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The Toronto Wildlife Centre has submitted a proposal to build a new location in northeast Scarborough at 6461 Steeles Ave East, between Markham Road ad Sewells Road, and within the boundaries of Rouge National Urban Park. Submitted to the City last week, the plan calls for a newly built, two storey building spanning 4,300 m², and an alteration to an existing on-site heritage structure. The building is designed by Stanford Downey Architects, a Toronto firm best known for One King West Hotel and Residences. The completed facility would house surgical assessment and diagnostic rooms, a call centre, offices, and public education display areas while the heritage building will serve as a residence for interns working and living on site.
Toronto Wildlife Centre is a charity that focuses on care for sick, injured or orphaned wild animals. Since 1993 they have cared for an average of 5000 patients annually, ranging in size from hummingbirds to wolves. The animals are typically brought to the centre by the public—which currently operates right next to the runway of Downsview Airport in North York—and are rehabilitated before they are returned to their natural habitat.
Because of the Rouge Park location of the new centre, the proposal has to adhere to the strict frameworks of the Growth for the Greater Golden Horseshoe and Greenbelt Plans. The proposed building’s footprint only accounts for 2% of the developable area of the site. 55% of the site’s natural self-sustaining vegetation will be left completely untouched. The facility will include 6 outdoor compounds, a resource not presently available to the current location beside Downsview Airport.
The site plan for the property, shown below, concentrates the new building, heritage residence, parking and facilities along the north side of the site and spaces out the outdoor compounds along the rest of the property, connecting them with a gravel servicing road.
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