Toronto 245 Queen Street East | 94.3m | 25s | ONE Properties | Graziani + Corazza

It's not a case of conflict of interest. Every developer must pay for a range of studies which cover the various impacts of their proposal, including a heritage impact assessment. All of the studies argue the merits of each aspect of the proposal's design, but the City vets all of the reports to see whether the plans actually do meet their requirements and standards. It's not like the reports are all accepted, no questions asked: through the planning process the City typically seeks any changes they feel necessary to end up with a solid plan.

Sure, developers usually ask for more density than they expect they'll wind up with, and negotiations are normally quite complex covering many issues, but as part of the process the developers don't really say "approve this plan or i'll knock down heritage resource X". The typical angle is more like "since we're going to save heritage resource X, you should grant us Y density so we can afford to do it". If the whole package is acceptable to the City, they get recommended for approval by Council, if not, they can appeal to the OMB. By the time they're at the OMB, they're typically fighting about height and density issues and have usually worked out heritage preservation plans already.

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interchange42 said:
It's not a case of conflict of interest. Every developer must pay for a range of studies which cover the various impacts of their proposal, including a heritage impact assessment. All of the studies argue the merits of each aspect of the proposal's design, but the City vets all of the reports to see whether the plans actually do meet their requirements and standards. It's not like the reports are all accepted, no questions asked: through the planning process the City typically seeks any changes they feel necessary to end up with a solid plan.
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I accept that this is the intended result of the process, but I don't think it always works quite so well in practice. Not to take this too far off-topic, but I was part of a fight in Kitchener to save some warehouse buildings that were proposed to be levelled for a parking lot, and the developer paid for a heritage impact assessment that said the buildings were worthless. I read the report (it was from a very well-regarded firm that also prepares a lot of heritage studies in Toronto) and could hardly believe what I saw in there. These buildings were some of the last of their kind in the city and were part of a complex, a bit like the Distillery District, where the significance lay in the relationships between the individual buildings and their value as a whole. The report ignored the context, treated them as standalone buildings, and conveniently concluded that they could be demolished with minimal impact. And of course it had to, because it was commissioned by a developer that wanted to knock the buildings down. What else would it have said? And the city accepted the report and gave the developer permission to demolish all of the buildings. Now there's a gravel parking lot (and the one building that the developer spared is now being adaptively reused as an office for Deloitte). Anyway.

Maybe staff in Toronto are more skeptical. I hope so.

To my mind, the difference between heritage studies and the other materials submitted with zoning or site plan applications is the level of objectivity. You can't prepare a BS sun/shadow study or wind study, because they rely on measurable, scientific things. Heritage is a human construct and is necessarily subjective. Whether a building is "important in defining, maintaining, or supporting the character of an area" is a value judgement, and that kind of judgement doesn't lend itself well to reports commissioned by parties seeking a particular outcome. That's the conflict that bothers me.

Anyway, I'll get off my soapbox now -- and I do appreciate the factual and informative response to my cynicism.
 
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denfromoakvillemilton said:
I think the community needs this from what I see here.
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Is the direct solution to social issues is to build unaffordable housing and mid-range retail? I'm not saying it can't be part of improving a neighbourhood, but I can think of a ton of different approaches (Vancouver's Woodwards redevelopment comes to mind) that would be more appropriate.
 
modernizt said:
Is the direct solution to social issues is to build unaffordable housing and mid-range retail? I'm not saying it can't be part of improving a neighbourhood, but I can think of a ton of different approaches (Vancouver's Woodwards redevelopment comes to mind) that would be more appropriate.
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DSC said:
Well, the 'community', as represented by the local neighbourhood associations and the local BIA do not agree.
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Probably, but it seems this the quickest way to gentrify the area.
 
smably said:
I accept that this is the intended result of the process, but I don't think it always works quite so well in practice. Not to take this too far off-topic, but I was part of a fight in Kitchener to save some warehouse buildings that were proposed to be levelled for a parking lot, and the developer paid for a heritage impact assessment that said the buildings were worthless. I read the report (it was from a very well-regarded firm that also prepares a lot of heritage studies in Toronto) and could hardly believe what I saw in there. These buildings were some of the last of their kind in the city and were part of a complex, a bit like the Distillery District, where the significance lay in the relationships between the individual buildings and their value as a whole. The report ignored the context, treated them as standalone buildings, and conveniently concluded that they could be demolished with minimal impact. And of course it had to, because it was commissioned by a developer that wanted to knock the buildings down. What else would it have said? And the city accepted the report and gave the developer permission to demolish all of the buildings. Now there's a gravel parking lot (and the one building that the developer spared is now being adaptively reused as an office for Deloitte). Anyway.

Maybe staff in Toronto are more skeptical. I hope so.

