Toronto Emerald Park Condos | 128.92m | 40s | Bazis | Rosario Varacalli

[11th]

Anyone wants to guess which block of Yonge Street is shown in the original photo (shown above) with the Mel Lastman BadBoy store? Lots of hints,.... none of those building structure exist today,... but if you look closely, you'll see huge wooden electrical poles serving the side streets,... which are still there!!! And most people in the area should notice them,.... since most electrical wires along Yonge Street has been buried and hydro poles along side streets are usually concrete,.... not like these towering prehistoric wooden relics!

By process of elimination, it is the block where Emerald Park now stands - Yonge between Poyntz and Bogert.

 

[Bill123]

Signs for LCBO going in!

Pretty obvious its LCBO

Also two upcoming restaurants, a bubble tea shop and a noodle shop.

On the hullmark side we have a Beautiful me coming soon.

Edward, that's a very good guess,... but incorrect.

View attachment 63986
In 1955 Mel Lastman started opening up Furniture stores throughout Toronto,... first one was on Weston Road, Kennedy & Eglinton, North York, etc,.... started consolidating them under his Bad Boy nickname in 1968,.... the original photo shows Mel Lastman's North York Bad Boy store in 1968,... while Lastman was just started in politics as Controller in North York in 1969,... he became North York mayor in 1973 until amalgamation in 1998 then became first mayor of amalgamated Toronto.

Mel Lastman reminds me of Donald Trump lol

 

[Bill123]

Progress on the sign

METRO WHERE R U???

 

[Digger]

Great news about the LCBO, its about time. The LCBO at NYC is terrible and the closest decent LC is at Bayview Village. And more noodles and bubble tea is exactly what this neighbourhood needs...

I was hoping for the Starbucks but who knows if that's going to still happen. What this area needs is some proper evening and dinner locations. The 3 brewers were supposed to move into the Gibson square but backed out for whatever reason. The Keg proposed at North York BLVD and Yonge is taking years to materialize if it ever happens. The Union social, and the Bake Code were two welcome establishments but other then that it's pretty slim pickings in the entertainment category.

 

[Bill123]

Great news about the LCBO, its about time. The LCBO at NYC is terrible and the closest decent LC is at Bayview Village. And more noodles and bubble tea is exactly what this neighbourhood needs...

I was hoping for the Starbucks but who knows if that's going to still happen. What this area needs is some proper evening and dinner locations. The 3 brewers were supposed to move into the Gibson square but backed out for whatever reason. The Keg proposed at North York BLVD and Yonge is taking years to materialize if it ever happens. The Union social, and the Bake Code were two welcome establishments but other then that it's pretty slim pickings in the entertainment category.

Pretty surprising given the population density of NYCC that businesses would claim to open then all of a sudden do a 180 and go "nevermind".

The bubble tea shop is cliche yes but the noodle store is not. Chinese noodle is quite different to other types. I've personally always preferred pho but recent Chinese immigrants love their noodle since it reminds them of home.

So far the emerald park mall is turning out to be a sort of pacific mall + Sheppard mall combo with some unit owners (whom bought in for the tnt) opening and some tenants closing up shop at sheppard mall (due to renovations) and setting up in emerald park.

Two of the food court units are under renovations: yuki hana japanese sushi and thenanashake which i am guessing is doing drinks related to bananas.

Other likely additions to the mall are: fitness supplement store, chinese food court restaurant and clothing store.

It would be REALLY nice to have a keg in NYCC.

 

[sunnyraytoronto]

By process of elimination, it is the block where Emerald Park now stands - Yonge between Poyntz and Bogert.

11th is correct. The original photo shows the west side of Yonge Street, between Poyntz Ave and Bogert Ave in 1968,... the block where EmeraldPark now stands!

