Historic retail strips in Ontario

[Ed007Toronto]

"The GTA has some nice ones too. The ones I've seen are Unionville, Aurora, Newmarket, and Kleinburg. Richmond Hill is particularly nice"


I find the Richmond Hill one pretty dumpy. A mish mash of styles, some small strip malls, empty lots etc. And the retail that's there is also pretty bad. Rundown variety stores and restaurants, x-rated video stores and the like. Could easily fit in with some of Toronto's more rundown sections.

 

[spmarshall]

Yep, all in York Region. I don't think Chuck sees much of the GTA except York Region and perhaps a little bit of Toronto. :b

I agree that RH is a bit of a dump. I really like Streetsville. It really maintains the very-small-town feel to it. Other GTA faves are Oakville and Unionville. Brampton's has some good buildings, mixed in with some dumps.

 

[ganjavih]

Check out this document on historic storefronts: Conservation and Maintenance of Storefronts

Also, please post some images of your favourite historic retail strips in Ontario. Here are a few:

London

Perth

Toronto

Niagara-On-The-Lake

Ottawa

North Bay

St. Marys

 

[Junglab2002]

Aside from Toronto's Queen Street West, King Street East, and Front Street East, my favorite has got to be, of all places, Dundas ON - it still has a number of cast iron facades, quite heavily detailed. Sorry, no pics.

 

[afransen TO]

Its nice that that diagram informed us all what windows are...

 

[SD2]

Its nice that that diagram informed us all what windows are...

Yes...without those labels I don't think I would've ever figured out where the bottom and top of the building is.

 

[rdaner]

Put Stratford on the list as well as Cambridge.

 

[spmarshall]

Kingston is really good, as is Belleville, Port Hope and Cobourg (which is one of the first sketches, actually), as they are fairly vibrant, well-kept and historic. Stratford is amazing as well.

Cobourg photos

 

[Canuck 36]

I really liked the London retail strips - a very pleasant surprise while walking out of the bus station.

 

[AlchemisTO]

Peterborough's George street is definitely up there...

 

[Jarrek]

I'll post some photos of Stratford, Goderich, Coburg & Port Hope tonight.

I'll throw in Quebec City and Montreal as well, even it's not Ontario.

 

[miesvanderjoe]

Lotta nice stuff in Guelph, too. Sorry, no pics.

 

[ganjavih]

I looked for pics of Guelph, Stratford and Cambridge but couldn't find any good ones.

 

[SHORTY65]

The entire town of Perth is absolutely gorgeous, hard to believe it's only 20km from Ontario's armpit of Smiths Falls!!!

 

[Chuck100]

The GTA has some nice ones too. The ones I've seen are Unionville, Aurora, Newmarket, and Kleinburg. Richmond Hill is particularly nice. A consultant is currently working on a plan to restore Thornhill's mainstreet with a wall of 4 floor mixed use buildings on Yonge St to be integrated with the transitway.