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To close out 2020, we are taking a look at the 10 most popular UrbanToronto Database files, Forum Threads, and News Stories from across the entire year.
Several new and updated development proposals, construction projects, and long-term visions from around the Greater Toronto Area made news over the course of 2020. The year's top ten news stories featured a mix of new and refined proposals that include skyline-altering "supertalls", large-scale master plans, transit news, and a growing list of projects in the 905 region. In fact, somewhat of a surprise is that stories about projects in the 905 make up six of our top ten this year, including the four most popular stories of 2020: it looks like development is getting quite serious in the suburban cities around Toronto.
10. 13-Storey Condo Proposed on Guelph Line in Burlington
Our tenth most popular story of the year covered a proposed 13-storey condominium development in the works, planned to rise at Guelph Line and New Street, a short distance east of Burlington's Downtown. While nowhere close to the biggest or tallest project discussed on UrbanToronto last year, the proposal clearly generated local interest, representative of a wider wave of development in and around Downtown Burlington.
9. Growth To Watch For: Markham and Durham Region Report Now Available
UrbanToronto released many Growth To Watch For reports in 2020, and the announcement of one of the releases garnered enough views to make it our ninth-most-read story of the year. The high ranking of the Markham-Durham report announcement is surely a reflection of the growing interest in development in the 905, and in the popularity of our series of reports. They are available through a subscription or on a standalone basis.
8. Herzog & de Meuron Design 87-Storey Tower for Bay and Bloor
Our eighth biggest story of the year, and certainly one of the flashiest, covered a planned 87-storey pencil-thin tower at 1200 Bay Street. With a height-to-width ratio that would fit in within Manhattan's Billionaire's Row, the proposal would marks the entry of Pritzker Prize-winning, Switzerland-based architects Herzog & de Meuron to the Toronto market if it is approved, working in collaboration with local firm BDP Quadrangle.
7. Toronto Now Fastest Growing City and Metro Area in US and Canada
Coming in at #7 is an article on the continued growth of Toronto and the surrounding region, ranking the GTA as the fastest growing metropolitan area in the United States and Canada. According to 2019 data in a Ryerson University Centre for Urban Research and Land Development (CUR) report , the Toronto census metropolitan area overtook previous title-holder, the Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington metropolitan area, as the fastest-growing among the two countries.
6. Metrolinx Details Plans for the West End of the Ontario Line
Anticipation is growing regarding the provincial government's planned Ontario Line, and several stories were published on UrbanToronto throughout the year documenting various announcements and new details of the proposed rapid transit project. At #6 for the year, an article revealing plans for the line's west end—stretching from Exhibition Place to the intersection of Queen Street West and Spadina Avenue—generated much attention.
5. Toronto Construction Industry Grapples With Covid-19
For most, 2020's #1 story was the global pandemic, though COVID-19 and its far-reaching impacts on the local construction industry only ranked #5 on our list. Despite this, UrbanToronto provided bulletin updates multiple times per week since shutdowns began in March, 2020. If all traffic to these regular reports was combined, our COVID-19 updates would easily take the #1 spot. By volume, COVID-19 was absolutely the top news item on UrbanToronto, albeit spread out over many dozen posts.
4. SmartCentres Intensifying Pickering Property With Two Residential Towers
Our top 4 now takes us entirely beyond the 416 to the 905, where big news has been brewing throughout 2020. At #4, a story revealed SmartCentres' plan to redevelop the 48-acre site at Brock Road and Pickering Parkway in Pickering with a multi-tower community. The first phase of the plan consists of 33 and 34-storey condominiums on an initial six-acre lot, set to reach heights of 106 and 109 metres.
3. Mississauga's New Tallest Buildings Rise Above Grade
Moving into the top 3, we reach Mississauga, the GTA's second-biggest city with an increasingly vertical downtown. Our #3 most popular story covered a construction milestone at the site of the ten-tower, mixed-use 'M City' development in Mississauga. Set to briefly take the crown of Mississauga's tallest buildings, the 60-storey M1 and M2 towers reached street level back in April, and have since begun their ascents above Burnhamthorpe Road and Confederation Parkway. A taller third tower here is now working through its earliest stages of construction.
2. Plans Advance for Six-Tower Proposal on Eglinton in Mississauga
To the north of the Mississauga City Centre area, a 2018 plan to bring six towers to 91 Eglinton Avenue East resurfaced last year with revised plans. The story revealed that the new plan included scaled-back heights of 13, 19, 24, 25, 35, and 37 storeys, drawing enormous interest from the community, and taking the #2 spot for the year.
1. Oxford Properties Launches 'Canada's Largest Development in History' at SquareOne in Mississauga
Finally, our most read article of 2020 was yet another Mississauga proposal, this one a long-term intensification of the 1972-built Square One Shopping Centre into a major mixed-use hub being touted as the largest development in Canada's history. A staggering 37 towers would be built around the sea of parking and open lots surrounding the mall, generating more attention than any other article we published last year.
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