Same vantage point today,... with LCBO sign up (no timetable for metro signage,... gee, I wonder why?). Also note, I included the southern sidewalk and curb in this photo because that's likely the site where most of WillowBowling was,... since they widen Poyntz Ave northward with Beecroft Ave extension south to Poyntz in early 1990s,... and again shifted the northwest corner of Yonge & Poyntz in a northern direction (city laneway under East Tower & EmeraldPark land swap) to better align it with Anndale Drive extension from HullmarkCentre Section 37 contribution.


EdwardSkira got the historical significance of Mel Lastman's BadBoy stores,... long time North York Mayor Mel is like a rock-star around here,... still!

UD2 was correct in guessing circa 1970 and mentioning these photos were taken before the subway was extended north to Sheppard,... and Finch in 1974. These black and white photos were taken in 1968 by the TTC in their planning for Sheppard station, it's entrances and since the focus is on south of Sheppard,... also on where to place their crossover tracks (decided on Johnston Ave/Glendora Ave which is just north of Avondale Ave/Florence Ave). Interestingly, at the time they were also considering having the entire underground subway tracks just west of Yonge Street (similar to YorkMills station just east of Yonge Street, Eglinton station just west of Yonge Street, Bloor station just east of Yonge Street) and better aligned with the property they acquired for the Sheppard Bus terminal. Of course, they ended up placing the Sheppard Station directly below Yonge Street.

From the original 1968 photo, Willowdale Bowling had 10 lanes on street level and 6 additional lanes in the basement; in the 1970s it was a clothing store, then a restuarant. The BadBoy store(s) became greasy spoons named Fuller's, then Vittel's restaurants. There was a grease fire at the restaurant in about 1981,...

Of course, Yonge Street frontage isn't all there is to the EmeraldPark site,... thus, this ThrowBack wouldn't be complete without discussion about the rest of the block,... and beyond. So for comparison this is what it looks like now:

Note: Beecroft Road extension south of Sheppard to Poyntz,.... VS shorten Frizzel Road along with Bogert Ave donated for parkland at Lansing United Church.

1981 aerial shot,.... Notice: Beecroft Road stopped at Sheppard, Bogert Ave went straight through from Yonge to Frizzel Road and beyond,... Frizzel Rd connected to Sheppard.
This 1981 aerial photo seems to show the northwest corner of Yonge & Poyntz area fenced off after the fire damage,... it was never rebuilt, just became a parking lot with a trailer for Budget or Tilden car rental. Notice: in this 1981 photo, the block extends all the way back to Frizzel Road which ran between Poyntz Ave and Sheppard Ave,... Beecroft Road hasn't been extended south of Sheppard and off Yonge Street, it was all single residential houses back there. The white 2 storey building on the northern part of the block survived and when I moved into the area in 1989 or 1990, ground floor had a PJ Pets store.

In the mid-1980s an office development company or two was agressively acquiring land surrounded by Yonge Street to Frizzel Road and Sheppard to Poyntz Ave. In the northern half, between Sheppard Ave West and Bogert Ave, they used that land for Nestle Building and empty site now to be used for Menkes 4800 Yonge proposal. But as part of Section 37 community benefits the community got AlbertStanding Park at southwest corner of Beecroft Road & Sheppard Ave West. As part of Section 42 & 45 infrastructure improvement, developer also had to donate properties for Beecroft Road extension south of Sheppard to Poyntz Ave. I'm not sure if it was one or two company was involved; might have been one focused on north of Bogert Ave and other south of Bogert Ave OR just one company that parcelled the land in 2 phases.

Anyways, by the late-1980s early-1990s bungalows around here were worth about 350-400K (we brought a bank foreclosure on a market correction in the high 200s,.. good luck finding one of those these days!),... but the office developer acquiring properties to parcel a larger piece of land,... were offering each property $1million! A friend of my parents had a property on Poyntz or Bogert and they sold - it was a no brainer!,... it was easily double market price!,... everybody sold at $1million,...except for one! There was a bungalow at the southeast corner of Beecroft and Bogert,... the elderly old man refused to sell at $1million,... he was very greedy and insisted on $2million. They went back and forth for a long time,... this developer wanted to build offices on this block (where EmeraldPark now stands),.... the elderly old man thought he had the big developer by the nuts since they needed his property and his was the last one on the block,.... the developer finally offered $1.5million,... the elderly old man still refused and insisted on $2million.

