’re losing jobs that we liked, but you have to figure into that that the city has no real ability to stop the developer from tearing down the existing building.”
 
SiteLine Group president Josh Silber said good compromises leave everyone a little unhappy, but is generally pleased with the outcome.

"We're excited to be partnering with the city to pioneer an incubator space that will help startups in Toronto," says Silber.

The company is now looking at options that will help take the project to market. Silber says it's too early to say when demolition and construction will begin. "We've got a lot of work we need to get done."
 
Writer: Paul Gallant
Source: Charles Campbell, Josh Silber

City council must decide this week whether it will demand more of a developer that wants to tear down a light industrial building on Dufferin Street to erect three mostly residential towers.
 
The development application for 430-444 Dufferin Street has been in play since 2011 and would see a high-rise complex built on Dufferin between the railway tracks and Alma Street. The current proposal from Markham’s SiteLine Group, for two eight-storey towers and one 12-storey tower providing a total of 369 residential units, is slated to go to the Ontario Municipal Board on June 15.
 
At issue is whether SiteLine’s promise to include about 60,000 square feet of light industrial space over multiple floors of the north tower adequately makes up for the loss of an equivalent amount of light industrial space in the existing single-storey building. More than 150 people currently work there at enterprises such as the Akin Collective, the Brockton Collective, Canadian Salvage Timer and Design Republic. The property is zoned as employment lands and the city has opposed the application so far because it worries that losing real estate zoned for light industry will hurt the city’s long-term prosperity.
 
As a compromise, SiteLine put forward a proposal this month that would dedicate about half of the north tower to light industrial uses, providing a separate elevator, loading dock and HVAC system to separate the workshop spaces from the residential spaces. But at a community meeting last week, tenants of the existing building expressed concerns that they’d be able to afford the space in the new building and whether they’d be able to wait out the construction period, which could be years.
 
The city has persuaded SiteLine to dedicate a percentage of the industrial space to a business incubator. It’s a new concept for Toronto—and perhaps even for Canada—that would provide below-market space and other supports to nurture small-scale manufacturers, artisans and artists in the building.
 
“We want residents to be able to create in their own neighbourhood,” said Nirvana Champion, economic development officer at the City of Toronto, who presented the incubator concept to the community.
 
But attendees at the meeting were skeptical about the level of commitment—and the length of commitment—the developer was prepared to make to the incubator.
 
“This needs to be in perpetuity or for a long time,” said Ward 18 Councillor Ana Bailão, who called the community meeting. “If we make this building successful, there might be a better chance of another building [in the same employment lands area] doing the same thing.”
 
Council will vote this week on whether to accept SiteLine’s current proposal, which includes the incubator. If it votes yes, the project is expected to move ahead as proposed. If council votes against the proposal that’s on the table, the OMB will grapple with the case. “Honestly, it could go either way,” says Bailão, “but I think the community really needs to benefit from this.”
 
Writer: Paul Gallant
Sources: Ana Bailão, Nirvana Champion and Sarah Phipps

Have you ever thought of working in a food court?

John White at WZMH Architects thinks you should, and suggests if you haven't, you may already be behind the curve.

“One of the interesting things that we found in designing Waterpark Place is that the food courts are taking on a new identity,” he says, referring to the 30-storey RBC-branded building just south of Queens Quay that officially opened in December. It's the southernmost point in the underground PATH system, and also features a 627-seat food court, designed by WZMH.

White says that RBC, along with other large firms such as Deloitte, have started operating their offices using something called hotelling. The idea is that instead of having your own office, cubicle or desk, you reserve one, per your needs, each morning, whatever you need to keep at the office relegated to an assigned drawer.

“It is no longer a fixed-seat concept,” White says. “The food court is becoming the fixed seat.”

But even without hotelling, and the office downsizing that's prompted it -- seeing per-worker office space reduced from an average of 150 square feet, according to White, down to 100 – you might already have noticed the shift. That is, serious people interviewing other serious people for serious jobs in public, and professionals meeting in surroundings that afford a good deal less formality – and possibly even more security – than is possible in an office.

To cater to this, WZMH has designed its Waterpark food court with three themes.

“Lounge seating has a living room feel,” he says, “like the high-end waiting area of an office. Business casual has tables scattered around that can be collected into boardroom-sized surface. Urban is more communal table seating.”

They've also incorporated two skylights to provide the sort of atmosphere conducive to long-term sitting.

According to White, the food court vendors are onside with the new dynamic, figuring what they lose in turnover, they gain in larger groups.

White sees this conscious food court design as the beginning of an inevitable trend that will involve the entire PATH system realizing that it's no longer catering to an office-bound, or even 9-5 world.

“More than transitory spaces you move through,” he says, “these are spaces you will inhabit.”

Writer: Bert Archer
Source: John White
 

A discussion among three architects and a community organizer managed, if just for a morning, to shift the focus away from condos toward what architecture can do for the city and its people, and how.

Janna Levitt, Marianne McKenna, and Michael McLelland joined Rosalyn Morrison of the Toronto Community Foundation to discuss various ways architecture and architects can contribute to the city’s social health.

"We're a firm about ideas," said Marianne McKenna, the "M" in KPMB. "How do we restore our position in society as advocates?"

"Other people make things," said McLelland of ERA Architects, picking up the theme. "Architects, like artists, are generally about ideas. Part of that means solving complex problems. I don’t love anything better than a fantastic problem."

And though some of those problems are problems of design, many of them aren’t. Levitt, of LGA Architectural Partners, spoke of her firm's work helping non-profit clients raise funds to get their project done. McKenna spoke of working with Manitoba Hydro on their zero-footprint building in Winnipeg to ensure the 3,000 newly consolidated employees would both benefit and integrate into their new neighbourhood by leaving out any cafeteria space, ensuring a large new client base for cafes and restaurants in the area.

The talk was hosted by the Design Exchange and sponsored by Shimmerman Penn accountants.

Writer: Bert Archer