Toronto 283 Sheppard Avenue West | 51.9m | 14s | OTT Properties | RAW Design

[Northern Light]

New to the AIC is this application which seeks to redevelop 283-297 Sheppard West, on the south side of Sheppard just west of Senlac.

Site as it is, per Streetview:

The App:

Application Details

www.toronto.ca

@Paclo

From the above:

Just one render:

Site Plan:

Ground Floor Plan:

Stats are spread all over the place:

14s

139 units

28 parking spaces

7.8 FSI

Elevator Ratio: 2 elevators - 139 units - or 1 elevator per 70 units.

 

[jmi22]

How hard is it to widen the sidewalk, bring the building face up to the new property line, and plant trees in the boulevard between the roadway and the sidewalk. It's only been the standard for like... two centuries

 

[Tuscani01]

How hard is it to widen the sidewalk, bring the building face up to the new property line, and plant trees in the boulevard between the roadway and the sidewalk. It's only been the standard for like... two centuries

Unfortunately, this part of Sheppard requires an insane ROW widening because 'Urban Design'...

 

[Northern Light]

Unfortunately, this part of Sheppard requires an insane ROW widening because 'Urban Design'...

Is this a UD thing or an Official Plan thing?

I see the ROW here in the OP is listed as 36M; when I measure property line to property line I get just over 23M; assuming you divided the difference in two, that's a 6.5M to the City from each side of the road.

Presumably this is intended to accommodate an additional lane each way, as otherwise you've got 10.5m sidewalk zones.

****

Given a proposed (and likely) subway here, I think additional lanes are not warranted and the ROW ask can be shrunk. 27M should be ample.

 

[Tuscani01]

Is this a UD thing or an Official Plan thing?

I see the ROW here in the OP is listed as 36M; when I measure property line to property line I get just over 23M; assuming you divided the difference in two, that's a 6.5M to the City from each side of the road.

Presumably this is intended to accommodate an additional lane each way, as otherwise you've got 10.5m sidewalk zones.

****

Given a proposed (and likely) subway here, I think additional lanes are not warranted and the ROW ask can be shrunk. 27M should be ample.

It's an OP thing, but the space isn't required for lane widening and is being used for sidewalk and grass as per the Sheppard-Lansing Secondary Plan.

5.2 Sheppard Avenue Promenade
The Sheppard Avenue West Promenade will include boulevard improvements consisting of wider pedestrian sidewalks, installation of street furniture and tree planting on both sides of Sheppard Avenue West and side streets connecting to Sheppard Avenue West, and include the integration of bicycle and shared mobility facilities within the boulevard

5.5 Landscaped setbacks on Sheppard Avenue West will be used to screen residential uses located at grade from street activity and provide at-grade amenity for nonresidential uses where provided.

6.1.1 To achieve balanced mobility options and implement "Complete Street" design elements, Sheppard Avenue West will protect for a 36 metre right-of-wayincluding: the existing four travel lanes, left-turn-lanes at signalized intersections, separated on-street bicycle lanes; potential boulevard parking facilities, tree planting, enhanced sidewalks and other streetscape improvements, such aspedestrian amenities and sustainable mobility facilities

 

[Northern Light]

It's an OP thing, but the space isn't required for lane widening and is being used for sidewalk and grass as per the Sheppard-Lansing Secondary Plan.

5.2 Sheppard Avenue Promenade
The Sheppard Avenue West Promenade will include boulevard improvements consisting of wider pedestrian sidewalks, installation of street furniture and tree planting on both sides of Sheppard Avenue West and side streets connecting to Sheppard Avenue West, and include the integration of bicycle and shared mobility facilities within the boulevard

5.5 Landscaped setbacks on Sheppard Avenue West will be used to screen residential uses located at grade from street activity and provide at-grade amenity for nonresidential uses where provided.

6.1.1 To achieve balanced mobility options and implement "Complete Street" design elements, Sheppard Avenue West will protect for a 36 metre right-of-wayincluding: the existing four travel lanes, left-turn-lanes at signalized intersections, separated on-street bicycle lanes; potential boulevard parking facilities, tree planting, enhanced sidewalks and other streetscape improvements, such aspedestrian amenities and sustainable mobility facilities

You know this stuff, but for the audience here......

The budgeted space for a standard vehicle lane is 3.0M, though curb lanes are often 3.5M

So that gets you to 15-16M from curb to curb.

If you add 'basic' cycle tracks, without boulevard separations (like University south of College); you need ~2.5M each, that gets you to 20-21M, in general, a main street sidewalk zone in Toronto is 6M these days (varies) that includes a landscape zone and a pedestrian clearway.

So that gets you to 32-33M. If they boulevard the Cycle Track, that's another 1M total (both sides) for 34M. So you get sidewalk zones at ~7M, or slimmer cycle tracks and and roads and sidewalk zones exceeding 8M

That's on the excessive side.

I'm sympathetic w/the notion, to a point.......but for where Sheppard is at now, that far west of Yonge, that's a lot.

 

[Tuscani01]

For reference, one just needs to look at Sheppard East for an example of what this looks like built-out. (Just missing the bike lanes)

 

[Northern Light]

For reference, one just needs to look at Sheppard East for an example of what this looks like built-out. (Just missing the bike lanes)

View attachment 683263

When Cycle Tracks go in, the Centre lane would come out, but the parking lay-bys are an issue here as well. I'm undecided on the building setbacks as such, what I don't like, in the image above, is the landscaping being between the sidewalk and the building, that makes the pedestrian experience substantially worse.

 

[jmi22]

For reference, one just needs to look at Sheppard East for an example of what this looks like built-out. (Just missing the bike lanes)

And then the people at Urban Design wonder why no one jumps to their defense when Ford tries to get rid of them.

I've seen better urban infill in Texan suburbs for the love of god

 

[jmi22]

It's an OP thing, but the space isn't required for lane widening and is being used for sidewalk and grass as per the Sheppard-Lansing Secondary Plan.

It would be tolerable if the row widening was used to create actual urban streetscapes, instead of the Garden City lawns that we are still demanding a quarter of the way into the 21st century somehow.

To see this done decently enough, one must travel all the way to the exotic lands known as Etobicoke City Centre, where some budding urbanist realized a sidewalk should be made of pavement, not grass.