Toronto's Improving Public Realm

[TheTigerMaster]

The City of Toronto has dozens of in-progress initiatives to improve the Toronto public realm over the past several years. Many of these improvements have gone largely unnoticed by the forum. I think it's a good idea to have a thread to compile the progress on these various initiatives.

Many (but not all) of these efforts are summarized in the City's TOcore Implementation Strategy: Downtown Parks and Public Realm Plan report, linked here. The report is quite extensive, so I'd recommend reading it in its entirety if you're interested. However I suspect the parts of most interest to UT readers are the Shoreline Stitch and Great Streets initiatives, which I've summarized below.

Great Streets

The Great Streets initiative is described as, "advancing the design for significant public realm improvements on 5 of the 12 Downtown Great Streets to make them outstanding civic places and connectors. These include permanent cycling infrastructure on Bloor Street, a permanent design for the King Street Transit Priority Corridor, implementation of the future vision set out in the YongeTOmorrow Environmental Assessment (EA), a feasibility study for creating a potential linear park along University Avenue in the future, and implementing streetscape improvements to Front Street West via coordination and partnerships with the development industry."

Completed Great Streets Projects (2015-2021)

• Bloor Street: BIA Parkettes and Streetscape Improvements (Spadina Avenue to Bathurst Street)
• Bloor Street West Bikeway (Avenue Road to Shaw Street)
• Queen Street: Queen Street West BIA Parkettes (Spadina Avenue to Bathurst Street)
• University Avenue: Median Park State of Good Repair Assessme
• King Street Transit Priority Corridor
• YongeTOmorrow EA Lower Yonge Precinct Plan
• College-Carlton-Gerrard: Gerrard Street Bikeway Upgrade
• College-Carlton-Gerrard: The Doctors' Parkette
• Front Street: Feasibility Study -- Bathurst Street to Spadina Avenue
• Front Street: Union Station Plaza (Sir John A. MacDonald Plaza)

Actions: Recommended, Planned and Underway
Tables 4 below describe the status of Actions from the Downtown PPR Plan. The tables outlines the current stage of the project and whether or not the Action is "Underway", "Recommended", or "Planned" (meaning it is in the Capital Budget and Plan, but has not started yet).

Shoreline Stitch

The Shoreline Stitch initiative is described as, "weaving the waterfront back into the fabric of Downtown by continuing to explore opportunities to deck over the Union Station rail corridor for public parkland, and exploring the potential for future phases of the Bentway/Under Gardiner initiative. This would weave together the 3 threads of the Stitch, including Queens Quay, the Bentway and the rail corridor, and enhance access to new parks currently being developed on the waterfront."

Completed Shoreline Stitch Projects (2015-2021)

• Planning for decking over rail corridor CIBC Plaza (POPS over rail corrido
• Love Park (Competition and Detailed Design Complet
• Rees Street Park (Competition Complete)
• Fleet Street Closure (Bathurst Street to Iannuzzi Street)
• Bentway Phase
• Cycling infrastructure improvements along Harbour Street Bikeway from Bay Street to York Street

Actions: Recommended, Planned and Underway
Tables 3-6 below describe the status of Actions from the Downtown PPR Plan. The tables outlines the current stage of the project and whether or not the Action is "Underway", "Recommended", or "Planned" (meaning it is in the Capital Budget and Plan, but has not started yet).

University Avenue
The report also made specific emphasis on the in-progress efforts to redesign University Avenue:

"In May 2018, City Council directed staff to consider the potential to prioritize the redesign of University Avenue through the implementation strategy for the Downtown PPR Plan. The 'University Avenue Sub-surface Technical Feasibility Study' has commenced and is a first step towards determining the feasibility and impacts of reconfiguring University Avenue to maximise parkland potential within the existing rightof-way. The study is a preliminary comparative analysis of the impact of below-grade conditions on potential conceptual alignments for University Avenue."

No official proposal for the University Avenue redesign has been released yet, however PUBLIC WORK did release an unofficial vision last year, which most of us should be familiar with.

Anyways as I said above, the contents of this post is just a portion of what is discussed in this report, so please take a look at the full report to get a better overview of the complete vision. The efforts implemented to date have already significantly improved the public realm in much of the city, and we've yet to even begin construction on the most significant portions (eg, King Street Transit Priority, and YongeTomorrow). I'm tremendously excited to see how this will shape the city in the upcoming years.

