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H&R REIT, one of Canada's largest REITs with real estate assets of $13.4 billion, announced in a recent investor update that the company is planning to redevelop two sites they own in Downtown Toronto, one on Yonge Street north of Wellington Street, and one on Front Street east of Blue Jays Way. While the firm says that applications have gone into the City for the 55 Yonge Street location and that they intend to file applications soon for the 310 Front Street West location, no planning documents are available for either yet. The company has published a website seeking public feedback on the Yonge Street site now, however, so we are able to report more about the concept plans for it.
Having bought the side-by-side 5-storey, 53 Yonge and 12-storey, 55 Yonge in recent years, H&R REIT is looking to replace both buildings with a 66-storey, mixed-use tower, designed by BDP Quadrangle and PARTISANS, both based in Toronto. Of note, the 1958-completed 55 Yonge was designed by noted Canadian Modernist architect Peter Dickinson and by Page + Steele Architects. While there are 2 storeys of underground parking planned in the new tower, 2 storeys of retail would be found at ground level, while office space in the podium would fill storeys 3 through 15.
Above the offices, the building elegantly sweeps back across 4 floors. Renderings indicate greenery in behind this portion of the tower, this area presumably containing amenities for those working and/or living in the tower.
Within the bulk of the tower, 482 residential rental suites are planned in a mix of studios, one-bedrooms, two-bedrooms, and three-bedrooms. The crown of the tower features a spire in the southeast corner, with the top floors sliced away at an angle that suggest the building height is capped so as to not add more shadow to a neighbouring park. We will have to wait until the planning documents are public to know for which considerations exactly the building's rise has been capped.
Once published, the planning documents will answer such questions as exactly how many metres tall the building is planned to be, while some numbers already appear on the community engagement website, including that 1,300 m² of retail is planned along with 16,700 m² of office space, which will presumably more than replace the amount contained in the two buildings onsite currently.
Just a couple steps behind, planning-wise, is H&R REIT's plan to redevelop where they own three mid-rise office buildings (completed in 1990) at 310, 320, and 330 Front Street West between Blue Jays Way and Windsor Street.
Proposed where 310 Front West stands at the southeast corner of the site, the current 8-storey building would be torn down and replaced with a 69-storey mixed-use building with 186 m² of retail at ground level, 10,963 m² of office on podium floors, and 550 rental apartments on the floors above.
This building is designed by Hariri Pontarini Architects. No community feedback website has been launched for this building yet.
H&R REIT is hoping to rezoning and site plan approvals for both projects in place by the fourth quarter of 2022.
You can learn more from our Database file for the projects, linked below. If you'd like to, you can join in on the conversation in the associated Project Forum threads, or leave a comment in the space provided on this page.
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