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Pinewood Studios 2.5 Million Sq/ft development (1000 Condos, Hotel, Retail)

I guess the plans to expand it is still in the works.:)

Behind the Scenes of Pinewood Toronto Studios
http://torontoist.com/2011/04/behind-the-scenes_of_pinewood_toronto_studios.php?gallery0Pic=2

Just as extraordinary as Pinewood Toronto's sheer square-footage is its plan to build an inhabited movie set on the stretch of waterfront land on its property. As announced by the Star last November, Pinewood is planning to develop the parcel of land into waterfront condos, business complexes, a hotel, a shopping promenade, and a few square blocks designed to resemble a handful of cities from around the world, useful for shooting exterior scenes. All in an area now defined by its proximity to a bunch of cement plants and its access to the mostly deserted Lower Don Rec Trail.

If all goes according to plan, you could purchase a condo in fake-London, walk a few blocks to get a coffee in fake-Chicago, and then turn the corner into fake–New York, just for a little culture, and be home in time for cornflakes. Imagine going on a mini-globetrot, just by strolling around part of the Port Lands. It's kind of like that sci-fi movie where the company can implant memories of fake vacations you never went on directly into your brain. What was that one called again?

The development is just another one of Pinewood’s multi-prong strategies to not just charm the chequebooks of major Hollywood studios, but to create jobs and stimulate the local economy. "Should a $180-million picture come to Toronto, it means about $100 million of that stays in the city," says Myers. "Every project is different, but it’s an enormous number of jobs...People are seeing Ontario as a fantastic place to shoot. And I think we're going to have a couple of very large feature films shooting here in Ontario, which we haven't had in a very long time. It builds on itself. The more people we can get to come to Toronto, the more people appreciate what a wonderful city it is, and how fantastic it is to shoot here."
 
I see Pinewood studios just cancelled a similar project planned for Buckinghamshire England. Any word on this project going ahead or being cancelled?

pinewood-pulls-plug-hollywood-project?
Pinewood studios has scrapped its £200m plan to build a 100-acre set in Buckinghamshire that aimed to rival Hollywood for the latest blockbuster films.

The owners of the studios, where the James Bond and Harry Potter films have been shot, had been working on ambitious plan which would have included up to 1,400 homes and 16 "streetscapes" for use in films.

The streetscapes – which would have included a permanent Venice canal, Parisian square, brownstone New York apartments as well as parts of New Orleans and San Francisco – would have been accompanied by apartments and houses for film workers as well as a school, theatre, cinema and sports facilities.
 
Living on a street zoned and purposed for movie making, for me, takes it to another level. This would imply that they would be imposing on the neighbourhood and certainly be taking more liberties with their movie making.
As mentioned in other replies, I think a lot of the impositions they make on existing neighborhoods would be very different in an area constructed specifically for film shoots. All those hospitality trailers are redundant, since you could walk 2 blocks and return to the permanent facility, for example. Lighting, generators, cables, etc... can all be planned for in advance and be connected to a central power facility. Residents would not require street parking like they do in other downtown neighborhoods and a connected underground parking system would allow them to enter or exit without disruption, if by a slightly different route.

If done right, the concept could work very well and with a living, working population there 24-7, it would not have a Disney feel at all. The architecture simply resembles other places. I could see a lot of people not only buying here, but paying a premium to do so.
 
The article (or announcement) is very short on details. When is the expansion going to be developed or are they waiting for transit and "city planning"? Is this just a stake in the ground for the moment?
 
The article (or announcement) is very short on details. When is the expansion going to be developed or are they waiting for transit and "city planning"? Is this just a stake in the ground for the moment?

Here you go..........Castlepoint will break ground on new Port Lands development near Pinewood Toronto Studios this week or next

Castlepoint Group announced Monday it will break ground this week or early next on three sound stages and an office development adjacent to the Pinewood Toronto Studios site in the Port Lands.

“I think it’s indicative to the fact that [the film industry in Toronto] did about $1.3-billion in revenues in 2011,” said Blake Steels, president of Pinewood. “We have demand. We had lots of opportunities we weren’t able to capitalize on because we didn’t have the space.”

The expansion, 40,000-square-feet of studio space and another 100,000-square-feet of office space, would allow for the production of either two large movies or a large movie and a big TV series simultaneously, with smaller projects going through as well
More....http://news.nationalpost.com/2012/0...r-pinewood-toronto-studios-this-week-or-next/
 
Has anyone heard anything about this project? I found some renders online.

Not sure if these have been posted:

pinewood-studios01.jpg


pinewood-studios02.jpg


pinewood-studios06.jpg


pinewood-studios03.jpg


I hope this happens sooner or later!
 
I don't have any inside information as to what the big players have in mind for down there. May it all happen sooner than I expect. But as far as I know, Pinewood is in phase two of its expansion and it's merely building more intermediate-sized sound stages, as well as perhaps more production office space. No condos that I've heard of. Not yet. I expect it will happen, in time, but any residential will be also cheek-to-jowl with brownfields and cement factories. It's not going to change as quickly as some might like. The portlands is a huge chunk of real estate, yes - but it will take time to re-shape it. I expect places like the lower Don will see radical transformations much more quickly than anything dramatic springing up along Commissioner or Unwin - it's still very much an old school industrial zone, complete with acres of ugly brownfields fronting the roads.

The film and television industry is doing relatively well right now but the skinny on the street is that the workload will take a significant hit in advance of the Pan Am Games, which is anticipated to be highly disruptive to all sorts of downtown businesses (but of course, other businesses can expect a nice surge, too, as an offset).
 
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If it's just purpose-built for additional studio and production office space, I wouldn't necessarily expect a great deal of flair in terms of bold architectural declarations. I'd love to be pleasantly surprised, though.

I'd expect to see some fairly utilitarian boxes being built - in addition to the ones already there - especially for new sound stages. And a new office block component, so as to accommodate additional production crew space. Retail? I'm guessing that provision would be fairly humble, created to service the existing, expanding business on Commissioner. Film and TV production crews work long hours... I can see java shops and graphics output bureaus working out there - not to mention special effects and post-production companies. Maybe a gym, a new eatery or two.

On the whole, it's great news for Toronto's local TV and film business - a resounding affirmation that it's come of age after decades of difficult ground work. Yes, the weak Canadian dollar is a huge factor and mustn't be discounted. But the long-term outlook for the business in Toronto looks very sound. Indeed, the wider GTA region is busy - tons of stuff happening not only in Leslieville and the Portlands, but also Etobicoke, Downsview, Scarborough, and Hamilton. Even Sudbury has seen a lot of business in the last few years. Pinewood has plans to keep building out in Toronto over several years to come. With big facilities we can continue to lure blockbuster feature projects - the kind of stuff that can be a real shot in the arm for the local economy. Perhaps just as importantly, there are now facilities in the GTA to accommodate pretty much every budget tier.... so much TV alone is being done here it's mind-blowing.

I've been waiting to hear about this for awhile now. I'm stoked.
 
Not sure where to put this.
 

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