Toronto Spadina Subway Extension Emergency Exits | ?m | 1s | TTC | IBI Group

innsertnamehere said:
Their central library is in Maple too. There will be a branch in VMC, but ultimately their city hall and central branch aren't.
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When you see highway mileage signs like this one:

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That's usually the mileage to the city's city hall, town hall, municipal building, or administration building. Maybe Vaughan doesn't know where its city hall is?
 
At the risk of stating the obvious, it's a new neighbourhood; obviously there was going to be a library there. A community centre too, eventually. Who cares which library is the "central" library? Is the library at Toronto City Hall of some civic significance or are the Reference Library and even North York more substantial?

Those renderings look pretty sharp and it's encouraging SmartCentres is bringing in Diamond/Schmitt. At an "optics" level, replacing a WalMart parking lot with a civic complex of that calibre, adjacent to a transit terminal is all good.

And, yeah, that WalMart parking lot is massive. They'll still be just fine during this "transitional period." (Of course, pretty much every suburban parking lot is designed for Christmas levels and is empty the rest of the year. No exception here.)
 
Vaughans parking bylaws are designed around Boxing Day (or today more likely Black Friday) traffic levels. The municipality probably requires more parking than anywhere else in the GTA, it's why you get the absurd lots out there.

As for why central branch and city hall should be downtown - they are places that draw people from across the city. The city hall has council meetings, etc, that serve the entire city. Central library branches (torontos is the reference library) contain books and information that is only available at that branch, again drawing people from across the municipality who can't just go to their local branch.
 
Yes, I am aware of the functions that both city hall (votes and papers and stuff!) and libraries (books and movies and stuff!) serve. I've also been to Vaughan council meetings and know that, for better or worse, they don't draw as many people as the Colossus theatres. People come out when someone is building a condo nearby, and rarely otherwise. It's far from the only thing that is capable of "drawing people from across the municipality."

"Downtown" isn't any one thing, anyway. Personally, I'd like to have seen them put City Hall in VMC but historic Maple is a kind of downtown too; putting the hall there doesn't compromise the viability of VMC.

The challenge, obviously, is trying to create a centre in a place that has had no single centre, just a few, small, scattered historic centres. A civic precinct needs libraries and public squares and that sort of stuff but it doesn't have to be "THE library" or "THE public square." Somehow I lived most of my life in Toronto (North York, specifically) and never once went to Metro Ref; NYCC and Fairview were the "big" libraries I'd go to when the local branch didn't serve. I've been to Nathan Philips Square many times but inside City Hall probably fewer than a dozen. I don't think that's an entirely uncommon experience. It's just not that important when building a "new downtown," except at a symbolic level, that those specific facilities be located there.

The parking is obviously nutty but I think they've either adjusted or are adjusting their standards, at least for residential developments. the big box standards are probably about the same as ever but that's par for the course in any auto-oriented suburb.

Those parking lots will go in phases and it's encouraging that, even at this early stage, they're starting to chip away at it.
 
rbt said:
I'm starting to wonder if they'll make a 2017 opening. York University station seems a long way from being finished; they might open in 2017 and skip that stop.
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Officially this is the statement in the review:

What’s In Store for 2016 and Beyond?
2016 will be an important year for the project to install mechanical and electrical components, systems installations, and other finishing work such as tiling and terrazzo flooring. Trackwork is scheduled to be finished in late March 2016. By the end of 2016, we expect that five of the six stations will be substantially complete. In 2017, testing and commissioning of the new line will be underway in anticipation of the opening at the end of 2017.
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Looks like construction will be done well ahead of time. The testing etc might take some time but hopefully not more than a year.
 
[QUOTE
That's usually the mileage to the city's city hall, town hall, municipal building, or administration building. Maybe Vaughan doesn't know where its city hall is?[/QUOTE]

Stoney Creek shouldn't even be on distance signs anymore, as it's now part of Hamilton and has no city hall.
 
INTz said:
Looks like construction will be done well ahead of time. The testing etc might take some time but hopefully not more than a year.
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Yeah, everything except York University station is on schedule. I'd put money that this station will be "finished" like UPX was "finished" when it opened; with several months worth of cosmetic work remaining.
 
rbt said:
Yeah, everything except York University station is on schedule. I'd put money that this station will be "finished" like UPX was "finished" when it opened; with several months worth of cosmetic work remaining.
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Large scale projects like TYSSE rarely have cosmetic work complete upon opening.
 
Hey everyone, loooong time lurker on this forum, but I have some pictures I took over the weekend I'd like to share. Flying into YYZ on Monday, I flew just south of the new Highway 407 Station and managed to snap a few pictures before disappearing into the clouds again. Apologies for the potato quality.
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