Toronto Forma | 308m | 84s | Great Gulf | Gehry Partners

[fedplanner]

An developer can apply to repeal the heritage designation, which they could appeal to the Conservation Review Board if refused. Or they could apply for a demolition permit (of a designated building), which would be appealed to the OMB if refused.

It may be confusing because while neither type of application has been made (only rezoning has been applied for), city staff recommended refusing demolition in a 50+ page report. Not sure how that slipped through the cracks. That report has basically been put aside for information purposes after a letter from the developer's lawyer pointed out they can't refuse an application that doesn't exist.

You bring up some really excellent points. I bet there is more to the story here. Maybe M+G purposely did not integrate the heritage buildings into their proposal so it can be offered as a concession in exchange for keeping the density. Similar to the effective tactic of proposing at a higher height than desired so a reduction to the desired height can be offered as an artificial concession during the planning review process.

freshcutgrass, the city and developer, together with other stakeholders on the panel, will work to resolve outstanding issues. Anything that isn't resolved by March 20 goes to an independent arbitrator. If there are still unresolved issues, the OMB will hear and rule..

If M+G and the city can reach an agreement on the heritage issue but density or parking remains outstanding, the OMB can rule specfically on those outstanding issues. As for density, when factoring in a conservation agreement for Ed Mirvish Theater and including it as part of the development, which is on the table, the densities would be in line with what has previously been approved in the area.

I believe good things will come from this panel, and I can't wait to get reports back from the public meeting to be held next month.

As for the heritage folks (adma et al), you guys do realize that the city's primary concerns do not include the destruction of the heritage buildings. A more modest proposal of about 50 storeys or so that conformed with what has previously been developed probably would have been recommended for approval. At best, the developer could probably get away with token facadism.

 

[TJ O'Pootertoot]

Well said on all counts, fedplanner.
This kind of horse-trading (facades for height or whatever) is all part of the process which is something I think some of the "leave it as is!" people here have totally missed.

I think the heritage situation we're discussing is fairly unusual, since the Heritage Act was revised. I can't imagine there have been many (or possibly any) instances of the OMB to permitting demolition of a designated building when council has refused demolition. s.34 implies it's possible but you can see how serious a move by the OMB that would move, effectively overruling TWO council decisions in one swoop.

s.34 of the Heritage Act, which didn't exist until 2005(?) is fairly explicit:
"Demolition or removal of structure
34. (1) No owner of property designated under section 29 shall demolish or remove a building or structure on the property or permit the demolition or removal of a building or structure on the property unless the owner applies to the council of the municipality in which the property is situate and receives consent in writing to the demolition or removal...."

There is a hierarchy of laws and the Planning Act (and OMB) might trump the Heritage Act (and CRB) but I have a feeling that would be quite a headline grabber if it actually happened. Since the OMB doesn't deal with heritage issues, per se, I'd think the CRB would get involved but...it definitely gets murky. I do know the CRB has less power than the OMB. The OMB actually imposes decisions whereas the CRB just makes recommendations to council.

The bit about the demolition refusal being in the report when it wasn't specifically requested is kind of amusing. But if the plans showed the buildings gone, I think one could reasonably infer they were being demolished. Still, I can see why M&G's lawyer would say, "We never even asked for a demolition!"

 

[freshcutgrass]

Since the appeal presupposes that the building was designated as heritage, then it does not seem enough to say "oh well, the building was listed, we (the OMB) aren't going to do anything". Why then would it have the power to order the municipality to consent to demolition?

The province created that amendment for that very purpose when the act was changed in 2005. Why would they go to the trouble of creating legislation they can't use? The answer is of course they wouldn't. When the province gave municipalities new powers, they balanced that with an appeal process with the OMB.

Maybe M+G purposely did not integrate the heritage buildings into their proposal so it can be offered as a concession in exchange for keeping the density. Similar to the effective tactic of proposing at a higher height than desired so a reduction to the desired height can be offered as an artificial concession during the planning review process.

No, I would think they didn't include the warehouses in the proposal, because they don't want it as part of the project. Also, applying for or appealing to the OMB fro demolition is a simple matter. "Alterations" to a designated heritage property presents an extremely complicated matter...murky water which I'm sure they aren't interested in wading into.

