Railway Lands: Blocks 18A+18B+18C (28 Rees St. east of CityPlace)

[grey]

Some of the signage in the Skywalk, which hasn't been updated since the 1980s, refers to "City Place" (clearly not the Concord Adex development two decades later). It even sort of has a logo. There's definitely some reference to "City Place" in union station where the old archival photos of the railway lands and harbour from the early 20th century are paired with the same scenes from about 1989.

Edit: sorry, Solaris already mentioned this on the last page

I think it you'll also find the same "City Place" logo around the old railway statue parkette and pathway that goes under the Spadina bridge west of the Skydome (which also predates the condos).

 

[TOfan696]

Metro Centre developed out of the idea of City place, if u read robert fulfords Accidental City there is a chapter on it

 

[Sir Novelty Fashion]

^ Interesting, thanks. I will.

 

[grey]

I think someone posted pictures from that book somewhere on the forum around a year ago. It might have been an old city document of the actual plan. I remember seeing pictures (horrifying pictures) of what they wanted to replace union station with.

 

[unimaginative2]

You guys are all kind of right about the name. Metro Centre was the original plan back in the 70s that initially involved demolishing Union Station, though later variations would have kept the Great Hall. It would have shifted the rail corridor south to run along the Gardiner in order to get rid of the tunnel effect that it currently presents and to free up the land for development. It was a massive plan, and also would have involved St. Jamestown-looking apartments on the current Cityplace site, as well as lots of office buildings and a convention centre, with the CN Tower as its centrepiece.

Once it was abandoned, in the 80s a new, less ambititous plan was developed named City Place. Not much happened until the late 90s when Concord bought the property. To throw even more into the mix, there was another plan by Marathon (CP's real estate arm) called Southdown to develop the current Maple Leaf Square/Infinity/Telus area with office buildings.

The big problem with Metro Centre was that it was planned during a pretty terrible time for architecture and urban planning. From the renderings presented, it looks like one enormous Hudson Bay Centre. Though I've always said that there's a place in my heart for Hudson's Bay Centre, blocks and blocks of it would have been a catastrophe. On the other hand, the original renderings for the Eaton Centre looked a lot like the Metro Centre plans, so maybe it would have turned out better than expected. On the whole, I think we really dodged a bullet on that one, but it's a shame that such ambitious planning, especially burying the rail corridor, seems impossible today.

I'm really disappointed about the senior's home falling through. I wish they could build something on that Enwave site. That whole stretch of Bremner is pretty dead along the SkyDome.

 

[adma]

Given how John Andrews was involved, I suspect Metro Centre would have turned out, on aesthetic terms, much "better" than the Hudson's Bay Centre--though much better for the worse, perhaps...

 

[unimaginative2]

John Andrews was a great architect, but I definitely don't think the scale and setting would be well-suited to his style at that time. Scarborough College, on a nice site out in a forest, was perfect for him.