Toronto Minto Yorkville Park Condos | 75.89m | 25s | Minto Group | IBI Group

It's difficult for me to fathom how replacing a B- quality nondescript office building with a ground floor coffee shop in a A+ location with an architecturally contoured, market demand driven luxury condo and new ground retail is a bad thing! The only issue I see is height and the proposal isn't breaking any records for the area.
 
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Ed007Toronto said:
Well the office building serves a purpose to those that use it. Not a lot of room for dentists in a luxury condo.
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Highest and best use Ed. Plenty of space for dentists, etc. in the other office buildings in the area. Vacancy rate is high. And guess what- if there wasn't space for them there would be demand for new office buildings. Anyway, that's what leases are for. If you want to stay put for a very long time negotiate a no-demo clause and the landlord will have to buy you out.
 
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adma said:
Well...as a permanent physical condition, of course not. As an emblem of "organic urbanism", though, maybe it's better to catch one's breath before applying too much of a blockbusting heavy hand. (Indeed, recent development like the Hazelton and 100 Yorkville demonstrates the virtues of a "catching one's breath" approach--even if, paradoxically, latter-day Jane Jacobs was part of the "anti" forces. As such, maybe they're the Village By The Grange of the 2000s.)

And, frankly...the key to "world stage" relative to Toronto isn't to focus upon Yorkville and its pretensions. It's to look *beyond* Yorkville and its pretensions; which is why I drag Kensington et al into this. And, the same can go for other cities: NYC, Paris, et al.

Ultimately, "world stage" is to urbanism what waxed pubes are to feminine attractiveness. And, sorry, kiddo; I like urban bush...
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I agree, though not so much about urban bush, obviously. How about a compromise, an urban bikini wax instead of a full-on Brazilian?
 
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Feb 23. I don't support a condo going here as you are really boxing the area in as well cutting down the daylight for it.
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condovo said:
The bastardized Vics and 70s-80s cheese, including the miserable building abutting 77 Yorkville to the west, definitely should go. (Gotta love those fancy-shmancy sidewalks and roadways too. Such klass.)
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Actually, I'd make an exception for something like WZMH's Cumberland Court, or the pre-70s likes of Diamond & Myers' York Square or George Robb's Old York Lane--at least as critical preexisting conditions that can serve as guidelines for the future...
 
condovo said:
I don't find Yorkville's boutiques and shops to be quaint at all. For the most part, I think they're quite shabby, especially for an area that aspires to be Canada's Rodeo Drive. Most of my out-of-town guests are incredulous that Yorkville is the chi-chi shopping district of Toronto. Hopefully, this development will continue to raise the bar on the neighbourhood, like The Hazelton Hotel and 100 Yorkville before it.
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I could not agree more with this statement. I usually went to Sassafraz in high school every year at Christmas during high school and didn't notice how cruddy the streets are in Yorkville. Aside from Bloor Street shopping I never really entered the neighbourhood until last summer when my boyfriend had a craving for Summers, and I for Dessert Lady. Walking down Cumberland was eye opening. I mean, the street was not paved properly (had cracks, unlevelled, etc), the sidewalks were miserable at best, and the only reason why it 'felt' like Yorkville was due to the blue lamp poles which doesn't really help. You would think they would have some fancy-shmancy interlocking brick at the very least.

I understand that the current building is used by many, however it is so darn ugly especially for Yorkville.
 
condovo said:
The bastardized Vics and 70s-80s cheese, including the miserable building abutting 77 Yorkville to the west, definitely should go. (Gotta love those fancy-shmancy sidewalks and roadways too. Such klass.)
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Why? Admittedly, I would criticize most of those Yorkville "modernizations" (or "postmodernizations") of Bay-and-Gables if they were done today, but many actually do show a lot of creativity in applying modern design principles and materials to create an interesting fusion aesthetic. Residential streets of a town grew into a vibrant urban mixed use neighbourhood. Those commercial streetscapes are clean and unique for the city. The worst buildings tend to be the big midrise and high-rise office buildings from before the 1970s that suck the life out of their part of the street.

The streets of Yorkville have seen many improvements over the years. Overhead wires are consistently buried, and there are investments like edges of granite pavers in places and trees. Yorkville park is highly successful both aesthetically and in terms of usage, with the rock becoming a sort of urban monumental staircase that draws people just for sitting. A lot more is still needed, but it already looks better than many commercial streets in Toronto. Once again though, it's the stuff maintained by the city that brings everything down: ugly patched streets and sidewalks, crooked signs, and too much concrete and asphalt.
 
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I agree with some of the other comments made that Yorkville is a little shabby, particularly in light of the Bloor Street revitalization - that was a painful process but Bloor Street really looks beautiful. The Yorkville businesses should band together and do something similar. That being said, I'm not sure how yet another luxury highrise condo is really going to help.
 
The Yorkville businesses are all part of the same BIA that redid Bloor Street. The Village of Yorkville Park was an earlier project for them.

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Update on this proposal:

From Kroum on SSC

To update everyone: I got a letter from the City of Toronto this week. The original plan has been amended and now the building will be 22-story tall (75.7 m. plus 5.5 m. mechanical penthouse).

During the last community meeting, which was about one year ago, there were strong objections from residents of my building, as well as 10 Bellair, to the height of the proposed building.

Furthermore, I have my own objections to their plan to ram all traffic to the new building into Genoa St., which is more of an alleyway and is already congested from servicing 80 Cumberland and the Minto.

Next meeting is on February 14th and I plan to attend. Will update with fresh pics and news.
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