This kind of horse-trading (facades for height or whatever) is all part of the process which is something I think some of the "leave it as is!" people here have totally missed.

Facadism quite often does no favours for either the old or the new.


The only facadism I see even remotely being considered by M&G, is possibly tacking it on the backside of the project...but not King Street. Not only are these not very attractive buildings for a facadsm, they don't meet the street well and this project needs larger setbacks to match the setbacks on the other parts of King.

 

[freshcutgrass]

I can't imagine there have been many (or possibly any) instances of the OMB to permitting demolition of a designated building when council has refused demolition.

Here's at least one instance where it has...

Rams Head Development Inc. (Bauhaus Condos). vs Toronto (City).
After a thoughtful consideration of the merits of the planning proposal and the City’s heritage policies, the Board ordered that the City consent to the demolition.

s.34 implies it's possible but you can see how serious a move by the OMB that would move

The Act also poses possible serious consequences for private property owners as well. That's why an appeal process was created, and why it isn't a hollow process as you seem to think it is/should be.

 

[adma]

I know the analogy isn't meant as literal, but sadly for some this is the prevailing view - that M+G are criminals who must prove something or oversome something because of presumed heritage. This anal orientation so typifies this thread. The designs are astonishingly beautiful, Toronto has long pined for something like this, interest are aligned as architect and developer have demonstrated committment to Toronto, and are first rate individuals.

City Council should leap at this and do THEIR bit to ensure it happens, rather than drawing up increasingly bizzaro criminal defendent analogies. Lets not provide more fodder to Jimmy Kimmel 'this is what Toronto endorses <Mayor Ford>, this is what they obstruct <M+G>. So far the proverbial Man In The Street has shown more common sense than the academics.

May I tell you something, buildup: your escalating tone of "astonishingly beautiful" etc etc is verging on mawkish to the extreme. It's reminding me of what architectural critics used to find so tiresome about the Coventry Cathedral cheering squad (think: the Cold War contemporary architecture version of an Andrew Lloyd Webber musical)

 

[argus]

Mawkish indeed! The insinuation is that anyone who lives in Toronto and questions this proposal is not of Toronto.

 

[CanadianNational]

Romanticism is not confined merely to the richness of the past, but also applies to aspirations for the future. It also enriches the present. Is there an architect or architecture afficianado in the world who is into this just for the facts and numbers?

 

[freshcutgrass]

May I tell you something, buildup: your escalating tone of "astonishingly beautiful" etc etc is verging on mawkish to the extreme. It's reminding me of what architectural critics used to find so tiresome about the Coventry Cathedral cheering squad (think: the Cold War contemporary architecture version of an Andrew Lloyd Webber musical)

Nah...I think you just hate that he pretty much nailed it.

It would be difficult to attain mawkish levels when describing a full on, balls out Gehry megaproject....let alone "extreme" mawkishness (considering mawkish means extreme).

 

[buildup]

Nah...I think you just hate that he pretty much nailed it.

It would be difficult to attain mawkish levels when describing a full on, balls out Gehry megaproject....let alone "extreme" mawkishness (considering mawkish means extreme).

Thanks Freshcutgrass, you caught my point.

Heritage-obsessives are adma-mant defending the so subtle qualities of the warehouses (an island in a sea of towers) and their very mediocraty is praised as perfectly contextual. But they rarely acknowedge that M+G is tremendously exciting by any objective standard (they describe as tall or dense). Adma, references the Torontoist blog against; I reference the New York Times which drooled. Astonishingly beaitiful indeed, certainly bt Toronto's standard. I hesitate to call them Bold because that would be an argument against.

 

[TJ O'Pootertoot]

Thanks Freshcutgrass, you caught my point.

Heritage-obsessives are adma-mant defending the so subtle qualities of the warehouses (an island in a sea of towers) and their very mediocraty is praised as perfectly contextual. But they rarely acknowedge that M+G is tremendously exciting by any objective standard (they describe as tall or dense). Adma, references the Torontoist blog against; I reference the New York Times which drooled. Astonishingly beaitiful indeed, certainly bt Toronto's standard. I hesitate to call them Bold because that would be an argument against.

