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As the City of Toronto continues to grapple with the housing crisis, its Housing Now initiative has been progressing slower than expected. This is due to a range of issues, from the pandemic to rising interest rates. The City and its Housing Now private sector partners are persisting, however, and now Tricon Residential in partnership with Kilmer Group and CreateTO have advanced plans for a new mixed-use development at 5207 Dundas Street West. Following an initial detailed proposal in 2022, a revised proposal which increases heights and unit count has been submitted for Site Plan Approval. The site is located within a short walk of Kipling station on Bloor Line 2, and a somewhat longer walk to Kipling GO station and MiWay terminal.
As part of the Housing Now initiative, the development, designed by Henriquez Partners Architects, aims to provide a significant number of affordable units to the city's housing market. Located at 5027 Dundas Street West on its southeast corner with Kipling Avenue and Dundas Street West, the development is part of the larger Bloor-Kipling focus area much of which is to be built on land reclaimed from the now removed Six Points interchange.
The Bloor-Kipling area was recently subject to a Zoning By-law Amendment process by CreateTO as part of Housing Now that will see several development blocks built out over the coming decade. This first proposal relates to Block 1, with Block 4 to the north of it to be the new home of the Etobicoke Civic Centre.
Across Dundas Street, the civic centre project was subject to an architectural competition which selected a design by Copenhagen-based Henning Larsen Architects, and is planned by the City of Toronto to include a variety of programs and services including a new district library and community centre. The site is part of the City's ambitious plan to create a new downtown area for Etobicoke through the block context plan for the neighbourhood.
This first mostly residential development consists of a 29-storey tower and a 25-storey tower sharing a podium ranging from 9 to 12 storeys, housing a total of 725 residential units in a mix of market-rate and affordable rental apartments, with 507 market units and 218 affordable units. The development is also to boast approximately 4,738m² of commercial space to animate the ground realm.
The prior version of this proposal included towers of 18 and 25 storeys, with a total of 248 market-rate rental units. The increase in size and market-rate rental units is in part a response to the rising interest rates and the lack of federal and provincial support for affordable housing. The City of Toronto is pursuing one way to make the project financially viable and deliver on its promise of affordable housing — increasing the number of market-rate rentals, in an effort to subsidize the costs of building the affordable housing.
The design also includes 206 parking spaces, with 114 for residents, 2 for car-sharing, and 90 for non-residential use and visitors. These spaces will be located in a single level below-ground garage, accessed from Adobigok Pathway, a side street to the south. There is also accommodation for bicycles, with 549 long-term and 71 short-term residential spots, along with 25 for commercial spaces.
Amenities for the development include 1,614m² of indoor space and 2,197m² of outdoor space, the latter including a landscaped courtyard area and the rooftops of the podium volumes. Each tower will be equipped with three elevators, resulting in one elevator for every 122 units for the shorter tower, and about 115 units per elevator for the taller tower.
The exterior landscaping plans are designed by CCxA, the design team run by Claude Cormier, and who are behind — among other recently built favourites — the dog fountain at Berczy Park, and more recently the heart-shaped fountain at Love Park at the Harbourfront. CCxA has designed a path of trees and lush greenery through the centre of the site.
As the City through CreateTO and its private sector partners navigate the challenges of building affordable housing in the current economic climate, developments like this one will play a crucial role in providing much-needed housing options for Toronto's residents.
UrbanToronto will continue to follow progress on this development, but in the meantime, you can learn more about it from our Database file, 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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EDITOR'S NOTE: This article has been edited to reflect the fact that the community centre at the new Etobicoke Civic Centre will not be run by the YMCA.
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| Related Companies: | Arcadis, CCxA, EllisDon, Entuitive, RWDI Climate and Performance Engineering, Tricon Residential |
