Toronto Love Park | 3m | 1s | City of Toronto | CCxA

The plan for partially opening of the park will not happen due to various issues with an official now opening in May/June, depending on the outstanding work still to be done. A fair number of items stolen from site during the process that was one if things delaying the project was well strikes and supple chain.

The Pumphouse is being built now that will house the interior work that will take place over the winter months with a spring testing of the system.

The pouring of the base of the pond is a day by day thing base on the weather. In the spring, the stonework will be mortar to to the base so people cannot walk in the pond.

The building of the rest of the granite sidewalk will take place under heated tents

Final planting will take place in the spring including the Ivy on the trellis that will be fast growing material.

One berm will not be cover until all the work is done that requires equipment to go over it to do the work.

The bronze animal figures are about 90% complete with the city holding onto the molds to either replace them for what every reason to adding a few more. There will be steel rods to anchor them down in to concrete so no one can steal them and be install in the spring. The final location is being worked on at this time.

The stone work at the base of the moais tiles is supposed to stop skateboards and there are backup plans if it fails

Since you cannot see the heart shape of the pond at grade level, I would recommend an arial view of the area once it finish as a place map located at a number of locations along where things are located on it, as well as for taking wedding photos.

All run off water will go into a reservoir under the park to help the trees and plants as well not entering the city storm water system or onto other property.

One thing that can delay this opening is our famous Toronto Hydro who still has to install aluminum light poles, the transformer as well any other electrical work.

All the material for the benches are on hand to be install in the spring. Love Park on the base of the bench supports

City/Waterfront Photos
LoveParkBlueJay.v1.jpg
LoveParkFox.jpg
LovePark3.v1.jpg
 
From Second City, third floor yesterday.
View attachment 444549

Great contribution as always; does make me think of something negative though, just looking at how little of the Lake one can see from this shot and recalling that the York Quay condos never needed to be in existence at all. Sigh.

Just over 30 years ago, that site could have been secured parkland, and should have. Instead, Graywood was allowed to build that thing, there.
 
Great contribution as always; does make me think of something negative though, just looking at how little of the Lake one can see from this shot and recalling that the York Quay condos never needed to be in existence at all. Sigh.

Just over 30 years ago, that site could have been secured parkland, and should have. Instead, Graywood was allowed to build that thing, there.
Nah, York Quay are fine. Love the way they look too, very 'of a time', pomo-lite. Great, large, livable units in there too, nothing like what we see today.
 
Nah, York Quay are not fine. Love hate the way they look too, very 'of a time', pomo-lite.

Fixed that. LOL You're a great guy PE but boy do we not share taste some of the time.

I find these to be irredeemable junk.

But here's the thing, even if this had been something I loved otherwise, I wouldn't love it there. The City is too disconnected from the Lake, especially from York to Yonge.

There is nothing on the south side I don't regret being built there, and nothing I would shed a tear for if it were reduced to rubble.

The south side of Queen's Quay should have been entirely parkland except for any heritage industrial we chose to retain, like Queen's Quay Terminal or the silos. I think saving at least one more heritage pier building would have been nice.

Great, large, livable units in there too, nothing like what we see today.

That's a positive, but the answer to that was to have imposed minimum unit sizes a generation ago so we never got the trash interior designs we've seen since.
 
Last edited:
But here's the thing, even if this had been something I loved otherwise, I wouldn't love it there. The City is too disconnected from the Lake, especially from York to Yonge.
"The city" would feel largely disconnected from the lake even if not for those condos, in my view. The Gardiner is a large, imposing monolith that seems to totally cut off "Toronto proper" from the Watefront, it is a massive barrier to making the core of Toronto seem cohesive. The Waterfront feels like its own, completely separate town. I am similarly not a fan of where Union station is located, in a perfect world I think it would've been located somewhere further north near Queen or thereabouts, but that's an organic accident of history and not really anything anyone can do anything about.

I do agree however with your core premise. For being a city with a massive lakefront, it doesn't feel like that's a significant part of Toronto's identity at all. I am not entirely sure why that is, but when I was visiting NYC last month, I was struck by how integrated the waterways feel into the fabric of the city (speaking specifically on Manhattan and Downtown Brooklyn here). You just don't *get* that vibe with Toronto for the most part, I feel. Queen's Quay from York to Bathurst is very good, and there are other pockets of the city where this is true (The Beaches or Humber Bay) but that's about as far as it goes, in my view. Large swaths of Toronto's lakefront seem like a complete after thought and I think that's a great shame.
 
"Large swaths of Toronto's lakefront seem like a complete after thought and I think that's a great shame.
Agree 100% but the original City was the small section of "The Bay" from about Cherry to Fort York and much of that was marshland. When it was developed it was by extending the land out to accommodate railways and industrial uses and nobody ever thought of actually LIVING there or using any of it for recreation.
 
Correct, @DSC. It wasn't until Campeau came around in the mid-70s with 33 and 55 Harbour that people thought living there might be a thing they could do. Even the Hotel did disastrously the first couple of seasons and Bob had to sell it to Li Ka-Shing in the early 80s.
 
I remember my Dad driving us to see the CN Tower after it was first open to the public via The Gardiner. And it was seemingly a sea of warehouses and factories from coast to coast, back in the day...
 
Not to mention parking lots everywhere on both sides of the Gardiner. Of course the city and developers could have and should have done better in integrating the waterfront with downtown, but I can't abide people who wax nostalgic about how nice Toronto was in the '70s and '80s. Of course it was if you expect to be able to drive quickly from your suburban houses and find free or cheap parking within 3 minutes walk from your destination!
 
...and then Dad goes, "Let's eat at the Spaghetti Factory after..as we have a city of London, *UK's worth of car parks to chose from just on the otherside!" 🙀

*Note: We where originally from said country, in case anyone was wondering...
 
My bitch with the waterfront redevelopment that you are hiding the lake/harbour from public view both walking and driving, mainly driving.

Have always stated, public land up to a 1,000 feet from the water edge with a main road next to it follow by development sloping to the north. One only has to go to Zurich, Chicago and a number of other places where public space comes first before development.

Downside for this area is the road system and to do would see a winding road which is no big deal as it would slow traffic speed down and keep by passers on the Lake Shore.

There are a few locations where existing buildings must remain that were there before the 70's as part of our history for the waterfront

Love Park will make a great impact on the area once it opens next year

How many of those parking lots exist today in the photo about??
 

Back
Top