 

[TheTigerMaster]

The TTC is also pursuing their Surface Network Plan, which will hopefully see transit priority initiatives installed along 20 of Toronto's most heavily used bus routes.

From a public realm point-of-view, the most interesting of these corridors is Queen Street. With Queen Street already effectively operating with just one traffic lane in each direction thanks to CafeTO, I'd anticipate that political approval for a transit solution resembling the King Street Transit Priority Corridor should be relatively straightforward to obtain from City Council. City Planning does not yet have any plans for permanent streetscape enhancements along Queen Street, however if Queen Street eventually gets approval for its transit priority corridor, I'd expect plans for coordinated streetscape improvements along Queen Street to emerge.

Detailed design and engineering for Queen Street transit improvements won't begin until 2026, so we'll have to wait a while for any movement on that.

Planning for permanent streetscape enhancements along the King transit corridor will be completed sometime between 2021 and 2025. Hopefully sooner than later.

 

[syn]

These all seem to cover improvements to specific areas - is there a plan to address how public works addresses repairs, maintenance, etc.?

 

[TheTigerMaster]

These all seem to cover improvements to specific areas - is there a plan to address how public works addresses repairs, maintenance, etc.?

Are you referring to how the City will tear up beautiful new cobblestone streets for repairs, and patch it up with asphalt? I don't see anything in the report specifically addressing that.

The closest thing is on Page 31, which essentially says that whenever possible, the public realm improvements will be done at the same time as state-of-good-repair enhancements.

 

[TheTigerMaster]

LORINC: What is the future of CafeTO?​

On October 27, council we be voting on whether CafeTO should be made permanent.

 

[TheTigerMaster]

LORINC: What is the future of CafeTO?​

On October 27, council we be voting on whether CafeTO should be made permanent.

I just hope we can get sheltered and heated patios, like we see in NYC. It’s a much nicer experience, and would make these patios genuinely useful all times of year, perhaps with the exception of January, February and part of March.

Plus they just make the street look so much nicer, and they effectively isolate pedestrians and diners from cars.

Also I’m curious if this program has caused any decrease in road injuries and fatalities, given that they naturally calm traffic.

Anyways generally I’d say CafeTO has done more to improve Toronto’s public realm than any other program, so I hope it’s here to stay. Pedestrians love it. Diners love it. Businesses love it. Now we find out how powerful the parking lobby is.

 

[DSC]

I just hope we can get sheltered and heated patios, like we see in NYC. It’s a much nicer experience, and would make these patios genuinely useful all times of year, perhaps with the exception of January, February and part of March.

Plus they just make the street look so much nicer, and they effectively isolate pedestrians and diners from cars.

View attachment 356017

Also I’m curious if this program has caused any decrease in road injuries and fatalities, given that they naturally calm traffic.

Anyways generally I’d say CafeTO has done more to improve Toronto’s public realm than any other program, so I hope it’s here to stay. Pedestrians love it. Diners love it. Businesses love it. Now we find out how powerful the parking lobby is.

Though CafeTO certainly made it easier to open a patio; it is worth remembering that in early 2019, before covid entered our vocabulary, the City completely updated the by-laws on 'boulevard cafes'. Apart from legalising curbside cafes (where the enclosure is not immediately adjacent to the building) and parklet cafes (where the enclosure is in the parking lane) and allowing (unlicenced) small flankage cafes these changes also made it clear that the primary role of sidewalks is for pedestrians and that those with visual or mobility challenges need to have straight and unobstructed pathways of a decent width. Did the 2019 changes achieve everything, no. Did they greatly improve things, yes. CafeTO built on these new regulations and certainly greatly expanded the street culture and allowed restaurants and bars to experiment a bit (no fees helped that!)! Details at: https://www.toronto.ca/services-pay.../sidewalk-cafes-and-marketing-displays-bylaw/

 

[Northern Light]

I just hope we can get sheltered and heated patios, like we see in NYC. It’s a much nicer experience, and would make these patios genuinely useful all times of year, perhaps with the exception of January, February and part of March.

Plus they just make the street look so much nicer, and they effectively isolate pedestrians and diners from cars.

View attachment 356017

Also I’m curious if this program has caused any decrease in road injuries and fatalities, given that they naturally calm traffic.

Anyways generally I’d say CafeTO has done more to improve Toronto’s public realm than any other program, so I hope it’s here to stay. Pedestrians love it. Diners love it. Businesses love it. Now we find out how powerful the parking lobby is.