1992 aerial shot,... notice Nestle Building site at southeast corner of Beecroft Rd & Sheppard Ave West started digging. Beecroft Road was extended south to Poyntz Ave, AlbertStanding Park with part of Frizzel Road and Bogert Ave converted to parkland was formed as part of Nestle Building Section 37 community benefits.

On the other side of Bogert Ave, Nestle tower construction started in 1992 and completed in 1994,... and the office market tanked in the early 1990s and stayed down! Nestle phase 2 twin tower to the east was place on hold,.... The elderly old man who was offered 3 times the market value of his property didn't have an offer anymore,... because now the office developer withdrew their offer because there wasn't an office market anymore,...

In the 1990's, I recall walking by that bungalow at the southeast corner of Beecroft Road and Bogert Ave,.... huge pear trees in the backyard,... once in a while I would see that elderly old man tending to his garden,... everything else on that entire block had been demolished into empty dusty weed-filled fields and the properties along Yonge Street paved over as parking lots,..... everytime I saw that elderly old man, I felt really bad for him,... he was too greedy, he should have took the money like everyone else,... and lived what remains of the rest of his life any way he wanted,.... instead, it's likely his heirs or estate that'll benefit.


Anyways, by 2000 that little bungalow must have sold (I don't know for how much), since there was OMB approval for 2 residential condos with 364 units on the western end of this EmeraldPark site along Beecroft Road,.... and it included the density transfer from Lansing United Church (eastern protion along Yonge Street was reserved for office that never happened). Usually, Beecroft Road is the western border for the North York Secondary Plan,... but south of Sheppard, it's Frizzel Road!,... likely because Beecroft didn't originally extend south of Sheppard but Frizzel Road did. Anyways, even though that new residential developer won OMB approval,.. that developer never proceeded with their development proposal,... maybe because Section 37 community benefit costs were deemed too high?,... but city uses fixed formula so more likely due to market conditions,... I know, how can residential condos not sell well in North York Centre? But consider this was year 2000,... and huge amount of condo inventory was about to come online locally with Maclean-Hunter property conversion to huge number of Avondale Condominiums,... 10 condo towers plus townhouses,...

Then along comes Bazis with EmeraldPark proposal in 2008,....

Photo credit to Edward Skira from post# 566 of EmeraldPark ground breaking in March 2011,... notice, in the background,... that elderly old man's little red brick bungalow was still standing!

 

[sunnyraytoronto]

Yep, I go to Mandarin and like the place. Every time I go, I see the place full of mainly Asians, so anybody who says that Asians don't go to Mandarin, obviously, does not go there. (and is clueless)

Yes, Mandarin is the posterchild for non-authentic Chinese food,... I mean, what kind of Chinese restaurant serves french fries and pizza?

Here's a recent CNN article on how authentic (North) American-Chinese food is,....
http://www.cnn.com/2016/01/14/foodanddrink/american-chinese-food-opinion/index.html

When you have Mel Lastman declaring he'll introduce Fortune Cookies to China,... you got to realize Fortune Cookies are not authentic Chinese food items! Nor are Chop Suey, Orange Chicken, Egg Foo Young, General Tso's Chicken (my favourite, BTW), etc,.... generally, anything with large portions of deep-fried heavily battered meat caked in sugary candy-like sauce,... wouldn't be authentic Chinese cuisine,... most of these non-authentic Chinese food items are a dietician and health professional's nightmare,... they're simply too many empty calories,... and if these were authentic Chinese dishes, Chinese people in China would be much fatter than Americans!

But the bottom line for any businese is always money,... who are their customers and what are they willing to pay? Are their customers idiots willing to pay $25-30 per person for fake Chinese all-you-can-barf meal consisting of deep-fried meat covered in candy like sauce,... or are they smart enough to pay $10 for a real authentic Chinese dish?


