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The site of Canada's largest hotel, the Eaton Chelsea at Yonge and Gerrard in Downtown Toronto, is primed to be redeveloped into one of Canada's tallest buildings. Hotel owner Great Eagle Holdings is drawing closer to approvals for their Chelsea Green project, with a new planning submission offering a look into updated plans, including a significant redesign by architectsAlliance.
Redevelopment was initially proposed in 2015 as four high-rise towers—proposed at 46, 50, 74, and 80 storeys. The plan was refined in 2016 and presented to the Design Review Panel as a three-tower plan with heights of 49, 88, and 88 storeys. Following a settlement at the Local Planning Appeal Tribunal (LPAT), the project is back once again for a rezoning resubmission, this time seeking approval for three towers at 31, 48, and 84 storeys, reaching respective heights of 110.15, 163.5, and 275.75 metres.
At the northwest corner of the site n Gerrard beside the recently completed 43-store Livmore rental tower, the 31-storey tower would be the new hotel, containing 400 guest rooms and suites, as well as food and beverage, co-working, and hotel spa spaces. The new hotel represents about a quarter of the existing 1,590 guest rooms and suites in the Eaton Chelsea (a significant number of which have been closed in recent years: the current hotel's south wing has been mothballed).
A privately-owned public space (POPS) would separate the 31-storey tower from the 48-storey to the east. The 48-storey tower’s podium would house a mix of amenity and food and beverage spaces serving the hotel next door, connected by an elevated bridge. Above, the tower would house 501 residential units on floors 8 through 48.
Another POPS space is proposed to the south of a publicly accessible pedestrian mews carving through the site and linking two long-detached blocks of Walton Street. This POPS would connect with a new 785 m² public park leading down to Elm Street, completing a pedestrian mid-block connection between Elm and Gerrard Streets and n up into College Park.
On the south side of Walton Street, the 84-storey tower would contain 1,169 residential units, and would rise just above the pinnacle of Aura at College Park, currently the city’s 3rd tallest building as measured by roof height.
In total, the plan calls for 119,761 m² of residential space, accounting for 75.8% of the total project gross floor area. This space would come in the form of 1,670 units in a mix of 1,184 one-bedrooms, 325 two-bedrooms, and 161 three-bedrooms. The remaining space would include 25,597 m² of hotel space, 9,067 m² of retail space, and 3,528 m² of office space.
Additional information and images can be found in our database file for the project, linked below. Want to get involved in the discussion? Check out the associated Forum thread, or leave a comment in the field provided at the bottom of this page.
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| Related Companies: | Arcadis, architects—Alliance, Gradient Wind Engineers & Scientists, Grounded Engineering Inc., Mulvey & Banani |