I have to say, while I am VERY pro patio; I'm not keen on the examples in this image at all.

They seem to defeat the very point of being outdoors.

If you're walled in; that's not a patio, its a building; just a shabbily built one.

***

I don't really see a problem with patios being seasonal. By and large, I don't feel compelled to eat outdoors with my jacket on in January.

That said, i'm very open to designs that allow good shoulder season coverage; lets call it long-sleeve/sweater weather; October/Early Nov; Mid-April through early May.
I think true 'winter patios' do have their place, but its really limited, its around an ice skating rink, where you're taking a break from the skating, and sipping a hot cocoa or coffee with or without alcohol.
Its a patio that's only open mid-day, on the weekends, for brunch, when the natural sunlight is warming, and a view just demands being outside, briskness be damned.

Patio heaters can be part of that shoulder season mix, but they do consume a lot of energy and I'm really not all that hot on them as a 'we need these to open'.........I tend to think they have a place for the mid-afternoon diner as the sunlight wanes, or if an unexpected temperature drop occurs, for diners already mid-meal.

For overhead shelter, I'd rather just see retractable awnings, which some patios have now.

That doesn't work for the curbside offerings, and there, other options could be examined.

But still, the point of a patio is to be outdoors, not within 4 walls and a roof!

 

[nstuch]

These improvements sound good in theory but the primary problem with Toronto is that everything is done in the most half-assed way possible. When it comes to the details we're a total failure, take front street in front of Union Station, still have the crappy concrete barricades and temporary wooden hydro poles which will still be there in 5 years +. The entire public realm citywide looks like no one really cares, what other major city in the world is littered with old telegraph poles, like on King St and Queen St west of Spadina which are some of our premier shopping and restaurant areas, and asphalt patches everywhere, and broken garbage cans, and massive weeds growing out of the sides of buildings and tree planters. It's not surprising though considering the average resident just seems oblivious to the shabbiness.

 

[TheTigerMaster]

These improvements sound good in theory but the primary problem with Toronto is that everything is done in the most half-assed way possible. When it comes to the details we're a total failure,

When it comes to street patios, I think our tendency to over-regulate would cause this “half-assed” feeling more than anything else.

We need to:
1. Give restaurants the ability to be creative and flexible with their designs. Do not over-regulate them to death. When reading NYC's Open Restaurants guidelines I was impressed with how straightforward and permissive they were. Notably, they specifically allow outdoor heating.
2. Assure restaurant owners that this program is here to stay. This will encourage them to invest in high quality, permanent fixtures, that will least years. In the picture I posted above, note the very high quality signage these restaurant owners have installed in NYC. The leftmost restaurant even posted a whole moose statue on top of the patio!

 

[nstuch]

sorry, i was referring to the public realm in general and the initial "great streets" post, not street patios specifically.

 

[TheTigerMaster]

I just hope we can get sheltered and heated patios, like we see in NYC. It’s a much nicer experience, and would make these patios genuinely useful all times of year, perhaps with the exception of January, February and part of March.

Plus they just make the street look so much nicer, and they effectively isolate pedestrians and diners from cars.

View attachment 356017

Also I’m curious if this program has caused any decrease in road injuries and fatalities, given that they naturally calm traffic.

Anyways generally I’d say CafeTO has done more to improve Toronto’s public realm than any other program, so I hope it’s here to stay. Pedestrians love it. Diners love it. Businesses love it. Now we find out how powerful the parking lobby is.

I'd also love to see the City allow retail and restaurants to exclusively operate out of small, curbisde establishments. These would be setups very similar to what we see with Market 707 at Bathurst and Dundas:

This kind of ultra-fine grained retail can really breathe life into a lot of under-utilized Downtown corridors. It would also have the effect of re-injecting some diversity into the Downtown retail landscape, as the rents for these small stalls are surely far cheaper than that of a whole retail unit. Small businesses that could never afford these massive condo retail units would likely be able to afford one of these stalls.

University Avenue in particular comes to mind as a street that would really benefit from this treatment. It's one of the densest streets in the city, surrounded by residential and employment areas, yet pedestrian activity on the street is rather low, as there is nothing on the street to cause pedestrians to walk or linger there. These installations should made a component of University Avenue once the street is redesigned.

