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Though appeals of a City of Toronto-initiated Official Plan Amendment to designate the air space above the Union Station Rail Corridor as parkland to protect the space for the proposed Rail Deck Park were dismissed by the Local Planning Appeal Tribunal (LPAT) last summer, a competing Official Plan Amendment also before the Tribunal has been updated, now that world-renowned firm Safdie Architects is attached to the project.
P.I.T.S. Development Inc.—a consortium of CRAFT Development Corp., Kingsmen Group Inc., and IDR Developments—who purchased the air rights over the transportation corridor when the corridor itself was purchased by Metrolinx, submitted their first Official Plan Amendment application and concept plan to the City in 2017. They proposed the ORCA Project, an eight-building development over the existing active rail corridor south of Front Street West between Bathurst Street and Blue Jays Way. The application was refused by City Council in January, 2018 and subsequently appealed to the LPAT. A nine-week hearing is scheduled to hear the appeal beginning in November, 2020.
As the battle for the space has continued on both fronts in the meantime in the run-up to the LPAT hearing. In January, 2020 City Council adopted a staff report seeking to initiate expropriation proceedings for approximately three acres of air space above the Union Station Rail Corridor east of Spadina Avenue (the City has not expropriated any of the air rights to date), while P.I.T.S. submitted this revised concept plan designed for them by Safdie Architects and PWP Landscape Architecture to the City in March, 2020. The submission documents have just now become available to the public. Now proposing ten towers, this concept succeeds the eight-tower concept conceived for P.I.T.S by Sweeny &Co Architects.
The new scheme calls for 3,500 units across 207,100 m² of residential space, with 874 studios, 1,257 one-bedrooms, 1,050 two-bedrooms, and 349 three-bedrooms planned. A 78,400 m² office component joins 38,200 m² of retail, a 1,700 m² daycare, and a 10,300 m² signature galleria space. The development would also feature a total of 44,363 m² of open space.
Three levels of retail would face Front Street. The upper levels of the podium, characterized by extensive glazing and domed skylights, back onto the large open space area along the southern edge of the site. Six residential towers would rise from the podium, with maximum floor plate sizes ranging from 618 to 747 m².
Between Bathurst and Portland, two 43-storey towers are proposed. A pair of 43 and 46-storey buildings are planned for either side of Draper Street, and another two 46-storey towers are envisioned across the street from The Well, east of Draper Street. A zigzag orientation is deployed for the tower alignment, creating greater separation distances and enhancing light, views and privacy for residents. The six towers are organized into two groups, with five-storey mid-air bridges containing a mix of residences and amenities connecting each trio.
A 36-storey office tower is slated for the southwest corner of Front Street and Spadina, just opposite The Well's office building. It would contain a large lobby area and a corner plaza with stair and escalator access to the lower retail area and open space to the south.
East of Spadina, towers transition down in height from west to east. A 43-storey non-residential building would potentially hold a hotel, office, and retail uses. A 33-storey residential tower would comprise the middle building, with the easternmost volume containing 20 floors of residential space. Similar to the buildings on the westernmost area of the site, an architectural element linking each building would hold units and amenity spaces.
The proposed decking structure over the rail corridor has been revised to include a single level of parking beneath the surface west of Spadina Avenue and two levels east of Spadina Avenue for a total of 874 spaces. The original decking structure had included two levels of parking containing 1,225 spaces across the full site.
Construction of the decking structure also would have required regrading and relocation of some elements of Northern Linear Park, an elongated green space at Blue Jays Way and Navy Wharf Court. To provide vehicular access into and out of the site, three driveways would have crossed the park west of Spadina, with another crossing the park east of Spadina. The City said they would not authorize any disruption of the park, and the revised proposal now contemplates no surface disturbance to the green space.
Vehicular access to the development has been moved from the south side of the properties to the north side, to and from Front Street. The single driveway proposed east of Spadina Avenue has been relocated from the south side of the site to the northeast corner at Blue Jays Way. Along the south side of Front Street between Bathurst and Spadina, five vehicular driveways are proposed.
Comments from the City respecting proposed pedestrian connections criticized the lack of universality, with staff citing slopes and stairways as impediments to accessibility within the development. Whereas the original scheme envisioned the relocation of the Puente de Luz pedestrian bridge to a new site determined by the City, the current plan keeps the link in place. Additionally, the entire Front Street sidewalk has been redesigned to measure six metres wide, and seven pedestrian access points are provided through the site in a north-south direction. These include a galleria entrance with enclosed glass roof, stairs and elevators just east of Bathurst Street and an open plaza at Front and Spadina outside the proposed office building.
The audacious development is in the initial conceptual stage of the planning process. If the Official Plan Amendment application is approved, more detailed Zoning Bylaw Amendment and Site Plan Approval applications will follow.
You can learn more from our Database file for the project, linked below. If you'd like to, you can join in on the conversation in the associated Project Forum thread, or leave a comment in the space provided on this page.
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| Related Companies: | RJC Engineers, SvN, Sweeny &Co Architects Inc. |