You're projecting, at least in my case. I think they're "bold" and "exciting" (they're also, rather obviously, tall and dense). Beautiful is very subjective but I wouldn't particularly disagree. that doesn't mean they can't be "too tall" or "too dense" or that the heritage buildings' status should be reduced to a "which building is cooler" contest. Can't elaborate - Justin Bieber's bail hearing is on live and the mayor has disappeared.

 

[adma]

Thanks Freshcutgrass, you caught my point.

Heritage-obsessives are adma-mant defending the so subtle qualities of the warehouses (an island in a sea of towers) and their very mediocraty is praised as perfectly contextual. But they rarely acknowedge that M+G is tremendously exciting by any objective standard (they describe as tall or dense). Adma, references the Torontoist blog against; I reference the New York Times which drooled. Astonishingly beaitiful indeed, certainly bt Toronto's standard. I hesitate to call them Bold because that would be an argument against.

Ah, I can't help thinking of how, in the Aura thread, I posted the Top 10 Bitchiest Reviews in the New AIA Guide

and you responded thusly

"on behalf of *older* neo/revivalist...". That's my point, it is loved now, but was kitchy at the time, Gothic come-on 12th Century! Nothing wrong with revivalist work now in the right hands.

Quite correct that was a bitchy review. 15CP is a spectacular building. To respond to your inconsistency its respectful of Context, highly so. Sooo much penis envy - how do you people survive???
(Actually re-reading that review, I'm not convinced its critical. Afterall who wants pre-war size bathrooms?)

Adma, what are examples of 50 story buildings less than 10 year old than you a formerly tenured Humanities Prof now on a very rich unfunded public pension approve of?

Look at it this way: the bitchy tone of the ever-immortal five-editions-and-running AIA Guide To NYC is to your lily-livered brand of overripeness as Rocky Horror is to Mamma Mia!.

(And--and I've said this before--it's an interesting reminder of how, esp. in the last third of the c20 before post-Bilbao starchitecture, cyberspace, and pubescent skyscraper geeks reared their so-called ugly heads, it was these AIA-Guide types of things--including Patricia McHugh's 80s Toronto guide--that defined architectural tourism. Which, in those post-Penn Station/Pruitt-Igoe days, had a natural tendency to highlight/privilege the old and be snarkier t/w the new--yet in a refreshingly, stimulatingly egalitarian way, so that an Empire State or Chrysler or Gehry is just one entry coexisting happily among others--that is, a network of urban appreciation that looked beyond starchitecture as a crutch. And it's probably *also* thanks to that school of "guidebook tourism" that the capacity to intelligently appreciate an Eclipse Whitewear for what it is [pssst: *don't* answer "mediocrity"] exists at all--unfortunately, we're now in an age when the architectural-tourism baton has shifted to glossy sites with glossy pics of glossy new starchitectty stuff, and forcing the afficionados thereof into appreciating the old stuff is like Wilma insisting upon dragging Fred to the opera...)

 

[TheTigerMaster]

Adma your writing style... it hurts. Try using a period every once in a while. Tone down the creative punctuation. And that parenthesis block is probably the longest I've ever come across.

 

[verticalvillage]

Courtesy of Wikipedia:
FRUIT
FRUIT is an acronym for "Fear of Revitalization Urban-Infill and Towers". The word FRUIT or FRUITs is a play on words in support of the acronym BANANAs. First used in a development industry article in Vancouver to refer to irrational local opponents (fruit cakes, fruit loops or just fruits) of well-planned developments.

 

[junctionist]

That acronym doesn't apply since this development isn't well planned. It's violating planning policy meant to keep this city livable and protect cultural assets like heritage buildings.

 

[ksun]

Adma your writing style... it hurts. Try using a period every once in a while. Tone down the creative punctuation. And that parenthesis block is probably the longest I've ever come across.

agree.
Trying to emphasize everything is like emphasizing nothing. It is not good writing if it keeps confusing people with all the convoluted sentence structures.