Lenser
Senior Member
Tewder: sad to see you too have chosen to use that vile term "special interest groups" as glib code for people and organizations whose views you dislike.
To add salt onto the wound, the Eaton Center is now ranked the 2nd largest mall in Canada. Absolutely insane that they would even suggest that another mall is needed here.
Tewder: sad to see you too have chosen to use that vile term "special interest groups" as glib code for people and organizations whose views you dislike.
Hmm??, sounds to me like this will become Toronto's next money pit?
Sadly, the interior has gone to seed. Ugly fluorescent lights illuminate its hallways. The baseboards are chipped, the woodwork faded. Some of its old rooms have been converted into modern government offices and courtrooms completely out of sync with the original style of the place. The interior courtyard, sometimes talked of as the future home of a City of Toronto museum, has been turned into a kind of parking lot and loading space. In short, shameless neglect has turned an invaluable piece of Toronto’s heritage into a bit of a dump.
Oh, I get it, alright, Tewder. Problem is, though, getting people to agree on what exactly constitutes "the wider good." Much like asking a random sampling of people what they think of when they hear the term "special interests."
Even if that office space could be replaced elsewhere, guaranteed? Normally I wouldn't want to do something like this, but Toronto desperately needs a large park in the core of the city (we already lack should space and will need it even more with the massive influx of condos going up now and in the future) and this would be the best possible location. We already have David Pecaut Square here, but it is much too small. Clearing the site would roughly triple the potential public space. Disperse some of the Metro Hall office space to different buildings (Old City Hall, Mirvish/Gehry Towers, other buildings with vacancies; Deco?).
We have lots of parks and open spaces downtown compared to other cities. Just in a few blocks around this site is Clarence Square, the green-space by the Ritz/CBC, the roundhouse area, etc. And walk a bit farther and you're at NPS, the waterfront and Grange Park.
Why does Toronto "need" a large park right downtown? Purpose?
If you really want to extend the park I would be looking towards Roy Thompson Hall. They have the parking lot on the south and the sunken water feature on the
North that can be modified into open spaces at lot more effectively.