Greater Toronto Nodes

[buildup]

I'm confident downtown Toronto is on an established path to greatness. But I've come to see city centres such as Mississauga Town Centre (or whatever its called) as complimentry rather than depleting or competing with the core. Not every employer needs or wants to be at King & Bay. Furthermore its not ideal to have everyone in suburbia commuting everyday. So I would love to see the suburbs buiding dense vibrant commercial nodes.

Can anyone list where the major suburban commercial nodes are precisely - and how you see their potential?

Im aware there Mississauga and North York have ambitions.

 

[Memph]

The Urban Growth Centres that currently have something in them.

Etobicoke: Kipling & Bloor
Scarborough: McCowan & Ellesmere
North York: Yonge & Sheppard
Mississauga: Hurontario & Burnhamthorpe
Markham: Warden & Hwy 7
Richmond Hill: Yonge & Bantry
Brampton: Main & Queen
Burlington: Brant & Lakeshore
Pickering: Liverpool & Kingston
Oshawa: Simcoe & King
Midtown: Yonge & Eglinton

Unofficial Growth Centre: Yonge & St Clair

There's also Humber Bay Shores which is growing but mostly residential and not an official growth centre, and to a lesser degree, there are others like Trafalgar & Dundas.

And a bunch of major office parks...

Orbitor & Matheson
Erin Mills & 401
Consumers & Sheppard
404 & Hwy 7

Plus some growth centres that don't have much yet, at least not in the central part of the growth centre:
Milton, Langstaff, Vaughan, Midtown Oakville, Yonge & Davis

 

[taal]

I'm confident downtown Toronto is on an established path to greatness. But I've come to see city centres such as Mississauga Town Centre (or whatever its called) as complimentry rather than depleting or competing with the core. Not every employer needs or wants to be at King & Bay. Furthermore its not ideal to have everyone in suburbia commuting everyday. So I would love to see the suburbs buiding dense vibrant commercial nodes.

Can anyone list where the major suburban commercial nodes are precisely - and how you see their potential?

Im aware there Mississauga and North York have ambitions.

I disagree to a certain degree, there are other cities in North America that are very core centric (i.e. Chicago / Calgary / ...) that even by today's #s have a larger percentage of employment located in the core compared to the suburbs (both within the city proper and outside [i.e. the 905]).

So in this sense I'm biased and believe the core should see more of the growth, the transportation system is already set up for such travel patterns.


Having said that there is always employment in the suburbs and it would be much better if this was concentrated in nodes, like the ones listed above. The problem is to date these cores have seen very little of the employment growth where the majority has been in massive office parks around the airport (as of the last 5 years or so) or Markham (i.e. 404 / 407) area earlier.

We'll have to see if the new nodes grow, currently the only examples outside of Toronto and MCC, are Markham Center and Vaughan ... the few office buildings in Markham center today are no different then the sprawling office parks ... Vaghuan center's new KPMG tower however is different and more resembles the towers in NYCC, the problem being this implies the net rental rates will be higher (to pay for underground parking and other thing associated with building more dense towers), but will the suburban companies be OK paying more rent ... only time will tell ...

Seeing how the outer 416 has seen so little growth, due to the high taxation in Toronto, that makes one thing price is still quite a significant factor. NYCC may just be too expensive but Vaughan and other centers a comprise for suburban employees.


Maybe one needs to look at MCC and NYCC as indicators ... MCC being the ideal indicator as its in the 905 (so already has low commercial tax rates) ... yet its seen essentially no office space growth ... in some ways doesn't this say it all ? Companies in the 905 are still looking for the cheeper land / rental rates ...

 

[DKsan]

I think you're looking for this: Places to Grow Urban Growth Centres
This is where all the action will be happening, though it misses a few places of natural core growth, like Port Credit, Hespeler and Preston in Cambridge, etc.

 

[TrickyRicky]

I have the opposite opinion of Taal. I think the GTA should really push the nodal strategy hard. Don't worry about downtown. Within our lifetime downtown will suck up more than it's fair share of development, growth, and investment. That is a given. I worry more about the cohesiveness of the GTA as a whole and feel that we are not moving fast enough to develop and tie together the regional nodes with transit (including highway) infrastructure.

A nodal, multi-centred GTA is a stronger more expansive and flexible entity. I don't think we are serious enough about this in our plans because most nodal areas just want to be, politically speaking, bedroom subdivisions. We need a network of roads and heavy-rail public transit infrastructure tying together our nodes. And we need to get serious about growth boundaries and densification. The GTA is already big enough, in terms of geographic footprint, to house a population several times it's size.

 

[taal]

I have the opposite opinion of Taal. I think the GTA should really push the nodal strategy hard. Don't worry about downtown. Within our lifetime downtown will suck up more than it's fair share of development, growth, and investment. That is a given. I worry more about the cohesiveness of the GTA as a whole and feel that we are not moving fast enough to develop and tie together the regional nodes with transit (including highway) infrastructure.

A nodal, multi-centred GTA is a stronger more expansive and flexible entity. I don't think we are serious enough about this in our plans because most nodal areas just want to be, politically speaking, bedroom subdivisions. We need a network of roads and heavy-rail public transit infrastructure tying together our nodes. And we need to get serious about growth boundaries and densification. The GTA is already big enough, in terms of geographic footprint, to house a population several times it's size.

