Courtesy:
www.insidetoronto.com
SUSAN O'NEILL
Apr. 27, 2006
Bridgepoint expansion plans get green light
Half-round building will be demolished
The redevelopment of the Riverdale Hospital site is on track to proceed after city council passed the final approvals required for the project Tuesday.
However, the decision, which clears the path for Bridgepoint Health to build a 12-storey, 512-bed facility to replace the existing 504-bed hospital, plus another building with 160 long-term care beds, has been met with mixed reaction in the community.
"I'm really thrilled the hospital has got the final approval," said longtime Riverdale resident Jackie Barber. "Everybody wins on this."
But those who have been fighting to save the hospital's half-round building, which will be knocked down under Bridgepoint's redevelopment plan, aren't viewing council's decision as a win for the community.
"Looking at that much-loved, semi-circular monument from the Don Valley is certainly a testament of what it is to be a proud Torontonian living in a beautiful city," Davis Mirza, one of the community members who has been fighting to save the half-round building, wrote in a submission to council this week.
Mirza had called on council to declare the building a heritage site.
"I urge city council to immediately declare the half-round building a heritage site; its possible refurbishment as a disability housing co-op, cultural community centre and/or art college with its own performing arts stage would make it an attractive showpiece for Toronto's possible bid for the World's Fair in 2015," Mirza said, who maintains the building's advantages outweigh its disadvantages.
"I know how strongly people feel about this. It's the saddest part of this redevelopment," Ward 30 Councillor Paula Fletcher (Toronto-Danforth) said of the fact the half-round building will be demolished.
"I'm not denying the sadness of that," Fletcher said, noting that city staff looked at every option possible in an effort to protect the building.
Despite the loss of the half-round building, the councillor said the redevelopment plans do include some positive aspects for the community.
The motions approved by council Tuesday, which included a series of land transactions, will ensure that a hospital remains on the site for at least 40 years, up from 10 in the original plans; that the land exchange for parkland will result in more green space for public use; that the surface parking on site will be eliminated; the old Don Jail will be restored and the new Don Jail will be closed.
"My commitment to the community is (to ensure) the new buildings will be significant and the hospital will be a beautiful landmark for Riverdale," Fletcher said.
Meanwhile, Barber said the new hospital will have positive impact on the broader city, which she maintained is in dire need of a state-of-the-art healthcare facility for patients requiring complex long-term care.
"Our population is getting older so our greater community is going to need more facilities for rehabilitation and long-term complex care," she said. "To have the new Bridgepoint Hospital build it a wonderful thing for the greater community."
Barber also said the patients being cared for in the current facility are deserving of a better environment in which to receive their treatment.
"That hospital was built in the 1950s. It was built as a place where people go who might get better … the rooms were designed for people who weren't going anywhere," she said, noting that the occupational therapy and physiotherapy facilities were designed for a small number of people.
"Now we have people who, 40 years ago, never would have survived, are being rehabilitated," she said.
"They are in bedrooms with no bathroom," she said, adding that patients often have to wear diapers because there is only one washroom facility on each floor.
"This is so degrading … it is a woefully, woefully out-of-date facility, a dehumanizing facility, through no fault of the people who work there … they do their best, but it is so small," Barber said.
As for the community of Riverdale, Barber said the neighbourhood will benefit from having a state-of-the-art hospital.
"They are going to get a brand new building instead of the decrepit building sitting there now," she said, noting the new hospital will improve the community from a visual point of view.
"Yes we're going to lose the half-round building, but what do you want? Do you want to punish hundreds of people every day for the sake of a building?" Barber said.
Riverdale resident Michael Koscec also questioned why people have become so attached to the half-round building.
"It is very unsightly and very ugly," he said. "It's a bad building … so what, it's half-round. That's the only thing it has going for it. If you look at it closely, it's a disaster of a building."
Koscec said the new hospital facility will be a much more attractive site visually and will fit well into the community.
He also said that having a hospital will be a great asset for the Riverdale neighbourhood.
"People seem to lose sight of the fact we're talking about people here … the patients. They need care and that takes precedence (over a building)," Kosec said.
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I have mixed blessings, as much as I enjoy the view of the half-circular from afar, the neighbourhood and city will benefit from having a state-of-the-art hospital in a brand new building. I'm looking forward to the Don Jail renovations and how they plan to incorporate with the new structure. The new park fronting Gerrard will include the orginal structures and I think the lawn bowling house currently sitting on the west side of the property.