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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.
Today's 'Then & Now' comparison takes us to the intersection of two of Toronto's most well-known streets: Queen & Spadina. In the 'Then' image above (taken in 2005), the view looking east is dominated by the Financial District skyscrapers Scotia Plaza and First Canadian Place (the latter of which was built in 1975 and remains Canada's tallest completed building). At this time, Queen Street West was lined on both sides with 2-3-storey buildings, bookended in this image by the 135m-tall Sheraton Centre Toronto Hotel, appearing under the arm of the traffic light in the distance.
Flash-forward to the 'Now' photo below, and the Financial District towers are all but blocked by the densification that has since taken place in Toronto's Entertainment District. The 2023 image shows a variety of building heights, generally stepping-down towards Queen, including Picasso Condos (128m), Tableau Condos (124m), and 330 Richmond (93m). The blue-glass building at the centre of the image is Queen Richmond Centre West, consisting of office and retail uses. The most-recent addition to the skyline from this vantage point however is another residential tower, Peter and Adelaide (152m), which is a sign of the continued residential redevelopment yet to come in this part of the city due to proposals such as 147 Spadina (86m), 122 Peter (131m) and RioCan Hall (130m & 145m).
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.
