Toronto Cherry House at Canary Landing | 50.32m | 13s | Dream | COBE Architects

Taken 30 November.

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I can't believe I'm saying this, but given the location and the city's population projections, are we building with enough density here? I was thinking keep the block corners as is, and add a couple of mid block point towers along the streets. Thoughts?

Edit: Nothing too tall but let's consider the site is adjacent to the Cherry street car line, and will be less than a 10 minute walk to the future Corktown subway station.
 
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The Preservationist said:
I can't believe I'm saying this, but given the location and the city's population projections, are we building with enough density here? I was thinking keep the block corners as is, and add a couple of mid block point towers along the streets. Thoughts?

Edit: Nothing too tall but let's consider the site is adjacent to the Cherry street car line, and will be less than a 10 minute walk to the future Corktown subway station.
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The area from Yonge to the Don, King to the Lake has an existing and planned stock of over 25k individual units- that's not accounting for projects not yet announced on the silo lands, around the hybrid (Provincially run) Gardiner East, Villiers Island, the Foundry, as well as the car dealership on Front, the former book depository land at the corner of Parliament, and the heritage building at Trinity and Mill.

As well, before the city did the land swap with the car wash for the First Parliament land, developers were planning on a sizeable podium and at least three 40+ storey towers, which I imagine won't just be ON the table again after the subway goes in but will have much larger heights. Add that to a huge tower which will likely go on the former Staples/Porsche site next to/on top of Corktown Stn. and I think we're good on density.

Currently built or planned gives us a population base that would make us the 35th largest population centre in Ontario. Additional projects could see us surpass North Bay in 23rd place. Just this neighbourhood.

That being said, i hope they have something special for frontage on Cherry St. I always kinda saw the two larger buildings as more Front. but I guess Cherry St. is going to be the main thoroughfare.
 
I think they have realized the area isn't dense enough to support the kind of retail and services that people imagined for this area. Fortunately it looks like they're evolving the original plan and including more density.

By 2026, The Goode, No 31, Blocks 3,4,7, Canary House and 28 Eastern will all be done and occupied, which should help the neighbourhood feel less sleepy and hopefully lure in some retail.

Hopefully Dream & team moves quickly on Blocks 13 and 20 which all include towers that weren't part of the original master plan
 
The Preservationist said:
I can't believe I'm saying this, but given the location and the city's population projections, are we building with enough density here? I was thinking keep the block corners as is, and add a couple of mid block point towers along the streets. Thoughts?

Edit: Nothing too tall but let's consider the site is adjacent to the Cherry street car line, and will be less than a 10 minute walk to the future Corktown subway station.
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This area is more than 20% denser than St. Jamestown as proposed; it will among the densest communities anywhere.
 
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DavidCapizzano said:
I think they have realized the area isn't dense enough to support the kind of retail and services that people imagined for this area.
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There is more density proposed here than is built in St. Jamestown, by a sizable margin. The area has ample (planned) density.

DavidCapizzano said:
Fortunately it looks like they're evolving the original plan and including more density.
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Given the extreme density already proposed, I don't see this as a good thing. In fact, the foundry site is badly laid out because there is too much proposed there.

Considering that more than 1/2 of the buildings planned here aren't yet built, or aren't finished I think its really dubious to talk about what retail is supported by less than 1/3 of the proposed population here.

I laid out all the math, the units, the per km2 etc awhile back.

In a multi-phase building process, you're not going to get all the retail vibrancy right off the bat, you get it closer to the end.

You also need the area not to be complete construction site, as much of it has been the last several years, and much of it will for a few years yet. That really interferes w/walkability.

One of the things to be understood here is that the way in which this was built out was a bit odd. If you wanted to maximize vibrancy from day one, the development all would have started at Cherry and tied into the Distillery District (which still isn't fully built out); but it would have been an extension of that area, and would have been visible and connected in a way it is/was not, because the development largely worked its way east.
 
^ and ^^. Great points! I am down on Cherry and Front quite a bit as one of my favourite brunch places is Aviary. What I have noticed is that there is a steady building of pedestrian traffic that must be enough to sustain a lot of the businesses. While there has been some turnover there are also several places that have been there since the structures were built.
 
Northern Light said:
This area is more than 50% denser than St. Jamestown as proposed; it will among the densest communities anywhere.
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How are we compared to Regent Park? They obviously had enough to warrant sports fields and an aquatic centre and a FreshCo.

I feel like the YMCA is going to need to do an expansion plan/fundraising effort before too long. Maybe it’ll push into whatever becomes of the Storage centre- which, cmon- the lifespan for that ticks away as land value increases.
 
jsmith77 said:
How are we compared to Regent Park? They obviously had enough to warrant sports fields and an aquatic centre and a FreshCo.
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In terms of planned build out; what was planned as far as 2021 would have put Regent Park at something like 8,000 ~17,000per km2 * (includes the park and aquatic centre) , which is relatively low density in comparison to West Don Lands.

The revised plans for Regent Park phase 4 and 5 will boost that some.

* edited to correct the current density number.

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However, a fair comparison would note that Regent Park started with 8,000 or so residents, whereas the WDL started with 0.

Regent Park is also more tied into adjacent areas, where WDL was a bit of an island, with Richmond/Eastern ramp system cutting it off from the north, and the gap initially between most of the early phase WDL and the Distillery to the west. (with the Don Valley to the east and no crossing between King and Lake Shore for pedestrians)
 
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DavidCapizzano said:
I think they have realized the area isn't dense enough to support the kind of retail and services that people imagined for this area. Fortunately it looks like they're evolving the original plan and including more density.
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That’s something I wish I understood more about retail numbers. The Foot Locker in Canary was not a great idea at the time. Tori’s Bakeshop may have worked, but I think they had other issues. Gears made sense but they found a better space up the street. The Original Fresh n Wild in the Distillery feels like it should have worked in some effect even when it was four condo area (nothing else was here), but that didn’t happen. The one business/location that baffles me is Long & McQuade, who’s been at Front/Eastern/Trinity for awhile now and fine.

At what point is a business failure chalked up to lack of density vs just a poorly run business?

Still curious if No Frills moves over to Time and Space, accepts their reduced footprint at King E Centre or maybe comes here to this project.
 
Toronto has plenty of medium-density neighbourhoods with thriving retail areas like Riverdale, the Junction, and the Danforth. Yet a high-density neighbourhood like this one can't have that? It doesn't make sense at first glance.

I'd guess the issue is that the area doesn't have the parameters large corporate retailers look for (e.g. parking, foot traffic, busy through streets, rapid transit). Yet it isn't competitive for small businesses and start ups due to the high cost of newly built retail spaces and likely overly conservative and selective condo boards. So it's hard to get the retail scene going.
 
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