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The area is slowly getting better every year. A hotel at this location is a perfect way to make it even better. More people on the streets is what this area needs.
 
condovo said:
I lived in the area until about four years ago and I say it does. As for all the hotels already lining one of the worst stretches of street in the city, Jarvis from Carlton to Shuter, I don't think this is the face of Toronto we ought to be showing visitors. However, we should be showing it to ourselves and taking more steps to alleviate the suffering that's so prevalent there.
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You think it does? lol Get serious! It is nothing like East Hastings at all, not even close. Last time I was in Vancouver, just over a year ago, there was something like 100 to 200 people just standing around, especially in the back alleys. When have you ever seen large groups of people standing around on Jarvis Street? I go by there on an almost daily basis and you're lucky to see 5 or more people on the street there. You're way off base.

Jarvis and Dundas used to be the worst corner in Toronto but since those 2 hotels opened there, it has become much better. I see little of the crazy shit I used to see there 5 years ago. More new hotels will only improve the area.
 
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I think Yonge & Dundas Square has helped a fair bit - there's seemingly a festival there every week through the summer. That brings in tourists who'd like to stay close by.

I think you'll see a slow wave of better retail rolling east from Yonge & Dundas. I was shocked to hear about the new Smoke's Poutinerie location at Dundas & George but, when you think about it in terms of crowds + students + probably fairly affordable rent, it starts to make some sense.
 
condovo said:
I lived in the area until about four years ago and I say it does. As for all the hotels already lining one of the worst stretches of street in the city, Jarvis from Carlton to Shuter, I don't think this is the face of Toronto we ought to be showing visitors. However, we should be showing it to ourselves and taking more steps to alleviate the suffering that's so prevalent there.
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4 Years ago... Its 2009, things have changed.
 
Torontovibe said:
You think it does? lol Get serious! It is nothing like East Hastings at all, not even close. Last time I was in Vancouver, just over a year ago, there was something like 100 to 200 people just standing around, especially in the back alleys. When have you ever seen large groups of people standing around on Jarvis Street? I go by there on an almost daily basis and you're lucky to see 5 or more people on the street there. You're way off base.

Jarvis and Dundas used to be the worst corner in Toronto but since those 2 hotels opened there, it has become much better. I see little of the crazy shit I used to see there 5 years ago. More new hotels will only improve the area.
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It was reported this week that the new 'most dangerous area' is Sherbourne and Dundas.
 
^^ A block away from the proposed hotel. Yep. Huge changes in four years. The Maxwell Meaghan Centre's now the W and the Fred Victor Centre's the St. Regis. Send in the tourists. :rolleyes:
 
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My anti-urban father and stepfather both think where I live (Dundas and Jarvis) is perfectly safe, moderate, and much like elsewhere downtown.

Anybody who is complaining about the area has clearly not spent much time living there in the last few years.

I've felt unsafe walking in this area (Dundas and Jarvis) maybe twice the whole time I've lived here. Same amount of worry I've ever had walking in Yorkville.
 
In this city, I've heard so many people say that different corners of the city are "the most dangerous". Some people site Jane & Finch, Jarvis & Gerrard, Sherbourne & Queen E, Bathurst & Queen W, Homewood & Wellesley, Duffrin & King, Dundas & Sherbourne, Lots of corners in Scarborough, lol, as well as a hand full of others and it all just proves, that there is no consensus on what neighbourhood is most dangerous. Every part of Toronto has sketchy people but over-all, it's still pretty safe. Jarvis is safe, and still changing for the better.
 
City Planning Request for Directions Report

I think the developer here is acting on bad faith ... demolishing a historic building (which was the condition of previous approvals??) :mad:
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To be considered by Toronto & East York Community Council on October 13, 2009:

http://www.toronto.ca/legdocs/mmis/2009/te/bgrd/backgroundfile-23524.pdf

The applicant has appealed the Official Plan Amendment and Zoning By-law
Amendment to the Ontario Municipal Board (OMB) due to Council’s failure to make a decision within the time allotted by the Planning Act. A pre-hearing conference is scheduled to be held September 28, 2009. A full hearing date has not yet been scheduled.

The application before the Ontario Municipal Board proposes to amend the Official Plan and the Zoning By-law to permit a 20 storey residential condominum building with 69 units. The base of the building includes three 2-storey townhouses fronting on Shuter Street. There are 56 parking spaces proposed within a four level underground garage accessed from an existing public lane. A valet will take cars to the underground garage via a car elevator.

The purpose of this report is to seek Council’s direction on the appeal of this application to the Ontario Municipal Board.

The proposal is inappropriate and too intense a form of development for this site. The proposed height and density considerably exceed that permitted in the Official Plan, the Zoning By-law and that of the previous Ontario Municipal Board approval, which was granted based on the premise of preserving the historical building which once existed on site and has since been demolished.
 
... so essentially, the developer has dropped the building by four floors to 16, and the planning department is saying that it is still too intense for a site that borders on 3-storey townhomes.

Meanwhile, the proposed 20 storey Hampton Inn located immediately to the west of this at the corner of Jarvis and Shuter also sits beside some 3 storey Victorian homes on Jarvis, and it will also shadow some of the George Street townhomes that the City does not want shadowed by this development. I am not sure the City's position is entirely defensible in this case, at least in regards to the shadowing, but other points in the refusal report make sense to me.

I also don't want to see a 16 floor building here because the owners who let historic Walnut Hall crumble to dust do not deserve anything beyond what current zoning allows.

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Make them rebuild Walnut Hall, brick by brick.
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When the Windsor Arms Hotel on Thomas Street was modified for a condo, the developer said that it was too difficult to work with the existing building, so it was dismantled. What you see today is a facsimile (albeit using salvaged material) of the hotel. There are other examples. The old house on the southwest corner of Sherbourne and Adelaide (?) was torn down/dismantled and rebuilt like new. Hmmm.. Would the concrete floors inside be a giveaway? (At least, it's better than saving a facade which reminds me of the aliens in Star Trek Voyager called the Vidiians, who combated a disease called the Phage by grafting on body parts from other races.)
 
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Mike, are you planning to attend? And/or do you know how much time has been set aside for this hearing? Thanks!

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