Now, back to EmeraldPark,..... how authentically Chinese/Asian will EmeraldPark retail level be???

EmeraldPark first floor retail level with small HongKong style PacificMall type small stores,.... was originally envisioned by most buyers as a smaller PacificMall-like Chinatown with Loblaws T&T Chinese supermarket on 2nd floor as anchor tenant,... now with T&T gone,... and likely Metro/Adonis as well,... how will the first floor retail evolve? Authentic Chinese or not,... likely more of a mix of Chinese-Korean-Japanese Asian shops,... but will they each cater solely to their ethnic demographics or other Asians or more to non-Asian demographics,... if the later 2, do they loose their ethnic authenticity by changing their merchandise, style or flavouring to cater to that market???

For EmeraldPark retail to succeed, it must be able to draw in customers,... not just from the local area, but also create a niche market that draws in from a larger area and be able to tap into the high volume of commuters zooming by the area via subway and highway. And to create this niche market, EmeraldPark must be able to distinguish itself from every other local small malls like SheppardCentre, EmpressWalk, NorthYorkCityCentre,... Creating an ethnic niche market does have it's risk,... generally more extremes in terms of being highly successful or failing miserably. The interesting factor is that the Yonge Street retail itself in North York Centre has become more Asian within the last couple of decades to mainly serve the new local condo residents,.... Will EmeraldPark retail compliment the existing Asian businesses along Yonge Street or will EmeraldPark retail being in an indoor mall actually take businese away from the current Asian Yonge Street busineses?

Also note, the density on the west side of Yonge where EmeraldPark is, is low since with the exception of EmeraldPark itself,... it's mainly single residential houses; the real density is on the east side of Yonge between Sheppard & 401, which includes HullmarkCentre, Minto Spring & Radiance, Menkes Cosmos and all the Avondale-Avondshire condos,... the question is can EmeraldPark retailers get these people into EmeraldPark instead of going north of Sheppard Ave where most of the Asian shops are along Yonge. The SheppardCentre mall renovation over the next 2 years should help since it'll make walking near that northeast block of Yonge & Sheppard more challenging.

In addition, whereas Asian shops on Yonge north of Sheppard - (Elmhurst/Greenfield Ave) benefit from on street parking on Yonge and side streets,.... there's no on street Parking along Yonge near EmeraldPark,... only limited meter parking along Bogert Ave & Beecroft Rd,... some residential side street parking available in evening if customers are willing to walk a block or two. Otherwise, it's underground parking at EmeraldPark or 4800 Yonge at their higher rates,... Thus, EmeraldPark would rely more on local walk-ins and TTC commuters VS drivers,....

 

[sunnyraytoronto]

Also two upcoming restaurants, a bubble tea shop and a noodle shop.
View attachment 64017

I do find the Bubble Tea shop and Rice Noodle shop a bit troubling since they're food establishments located at Yonge frontage,..... which endangers the original strategy of having the Food Court in the back along Beecroft Road,... and thus, force people to walk through the entire mall to get to the food court,..... I never did like that strategy since it failed miserably at North York City Centre when their original food court was located at the end of their lower concourse level furthest from Yonge Street.


In addition, there's 60 office condo on EmeraldParks third floor,.... they were released to buyers a few months ago but only 5 have building permits for renovations. Meaning, it'll be HullmarkCentre office condo deja-vu,... with 80% of the office condos remaining empty! In addition, probably 1/3 of the EmeraldPark office condos are at the inner part of the floor and do not have any windows,... most folks would hate being stuck in an office without any sunlight.

Mel Lastman reminds me of Donald Trump lol

Except,.. the Donald has much better hair!

The appeal of Mel Lastman is that he started as a kid selling fruits at his father's Kensington Market store because he had to,.... and he worked his way up as a salesman to selling furnitures and then owning his own furniture stores to become a success. Mel Lastman was a self-made man who knew how hard life is for the common folks because he been there,.... Donald Trump was born with a silver,.. forget silver, it was platinum spoon in his mouth!

