Toronto CampusOne Student Residence (was University Place) | 79.85m | 25s | Knightstone | Diamond Schmitt

See y'all at the meeting tonight?!

Haven't been to this library in years. Good memories.

greenleaf said:
245 College Street: Public Meeting

Date: Tuesday, February 21, 2012
Time: 6:30 - 8:00pm
Location: Lillian H. Smith Library, 239 College St (at Huron), Lower Level Auditorium

Councillor Vaughan and City Planning invite you to a public meeting about the development proposal at 245 College St. This is a proposed student residence building.

The original proposal for this site was for a 42-storey building. A revised proposal for a 24-storey building has been submitted.

Join Councillor Vaughan and City Planning staff to hear about the revised plans and provide your feedback.
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Went to the meeting tonight. As expected, there was a lot of opposition and local resistance. Even at 24 storeys, this project was unacceptable to the audience. Height, massing, and shadowing were still a large issue. The building having no parking was also a huge issue with the crowd, as some students will inevitably have cars which would require permit parking and overwhelm the already short supply on the streets in the area. The group of people from Glasgow Street, just south of the proposed building, were extra NIMBY-istic because this large mass will directly loom over their small side street. Also concern about the 700 or so units/people in the residence. Issue was brought up regarding the fact the "transient" population will cause safety and garbage concerns to the area. Names such as "boarding house" were shouted out, and typical student residence problems such as partying, drinking, drugs, sleaze, etc. were shared.

Important fact disclosed was that this is a private developers' residence project, not exactly a U of T rez building. The University has a part in developing it but the management will be by the developer (Knightstone?). Locals were concerned that because since this isn't a U of T building, it would pose security and safety problems. The U of T police will not have jurisdiction within this Rez, only private security guards will maintain order. This building will be available for a student of any university/college. People thought this kind of a concept would be potentially dangerous.

Don Schmitt (from Diamond & Schmitt) and Adam Vaughan were there to address the crowd. Schmitt presented two alternate proposals. One was 24s and the other was 22s, with a slight variation at the rear of the building. The would be a lobby entrance on College Street, as well as retail space for a cafe and bookstore. I was impressed by the renderings. The new renderings do look different from the ones we've seen before though. Gone is the fritted/frosted glass. The new design features more standard, grid window. The shape of the tower is still the same though. It reminds me of original design for Cube Lofts (N-Blox?) but with more box shifting. Overall, this revised proposal looks very promising but still faces stiff opposition ahead.
 
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Thans for the detailed report Travis!

42
 
i have two problems with this tower. 1- will it cut off pedestrians who walk south from college through the alleyway that connects to the "secret" north south street between huron and spadina? 2- there are actually places that building huge towers would go off without a hitch: the parking lot around Alumni Hall at Queens Park and St. Joseph, and the (rather large) parking lot between Con Hall and St. George (across from Mclennan Physical labs. both of these places are not near residential areas at all, are owned by the university, and already have tall buildings very close by.
 
Travis said:
Went to the meeting tonight. As expected, there was a lot of opposition and local resistance. Even at 24 storeys, this project was unacceptable to the audience. Height, massing, and shadowing were still a large issue. The building having no parking was also a huge issue with the crowd, as some students will inevitably have cars which would require permit parking and overwhelm the already short supply on the streets in the area. The group of people from Glasgow Street, just south of the proposed building, were extra NIMBY-istic because this large mass will directly loom over their small side street. Also concern about the 700 or so units/people in the residence. Issue was brought up regarding the fact the "transient" population will cause safety and garbage concerns to the area. Names such as "boarding house" were shouted out, and typical student residence problems such as partying, drinking, drugs, sleaze, etc. were shared.

Important fact disclosed was that this is a private developers' residence project, not exactly a U of T rez building. The University has a part in developing it but the management will be by the developer (Knightstone?). Locals were concerned that because since this isn't a U of T building, it would pose security and safety problems. The U of T police will not have jurisdiction within this Rez, only private security guards will maintain order. This building will be available for a student of any university/college. People thought this kind of a concept would be potentially dangerous.

Don Schmitt (from Diamond & Schmitt) and Adam Vaughan were there to address the crowd. Schmitt presented two alternate proposals. One was 24s and the other was 22s, with a slight variation at the rear of the building. The would be a lobby entrance on College Street, as well as retail space for a cafe and bookstore. I was impressed by the renderings. The new renderings do look different from the ones we've seen before though. Gone is the fritted/frosted glass. The new design features more standard, grid window. The shape of the tower is still the same though. It reminds me of original design for Cube Lofts (N-Blox?) but with more box shifting. Overall, this revised proposal looks very promising but still faces stiff opposition ahead.
Click to expand...

