Toronto The Wilde | 99.7m | 30s | Chestnut Hill | Kirkor

Community meeting for this was tonight. Overall most concerns were regarding the height and traffic, though I will give Councillor Colle credit as he called out the neighbours for complaining about 4 story townhomes on Marlee, and the 12 storey Dylan across the street. He seemed to really try and hammer the fact that it's in the city and community's best interest to negotiate with the developer and to try and avoid this going to the OLT. He seems to really want Marlee to be a complete street where people live and shop, and the eventual replacement of the auto dependent strip malls. Overall I was quite impressed with him this evening.

The location of the parkland dedication was also brought into question and based on the comments from staff and residents, I would expect the dedication to be moved off site. They mentioned that as part of the negotiations with the developer for phase 1, the city secured a house fronting Marlee in order to provide a better entrance to Wenderly park.
 
While I am all for increasing density, especially near transit lines - this proposal seems too high for the given site. It will tower over neighbouring properties on Glencarin and is much taller than all of the other current buildings/proposals for Marlee area. Hopefully a lower and more appropriate height can be negotiated along with allotment for affordable units.
 
And...........this one is off to the OLT; a Request for direction to oppose is heading to the next meeting of NYCC:


The reasoning can mostly be summed up thusly:

- The park location and configuration are not acceptable, the staff want an off-site parkland dedication to enlarge Wenderly Park.
- The relationship to Marlee is wrong and provides poor public realm

- The scale + neighbourhood conversion element is jumping the gun on Planning's study of the area.

For the rest, follow the link.
 
That is disappointing. While there are definitely elements that need improvement--I find the critique around having the parkland on Marlee to be particularly well founded, as is the probably excessive number of planned parking spaces--the argument that the site should transition to the Neighbourhoods to the east of the site (that is, the areas even closer to Glencairn Station), which would mean fewer units and lower heights, to be perverse and disappointing, though sadly expected.
 
This is absolutely ridiculous. im all for developing Marlee ave but 28 stories!?!? this is on a one lane road in a residential neighborhood. This height isnt even being approved for sheppard, avenue or any other new developments in areas with much better infrastructure. Let the big development be allocated to dufferin and Eglinton.
 
You can’t go back and change the past. The area has been developed as a low to mid rise and should remain that way. Look to other areas like Dufferin and Ellington crosstown to plan accordingly
 
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I'm sure you would have had the exact same take if you lived on Dufferin or Eglinton ;)

If I'm being serious, this issue keeps cropping up on UT: people getting upset about new density in their area.

My response is always the same: you're mad at the wrong thing. The reason density is being proposed is because the government has created perverse incentives (excessive population growth) to build everywhere. That's where you gotta start, not a random dev app you just learned about.
 
This is absolutely ridiculous. im all for developing Marlee ave but 28 stories!?!? this is on a one lane road in a residential neighborhood. This height isnt even being approved for sheppard, avenue or any other new developments in areas with much better infrastructure. Let the big development be allocated to dufferin and Eglinton.
There is an entire block of around 20-storey apartments just south of this on Ridelle and Roselawn. Those seem to be fine.
 
By and large, the areas in this part of Toronto have been slowly losing population over the past 50 years. The stores and businesses in this area could really use an influx of new residents. It's a sensible location for density and there's a surprising amount of options for public transit, walking and biking.

I'm not sure why densifying should be closed off as an option to take just now because 70 years ago there were some single family homes built nearby.
 
Here's my take. Glencairn is one of the least used stations on the whole TTC network, but it's 1 stop from Cedarvale/Eglinton West, 4 from Spadina, and 11 from Union. There are stations way further away that have way higher density. Heck, there's even high density projects popping up where stations have just been proposed, let alone actually existing.

As I mentioned with 280 Viewmount, there are eight 30+ storey buildings less than 500 metres away and they've been there since the 70s.

My feelings are neutral, I don't really feel too strongly for or against it, but I don't think enough people are benefiting from this location.
 
In terms of transit access for dollars, building here (and in similar locations) seems a complete bargain compared to the costs of building new transit lines. Let's maximize the use of existing assets and let new capital spending be used more efficiently.

To me, it's a no-brainer to build this and other similar ~30 story buildings in the 500m radius around the subway station.
 

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