Whereas Donald Trump made a killing in the New York City real estate market,..... Mel Lastman as Mayor of North York City knew in order to keep voters happy, he had to keep property taxes down,... and in order to do that but have city revenue growth as if he was running a company,... he had to increase the volume,... volume of property tax payers,.... and hence was the motive to create a high density downtown in North York Centre,.... the amount of land is constant, but when that land is converted from single residential housing usage to multi residential condo tower usage,... the amount of property tax generated from that piece of land increases by about 40 to 50 folds,.... and that's for your basic 100m 30 storey condo tower that's common in North York Centre. In the end when North York and other cities and boroughs amalgamated to form the new city of Toronto,... North York was considered the rich kid on the block since it had a large reserve,... of course the city of North York was smart enough to spend all that reserve on local infrastructure to the benefit of the people of North York who contributed to it,.... all before amalgamation so the rest of the city wouldn't get their filthy hands on North York money!

 

[Towered]

Yes, Mandarin is the posterchild for non-authentic Chinese food,... I mean, what kind of Chinese restaurant serves french fries and pizza?

- So? Does it matter?

Here's a recent CNN article on how authentic (North) American-Chinese food is,....
http://www.cnn.com/2016/01/14/foodanddrink/american-chinese-food-opinion/index.html

When you have Mel Lastman declaring he'll introduce Fortune Cookies to China,... you got to realize Fortune Cookies are not authentic Chinese food items! Nor are Chop Suey, Orange Chicken, Egg Foo Young, General Tso's Chicken (my favourite, BTW), etc,.... generally, anything with large portions of deep-fried heavily battered meat caked in sugary candy-like sauce,... wouldn't be authentic Chinese cuisine,... most of these non-authentic Chinese food items are a dietician and health professional's nightmare,... they're simply too many empty calories,... and if these were authentic Chinese dishes, Chinese people in China would be much fatter than Americans!

- Who cares? I don't think North American Chinese food ever claimed to be part of the apparently hallowed ground of "authentic" Chinese food. It was an adaptation based on a melding of vastly different cultures.

But the bottom line for any businese is always money,... who are their customers and what are they willing to pay? Are their customers idiots willing to pay $25-30 per person for fake Chinese all-you-can-barf meal consisting of deep-fried meat covered in candy like sauce,... or are they smart enough to pay $10 for a real authentic Chinese dish?

- So the many people who enjoy non-authentic Chinese inspired food are idiots? Maybe they justifiably enjoy it more than the so-called authentic stuff? To belittle these people is borderline racist, even though as I mentioned earlier, the majority of the times I've been to Mandarin, the bulk of the customers have been Asian. I guess they're a bunch of assimilated fakers then? Traitors to their culture, eh?

 

[interchange42]

Enough of that train of thought. Please stick to the topic.

42

 

[Bill123]

I have news on the subway tunnel. They are currently tiling. Estimate for completion is in "several months". Add SRT's estimated inspection time we might see a completed tunnel in 2017.

The remaining stores at Sheppard Mall have been gutted out with some closing after 39 years of business. This would be a perfect time for Emerald Park mall to open.

The supermarket is still a shell unfortunately. Last time I went up there I saw some workers, possibly consultants. If you look carefully you can see a shopping cart.

So far it looks like they are using this space to store equipment.

The office chairs/tables give off a bad vibe to me. Why move all this office furniture in if you are about to renovate? Its probably because they won't be doing that anytime soon...

On more positive news, the Teriyaki/sushi restaurant has building permits!

They have abruptly stopped the LCBO sign installation. Only one set has gone up. However the 2nd floor is constantly lit now making it possible to easily see some LCBO shelving.

 

[UD2]

I thought there was going to be only 1 set. Where is the second set supposed to go?

 

[Bill123]

There are sign mounts on the north and south sides of the building too. There are 3 sets of each anchor tenant.

 

[UD2]

LCBO sign on north and south side installed

 

[salsa]