Curious as to just who were these locals making all the noise. Much of the area south of here is rented out to students... were they present at the meeting, or was it the landlords? Perhaps the landlords were posing as actual residents. They would be expected to make a lot of noise, as this building would be competition for them for rent money.
Your mentions of "safety", "garbage", "boarding house", "partying", "drinking", "sleaze" etc sort of make me laugh, because I think all of this is already terrible in the community, and I think many of the people indirectly responsible for these problems may have been at the meeting. A professionally managed building like this one would be much less of a problem than many of the slummy buildings already in the area.
If the community is concerned about things like this, they should get vocal and do something about many of the fine establishments near spadina and college.
 
Dandy Horse said:
i have two problems with this tower. 1- will it cut off pedestrians who walk south from college through the alleyway that connects to the "secret" north south street between huron and spadina? 2- there are actually places that building huge towers would go off without a hitch: the parking lot around Alumni Hall at Queens Park and St. Joseph, and the (rather large) parking lot between Con Hall and St. George (across from Mclennan Physical labs. both of these places are not near residential areas at all, are owned by the university, and already have tall buildings very close by.
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IMO, towers basically directly on Queen's park and King's College circle are not a good idea. Ruins the feel.

And the con hall/st george one is not really that far from the site currently under debate.
 
What if some local home owners are concerned this new residence could impede on their landlord business, most will try to fight this thing from getting built ,assuming?
 
Dandy Horse said:
i have two problems with this tower. 1- will it cut off pedestrians who walk south from college through the alleyway that connects to the "secret" north south street between huron and spadina? 2- there are actually places that building huge towers would go off without a hitch: the parking lot around Alumni Hall at Queens Park and St. Joseph, and the (rather large) parking lot between Con Hall and St. George (across from Mclennan Physical labs. both of these places are not near residential areas at all, are owned by the university, and already have tall buildings very close by.
Click to expand...

There will be wide laneway/loading zone entrance on the ground level. This passageway will connect all the way down to Glasgow Street (the "secret street"). It may be accessible to the public to use, but it depends on the property management to make that decision. Its primary usage is for vehicles and trucks for delivery/drop-off access so that may pose as a safety concern for pedestrians. The future passageway and the current alleyway are both considered private property so access to it is really beyond public control.

The crowd was rowdy at the possibility that this building (if built), may set precedents for future developments of this size on the south side of College Street.
 
Student99 said:
Curious as to just who were these locals making all the noise. Much of the area south of here is rented out to students... were they present at the meeting, or was it the landlords? Perhaps the landlords were posing as actual residents. They would be expected to make a lot of noise, as this building would be competition for them for rent money.
Your mentions of "safety", "garbage", "boarding house", "partying", "drinking", "sleaze" etc sort of make me laugh, because I think all of this is already terrible in the community, and I think many of the people indirectly responsible for these problems may have been at the meeting. A professionally managed building like this one would be much less of a problem than many of the slummy buildings already in the area.
If the community is concerned about things like this, they should get vocal and do something about many of the fine establishments near spadina and college.
Click to expand...

The majority of people in the crowd were older residents from the area. With the most vocal/upset being from Glasgow Street (directly south of the proposed building). May or may not have been landlords, but were concerned about the massive influx of people on the neighbourhood. They stressed the term "transient" people and the risk they pose on the neighbourhood. There may have been 2-3 students at most at the meeting. One of them was vocal, and she said she is pleased by the building design and concept but expressed concern that this is not a purely U of T-run residence.
 
Student99 said:
Curious as to just who were these locals making all the noise. Much of the area south of here is rented out to students... were they present at the meeting, or was it the landlords? Perhaps the landlords were posing as actual residents. They would be expected to make a lot of noise, as this building would be competition for them for rent money.
Click to expand...

Well, Olivia Chow lives around the corner.
 
I can understand the local concern here, as this would be a massive change in the size of buildings allowed south of College. Such change may be good and warranted in the end, but I think it is overly dismissive to ignore how much change it represents.
 
^If it wasn't for the NIMBYs we could see 6-8 storey buildings going up all over this neighbourhood. But when it's so hard to get something built, developers might as well shoot for the moon.
 
k10ery said:
^If it wasn't for the NIMBYs we could see 6-8 storey buildings going up all over this neighbourhood. But when it's so hard to get something built, developers might as well shoot for the moon.
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Too bad that this neighbourhood thinks that any development is not good development...same said for the, Bloor/Dundas area
 
Automation Gallery said:
Too bad that this neighbourhood thinks that any development is not good development
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I'm not sure how you can infer that position from the locals' complaints -- I think it is a reasonable argument that plopping down a 24 storey tower (much less a 42 storey monstrosity) in a neighbourhood of lowrises is not good development.
 
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