To my mind, the difference between heritage studies and the other materials submitted with zoning or site plan applications is the level of objectivity. You can't prepare a BS sun/shadow study or wind study, because they rely on measurable, scientific things. Heritage is a human construct and is necessarily subjective. Whether a building is "important in defining, maintaining, or supporting the character of an area" is a value judgement, and that kind of judgement doesn't lend itself well to reports commissioned by parties seeking a particular outcome. That's the conflict that bothers me.

Anyway, I'll get off my soapbox now -- and I do appreciate the factual and informative response to my cynicism.
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I don't agree with the conclusions of every heritage impact assessment I've read either, including from firms that I've seen do solid work otherwise.

So yes, the developer's studies are not without bias, but I think the system still makes sense; landowners do have rights to do what they want on their property within the restrictions placed on it. When they want to go beyond the restrictions, they have to be able to argue for their plan, whether it be about traffic impacts or shadows or heritage. The developer knows the City is going to push back where it doesn't agree.

I think the City should have to explain (and defend) its POV on a new development; that a design might make it too windy on this corner, or that park Z two blocks away should not be shadowed, or that three building facades are worth saving on the site—not just two—or that an interior of a heritage building might actually be important too, as a City's demands are ultimately subjective as well. Even if they are drawn up in the best interests of sockety, they still have to be tested from time to time.

One recent example of where I thought Heritage Preservation was asking too much was at Bay + Scollard, where they recommended turning down a request by the developer to move a pair of heritage homes east by something like 20 metres to create a public space at the corner. Ultimately politics become a part of weighing the arguments, and in this case Kristyn Wong-Tam stepped in to okay the lateral move of the houses as having more pros than cons as part of this development. We won't always agree on the result, but that's an example of where I think the convoluted process worked.

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A few things on the new drawings.

Firstly - a 150 room hotel is now part of the project.

A placeholder for the proposed TTC station is on there and the heritage locations along Queen are identified

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Similarly the heritage facades on the Richmond side are identified as being retained - the corner building is not included in the proposal now.

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And the render shows 263/265 Queen façade incorporated. It's hard to tell about 251 Queen - but the lower windows in the current building appear to be there too - who knows

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denfromoakvillemilton said:
Probably, but it seems this the quickest way to gentrify the area.
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It would be, but the City has responsibilities that go beyond simple gentrification. Sweeping marginalized people under the carpet is something that the City is trying to avoid: there are complex issues here.

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Definitely think they should save the entire facade of 251 Queen- I would say this building has more architectural value than the bank building demolished last week, and even 263/265 Queen.

Anyone have a link to the documents?
 
denfromoakvillemilton said:
Probably, but it seems this the quickest way to gentrify the area.
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In fairness, there is no reason why building affordable housing should be a "quicker" way to improve an area than a mix of affordable housing - it's about political willpower. But if we're talking about gentrifying the area (which has an inherent quality of 'pushing out those with fewer resources') then yes, this would be the preferred option.

I think the onus is on those of us with a keen interest in city development, here on UT, and anyone else who cares about their city - to create that political willpower. To just cheer on gentrification isn't really improving things beyond their appearance.
 
modernizt said:
In fairness, there is no reason why building affordable housing should be a "quicker" way to improve an area than a mix of affordable housing - it's about political willpower. But if we're talking about gentrifying the area (which has an inherent quality of 'pushing out those with fewer resources') then yes, this would be the preferred option.

I think the onus is on those of us with a keen interest in city development, here on UT, and anyone else who cares about their city - to create that political willpower. To just cheer on gentrification isn't really improving things beyond their appearance.
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interchange42 said:
It would be, but the City has responsibilities that go beyond simple gentrification. Sweeping marginalized people under the carpet is something that the City is trying to avoid: there are complex issues here.

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I agree, but it seems that the city is only focused on pushing the crime out of the area right now. There needs to be a wholesale solution, affordable housing sounds good, but improved social services needs to happen too.
 
denfromoakvillemilton said:
I agree, but it seems that the city is only focused on pushing the crime out of the area right now. There needs to be a wholesale solution, affordable housing sounds good, but improved social services needs to happen too.
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Nothing wrong with pushing out crime. And in terms of social housing this area has more than its fair share right now. That includes city housing, shelters and social services. Better to bring projects like this in to mix it up. I've been in the area for 25 years now and the condos on Sherbourne (Mozo, Modern for example) have done wonders for an area that was pretty scary back then.
 
Edward Skira said:
Nothing wrong with pushing out crime. And in terms of social housing this area has more than its fair share right now. That includes city housing, shelters and social services. Better to bring projects like this in to mix it up. I've been in the area for 25 years now and the condos on Sherbourne (Mozo, Modern for example) have done wonders for an area that was pretty scary back then.
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I live right in the centre of the roughest part of Moss Park and I vehemently disagree that the solution is to "push out crime" by introducing developments that don't contain an integrative affordable component.
 
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