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Ranee Management has submitted a Zoning By-law Amendment application to the City of Toronto to permit the intensification of a large apartment site located on the northwest corner of Finch Avenue West and Sentinel Road in the Toronto borough of North York. The application seeks approval to redevelop portions of the site that are currently occupied by surface parking or lawns – with four mixed-use towers and a new recreation centre. The Kirkor Architects Planners-designed towers would be 14, 30, 36, and 40 storeys tall, while the recreation centre would be 2 storeys.
The site is currently developed with four 22-storey slab style rental apartment buildings arranged in a Tower-in-the-Park style, and which were built in the early 1970s. They currently provide a total 1,479 units, while a there is also a convenience store on the ground floor of one of the buildings. While each building has underground parking, each also features a large surface parking lot at its front, with a smaller parking area at its rear. Two outdoor pools with change room buildings are located in the centre of the site, while the remaining space is landscaped with trees and pathways.
In 2011, applications were approved in principle by the Ontario Municipal Board – now the Ontario Land Tribunal – on consent with the City to add eight new mid-rise residential buildings to the site, with a total of 1,035 new units. These approvals were never finalized. Since that time, Metrolinx has commenced construction of the Finch West LRT line, a result of which will be a transit stop immediately adjacent to the site at the corner of Finch and Sentinel.
The new proposal would comprehensively intensify the site with three tall buildings, one mid-rise, and a recreation centre with an outdoor pool. The proposed buildings would bring 1,720 new rental units to the site in approximately 127,452m² of residential gross floor area, as well as 1,050m² of retail gross floor area. All four existing rental buildings would be retained and enhanced with new indoor and outdoor amenity areas of 4,956.95m² and 5,661.70m², respectively. The floor space index of the project would be 2.85.
The 1,720 new units are proposed in a mix of 84 studios (2.6%), 2,245 one-bedrooms (70.2%), 527 two-bedrooms (16.5%), and 343 three-bedrooms (10.7%). The site would have a new grand total of 3,199 rental units.
The 2-storey, 1,500m² recreation centre and outdoor pool is proposed at the centre of the site for the shared use of residents of all buildings on the site. The recreation centre and outdoor pool would replace the older existing outdoor pools. The ground floor of the recreation centre would include a gymnasium, multi-purpose room and social hall, as well as other flexible amenity spaces. The second floor would include lockers and change rooms, amongst other amenity spaces. A rooftop garden would also be provided, to be accessed from a central elevator and stair corridor.
The total number of car-parking spaces would be 1,937, with 1,615 spaces for residents, and 322 for visitors and commercial purposes. There would be a total of 1,765 bicycle parking spaces, with 1,631 spaces for residents, and 134 spaces for visitors.
The site is currently served by two TTC bus routes, but by the time the new buildings could be built, the Finch West LRT will be operating. The Finch West LRT is an 11-kilometre light rail transit line with 18 stops, including an underground interchange stop at Finch West subway station less than a kilometre to the east. The new line is anticipated to be operating in 2023.
More information on the development will come soon, but in the meantime, you can learn more from our Database file for the project, linked below. If you'd like, 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: | Bousfields, Crozier Consulting Engineers, KIRKOR Architects and Planners, RWDI Climate and Performance Engineering, STUDIO tla |
