The Parkway Forest Community Centre, will be an important component of the Parkway Forest master-planned community, Emerald City at Don Mills Road and Sheppard Avenue. The Diamond Schmitt Architects-designed Parkway Forest Community Centre is a 50,000-square-foot facility with a green roof, a commercial teaching kitchen and an adjacent Rooftop Garden. Programming spaces and facilities will include the first full-size gymnasium in the neighbourhood plus a running track, multi-purpose room, arts and crafts room, youth lounge, meeting room, weight room, aerobics and dance studio, and a YMCA-run daycare — another first, as the first purpose-built child care space in this community. An outdoor pool and pavilion with change rooms is also part of the complex. The Centre is being built to achieve Toronto’s second LEED Silver Certification for a Community Centre, Childcare and outdoor pool with Pavilion. It also marks the first community recreation infrastructure to appear in the neighbourhood in 20 years, making the groundbreaking special for the residents, the City and the developer.

The Community Centre will be part of Emerald City, a master-planned high-rise community under construction in the neighbourhood. Designed as a family-friendly, lifestyle-oriented urban option, the comprehensive plan for Emerald City includes a pedestrian-friendly plaza and 13-acre family park with children’s playground in addition to the Parkway Forest Community Centre, ideal complements to existent amenities that include schools and a library.