Throughout October, UrbanToronto is celebrating 20 YEARS, with stories looking back over the last two decades. Each day we are also checking out our ever-changing street scenes, comparing an older "Then" shot with an up-to-date "Now" shot.

Then: Looking west along a barren Front Street East (2005), image by Edward Skira

Today's 'Then & Now' takes us to the east end of Front Street East, looking west towards downtown. While other areas in Toronto may have undergone significant skyline changes, in the foreground of this image is one area that has undergone an entire transformation from the ground-up. In the 'Then' photo above, taken in 2005, Front was a quiet asphalt road that connected directly with Bayview Avenue (roughly where Corktown Common is located today). On either side was vacant land that was once occupied by a plethora of industrial uses, including a railway hub, and the William Davies Company, at one time the world's largest pork processing facility. After the meat industry moved out during the 1980s, the land was acquired by the City for a housing project - Ataratiri - which failed in the 1990s, leaving the site vacant through the1990s and 2000s...

Flash forward to today (see below), and that same view has been altered drastically. Gone is the asphalt Front Street, replaced with pavers, and now boasting a public realm with wide sidewalks on either side, public art, and seating areas. Constructed as the 2015 Pan Am Athletes' Village, once the Games were finished, the majority of the condos in this image were converted to a combination of market-priced condos, townhomes, affordable-rent apartments, and student dorms for George Brown. In this image is Canary Park Condominiums (right), Canary Block Condos (middle-right), Canary Commons (left), and the under-construction Canary House, part of the larger West Don Lands: Block 10 Indigenous Hub. The treed site in the left forefront of the image is the latest proposal in the area - West Don Lands: Block 13 - led by Dream Unlimited and designed by Henriquez Partners Architects, which would bring 859 additional units to the neighbourhood.  

Now: Looking west along Front Street East through Corktown to downtown (2023), image by Edward Skira

Come back tomorrow for another Then and Now from over UrbanToronto's last two decades!

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Thank you to the companies joining UrbanToronto to celebrate our 20 years in business.

Related Companies:

Arcadis, architects—Alliance, Baker Real Estate Incorporated, BDP Quadrangle, Bousfields, Dream Unlimited, Egis, EllisDon, EQ Building Performance Inc., HGC Engineering Inc, Jablonsky, Ast and Partners, LiveRoof Ontario Inc, Mulvey & Banani, NAK Design Strategies, o2 Planning and Design, RWDI Climate and Performance Engineering, Snaile Inc., Tricon Residential, U31