When I step back and think about the most efficient model I agree with you to a certain degree. But there are enough cities that have vastly more employment downtown that I think ours can easily double in size (in terms of employment) prior to worrying about developing nodes in other parts of the GTA (significant nodes that is ... of course there will always be jobs else where).

 

[Memph]

When I step back and think about the most efficient model I agree with you to a certain degree. But there are enough cities that have vastly more employment downtown that I think ours can easily double in size (in terms of employment) prior to worrying about developing nodes in other parts of the GTA (significant nodes that is ... of course there will always be jobs else where).

A lot of the jobs outside downtown are industrial/logistics, retail and public sector like schools, police, etc which it wouldn't make sense to shift downtown. All you could shift downtown really is office employment, and even so, there are companies that would prefer to have their offices close to the warehouses, or suburban customers. These nodes elsewhere in the GTA are trying to attract offices that could locate downtown, but still, having all that transportation demand into downtown is maybe not such a good thing. I don't think trips into downtown need to increases to improve transit like GO, and the subways/streetcars are already near or over capacity. There's more room on transit if you're heading to places like ECC or RHC.

Btw, do you have evidence that Chicago is more core centric in terms of jobs? I think Toronto is pretty close, especially if you include Midtown. Other than Chicago, I think New York is the only American city that's more core centric than Toronto.

 

[Woodbridge_Heights]

I'm simply not sold on the nodal model, at least in the GTA. The reason is that there are no direct transit links between each of the nodes and the densities simply won't support any sort of higher order transit. Except for the downtown core.

 

[taal]

A lot of the jobs outside downtown are industrial/logistics, retail and public sector like schools, police, etc which it wouldn't make sense to shift downtown. All you could shift downtown really is office employment, and even so, there are companies that would prefer to have their offices close to the warehouses, or suburban customers. These nodes elsewhere in the GTA are trying to attract offices that could locate downtown, but still, having all that transportation demand into downtown is maybe not such a good thing. I don't think trips into downtown need to increases to improve transit like GO, and the subways/streetcars are already near or over capacity. There's more room on transit if you're heading to places like ECC or RHC.

Btw, do you have evidence that Chicago is more core centric in terms of jobs? I think Toronto is pretty close, especially if you include Midtown. Other than Chicago, I think New York is the only American city that's more core centric than Toronto.

I'll try to find data to back that up ... actually I recall someone mentioning Calgary has one of the most densest cores in terms of employment ! ... of course this is a per capita concept.

But see I think that's exactly the problem ... there are so many large software firms in office parks in Mississauga / Markham, why can't they locate downtown. I'm willing to bet the majority of jobs along Hi-way 7 are not at all back office jobs ... all these jobs with the potential to be downtown.

 

[balenciaga]

Btw, do you have evidence that Chicago is more core centric in terms of jobs? I think Toronto is pretty close, especially if you include Midtown. Other than Chicago, I think New York is the only American city that's more core centric than Toronto.

Toronto does not have a midtown.
3 minutes walking distance away from the Yonge/Eglinton intersection it is all low rise single family houses. You don't call a busy intersection with a few highrise buildings "midtown". It is a near suburb.

 

[balenciaga]

I'm simply not sold on the nodal model, at least in the GTA. The reason is that there are no direct transit links between each of the nodes and the densities simply won't support any sort of higher order transit. Except for the downtown core.

I think those people drive to work mostly.
Nodal model doesn't necessarily require extensive public transit. LA is a prime example.

 

[TrickyRicky]

It's not going to be easy because we are essentially going to have to layer transportation onto an urban armature that is locked into a network of low-rise residential enclaves. Let's put it this way, we are a car-centric region but our nodes aren't even well connected by car. Forget public transit, how do you even get from Downtown Toronto to Mississauga City Centre by car?

 

[Softee]

Toronto does not have a midtown.
3 minutes walking distance away from the Yonge/Eglinton intersection it is all low rise single family houses. You don't call a busy intersection with a few highrise buildings "midtown". It is a near suburb.

Yes, it does. People have been referring to Yonge and Eglinton as midtown (or sometimes uptown) for as long as I can remember. Just because the area doesn't meet your personal density requirements to be deemed as such doesn't mean that Toronto doesn't have an area worthy of the name. That area is called midtown because that's what most people who live in the city call it.

There are dozens of highrise buildings at Yonge and Eglinton, not just "a few".

 

[junctionist]

If you travel west along St. Clair, the street is lined with mid-rise and high-rise buildings until Avenue Road or so. Avenue Road is lined with mid-rise apartment buildings. The Yonge and Eglinton area has side streets dominated by mid-rise apartment buildings. The area definitely has the urban character that befits the midtown moniker. It also includes the many high-rise apartment buildings of Davisville. I'd say that Yorkville is also midtown since it's mostly north of Bloor Street. So midtown seems quite appropriate for the area from Bloor to Lawrence with Yonge at its heart. Midtown, then, like downtown, can be further divided into neighbourhoods.

 

[DKsan]

I'm simply not sold on the nodal model, at least in the GTA. The reason is that there are no direct transit links between each of the nodes and the densities simply won't support any sort of higher order transit. Except for the downtown core.

That's why Places to Grow is supposed to be built in conjunction with The Big Move. There are rapid transit links in place, but some need to be improved and some need to be created.