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A new, extended mid-rise, mixed-use United Kingsway Condos could soon replace an assembly of mostly low-rise commercial buildings along a stretch of Bloor Street West in Etobicoke's Kingsway neighbourhood. Having started with 2915 and 2917 Bloor Street West, Fieldgate Urban acquired the adjacent 2939 through 2943 Bloor properties and have submitted a new design to the City of Toronto for Zoning By-Law Amendments and Site Plan Approval. The reworked plan adding the adjacent properties would bring 225 units to the block, a significant increase from the original 90 units initially proposed in 2016.
The site is located on the south side of Bloor between Prince Edward Drive and Grenview Boulevard. Buildings currently on the assembly include the one-storey Kingsway Medical Building and its associated surface parking lot plus two more two-storey buildings with three storefronts and apartment spaces on the second floor. To the rear, running parallel to Bloor, is a public laneway. That stretch of Bloor is lined mostly by 2-storey mixed-use/retail buildings, bordered to the north and south by a well-established residential neighbourhood of single detached residential dwellings on large properties. Several recent approvals for mid-rise 'Avenue' style buildings have been approved along the this stretch of Bloor.
The previous 8-storey building proposal, designed by TACT Architecture, appeared as two distinct masses that read as separate structures with a fine-grained rhythm of retail bays at grade, which is generally reflective of the traditional rhythm of storefronts along Bloor Street West.
The revised proposal reflects the expanded area of the site while generally maintaining the proposed building envelope provided in the Council-accepted Settlement Offer for the previous proposal, including its overall height, building setbacks, and step-backs. As a result of the expansion, however, the total site and building frontage increases from 59 metres to 82 metres, and the total GFA increases from 10,600m² to 15,268m².
IBI Group’s new design reflects an extended rectangular 7-storey mixed use building, containing 14,225m² of residential and 1,403m² of commercial area, for a gross density of 4.94 times the lot area.
The new design maintains the 5-storey streetwall along Bloor Street West of recent nearby redevelopment proposals, with increasing step-backs on levels 6, 7 and the mechanical level. Along the rear laneway, the building maintains a 3-storey height with increasing step-backs at levels 4, 5, 6 and 7, and at the mechanical level. The front and rear terracing generally comply within 45-degree angular planes (taken from: a height of 80% of the Bloor St W right-of-way width; the rear building face at a height of 10.5 metres).
The ground floor is proposed to be occupied by two retail units (previously a large singular retail unit) fronting Bloor Street West, on either side of a central residential lobby area. To the rear of these would be two residential indoor amenity rooms totally 450m². The rooftop is proposed to provide an equal amount of outdoor amenity (450m²) in the form of a terrace accessed on the mechanical level.
The building is now planned with 225 residential dwelling units (increased from 163) consisting of 169 one-bedrooms (75%), 34 two-bedrooms (15%) and 23 three-bedrooms (10%). Illustrated below, the units are largely narrow and deep along a double loaded corridor. On the uppermost floor, however, the south facing units have with wider floor plans/layouts along exterior terraces.
Two levels of underground parking, accessed from the rear laneway via a ramp at the southwest corner of the building, would accommodate 91 vehicle spaces (68 resident; 23 visitor), reduced from 98, and 169 bicycle parking spaces. The building is a very short walk from Royal York subway station.
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: | Arcadis, Counterpoint Engineering, EQ Building Performance Inc., LEA Consulting, STUDIO tla |