 

[TheTigerMaster]

These improvements sound good in theory but the primary problem with Toronto is that everything is done in the most half-assed way possible. When it comes to the details we're a total failure, take front street in front of Union Station, still have the crappy concrete barricades and temporary wooden hydro poles which will still be there in 5 years +. The entire public realm citywide looks like no one really cares, what other major city in the world is littered with old telegraph poles, like on King St and Queen St west of Spadina which are some of our premier shopping and restaurant areas, and asphalt patches everywhere, and broken garbage cans, and massive weeds growing out of the sides of buildings and tree planters. It's not surprising though considering the average resident just seems oblivious to the shabbiness.

When it comes to street patios, I think our tendency to over-regulate would cause this “half-assed” feeling more than anything else.

We need to:
1. Give restaurants the ability to be creative and flexible with their designs. Do not over-regulate them to death. When reading NYC's Open Restaurants guidelines I was impressed with how straightforward and permissive they were. Notably, they specifically allow outdoor heating.
2. Assure restaurant owners that this program is here to stay. This will encourage them to invest in high quality, permanent fixtures, that will least years. In the picture I posted above, note the very high quality signage these restaurant owners have installed in NYC. The leftmost restaurant even posted a whole moose statue on top of the patio!

sorry, i was referring to the public realm in general and the initial "great streets" post, not street patios specifically.

It’s really easy to be cynical about urban design issues in Toronto, and I get it given our history. However I’d like to think that Toronto has genuinely turned the corner on these issues.

Just look at the two biggest urban design projects we’ll have completed in the upcoming years: the pedestrianization of Yonge between Carlton and Queen, and the redesign of King Street for the transit priority corridor. Now we can nitpick about the details and the particularities of each project, but the fact remains that on a very significant stretch of two of our main downtown corridors, we’re aggressively reclaiming space from cars, and using those spaces for better purposes. This is arguably the biggest upgrade to Toronto’s public realm in multiple generations, and in a few years Downtown Toronto is going to be a significantly nicer space because of it.

A decade ago I wouldn’t have even in my wildest dreams expected even one of those initiatives to get off the ground.

And we’re really just getting the ball rolling. University Avenue / Queen’s Park is likely going to become some sort of grand linear park within the next 10 to 15 years (I cautiously expect Council to approve whatever plans emerge for there), and the City is actively pursuing various other initiatives as well. Things really are looking good for the future of our urban core.

Now this isn’t to dismiss anything that you’ve said. The city does have a history of half-assing and poor maintenance, and that absolutely needs to be addressed. I’m just saying that overall we’re trending in the right direction, and I’m very hopeful that in a few short years this public realm won’t be as shabby.

 

[old boy]

It’s really easy to be cynical about urban design issues in Toronto, and I get it given our history. However I’d like to think that Toronto has genuinely turned the corner on these issues.

Just look at the two biggest urban design projects we’ll have completed in the upcoming years: the pedestrianization of Yonge between Carlton and Queen, and the redesign of King Street for the transit priority corridor. Now we can nitpick about the details and the particularities of each project, but the fact remains that on a very significant stretch of two of our main downtown corridors, we’re aggressively reclaiming space from cars, and using those spaces for better purposes. This is arguably the biggest upgrade to Toronto’s public realm in multiple generations, and in a few years Downtown Toronto is going to be a significantly nicer space because of it.

A decade ago I wouldn’t have even in my wildest dreams expected even one of those initiatives to get off the ground.

And we’re really just getting the ball rolling. University Avenue / Queen’s Park is likely going to become some sort of grand linear park within the next 10 to 15 years (I cautiously expect Council to approve whatever plans emerge for there), and the City is actively pursuing various other initiatives as well. Things really are looking good for the future of our urban core.

Now this isn’t to dismiss anything that you’ve said. The city does have a history of half-assing and poor maintenance, and that absolutely needs to be addressed. I’m just saying that overall we’re trending in the right direction, and I’m very hopeful that in a few short years this public realm won’t be as shabby.

I think people following the Public Realm issue know that turning around a culture of neglect is not an overnight thing. I was born in Toronto in 1948 and have seen astonishing changes. It's still going to need focussed work, and public and private investment, to enable our public spaces to catch up to the varied, and some times rampant, development this place has seen over several decades now. At least this topic has punched it's way up the ladder. Toronto has had a prolonged adolescence .

 

[Undead]

Here, I found the solution to the ugly garbage bins:

Source