Monthly Archives: January 2013

Exterior work nearly complete at 77 Charles

77 Charles West

January 26 2013: A view of the 77 Charles West luxury condo building from one block to the north at the intersection of Sultan and St Thomas Streets. Work on the building’s green glass exterior is nearly complete and, inside, model suites are available for viewing.

 

Nearly finished: When I last reported on the 77 Charles West condo project in an August 13 2011 post, windows and cladding were just being installed on the midrise building’s ground floor.  Now, the midrise condominium is almost ready for occupancy.

As of this month, the building is completely glassed in, finishing touches to the exterior are nearly complete (apart from one northwest-facing balcony which appears to be getting a major alteration, and parts of the building frontage along Charles Street which still await landscaping), work on the condo suite interiors is well underway, and developer Aspen Ridge Homes has opened a model suite for exclusive private viewings. Residences are still available for purchase, at prices starting from $2.1 million.

 

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Promotions start for controversial 365 Church condo tower in low-rise McGill Granby Village

365 Church condo

January 28 2013: This sandwich board sign with a rendering of  the forthcoming 365 Church condo by Toronto developer Menkes

 

 365 Church condo

… has appeared on the development site, currently a surface parking lot at the northeast corner of Church & McGill Streets …

 

365 Church condo

… while this “pre-sale” promotional flyer has been distributed to hundreds of households in the area by a Thornhill, Ont.-based real estate brokerage firm.

 

Sales launch approaching: Promotional activity has begun to rev up for the 29-storey 365 Church condo tower that will rise in the heart of the McGill Granby Village low-rise neighbourhood near Church & Carlton Streets.

A “coming soon to this location” sandwich board sign, bearing an architectural rendering of the rectangular glass building that Menkes plans to build at 365-375 Church Street, was set up just in the past couple of days in the parking lot that presently occupies most of the development site. And last week, a Thornhill, Ontario real estate brokerage firm distributed flyers promoting a website and “pre-sale seminar” for the 365 Church project to hundreds of households in the surrounding area.

But an official full-scale sales launch for the project could be weeks or even several months away, since a legal proceeding concerning the development is due to be heard by the Ontario Municipal Board (OMB) in mid-March. 

 

 

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U Condos construction reaches street level

UCondos

This was how the U Condos construction site looked on January 21 of last year.  As the yellow foundation drilling machine continued its work …

 

U Condos

… an enormous mound of soil (upper right) still had to be excavated from the site …

 

U Condos

… but one year later (January 26 2013, to be exact), underground parking levels have filled in the giant L-shaped excavation, and construction of the 2 condo towers and 19 town homes has reached ground level. Building forms for support columns for the ground level of the West Tower (left) already rise above grade.

 

 

Above is a link to a Flickr album containing three dozen photos of U Condos construction since the beginning of December. Click the image once to view a small-format slideshow, or click twice to access the album and view full-size photos instead.

 

Goldring Student Centre enhances streetscape on U of T’s Victoria University campus

Golding Student Centre

August 14 2011: Excavation was still in early stages when I shot this photo just two and a half months after the official groundbreaking for the Goldring Student Centre at Victoria University on the University of Toronto campus …

 

Goldring Student Centre

… today, 1.5 years later, construction crews have nearly finished applying stone cladding to the exterior of the 3-storey structure on Charles Street West

 

Goldring Student Centre

Architectural illustrations on a billboard at the construction site show how the new Goldring Student Centre and its landscaped quad will look when complete. The building was designed by Toronto’s Moriyama & Teshima Architects. 

 

Looking good: A new student social centre and meeting facility is shaping into a handsome addition to the Charles Street landscape on the Victoria University campus at U of T.

As installation of exterior stone cladding nears completion at the Goldring Student Centre, the 3-storey building already looks completely at home in its surroundings, fitting in well with the McKinsey and Company building next door and the Isabel Bader Theatre across the street — both of which also boast attractive stone finishes. I love the look of both those buildings, and think the new Goldring Student Centre nicely complements its neighbours and enhances the streetscape along Charles West.

 

 

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Hope for new public park dims as Ontario Gov’t sells 11 Wellesley West lands for redevelopment

11 Wellesley West

Up to three office towers or highrise residential buildings could be in store for lands behind this wooden hoarding at 11 Wellesley Street West, seen here from the northeast at the corner of Wellesley and St Nicholas Streets. Last week, a deal was supposed to close under which the Ontario Government would sell the property and pass ownership to a so-far undisclosed buyer, at a so-far unknown price, for redevelopment purposes. The closing apparently has been delayed until February. See report below for further details.

 

11 Wellesley West

Hoarding along Breadalbane Street at the southwest corner of the 11 Wellesley West site. Since at least early 2011, downtown residents and neighbourhood associations have been pressing the City and provincial governments to create a new park or public greenspace on the vacant 2-acre property between Bay and Yonge Streets.

 

Hopes fading: A real estate transaction that was scheduled to close yesterday may dash many downtown residents’ dreams for the creation of a new public park on a vacant Wellesley Street West site surrounded by thousands of existing condo and apartment units, with thousands more on the way. But the local City Councillor has pledged to continue fighting for green space on the location.

Ward 27 Councillor Kristyn Wong-Tam told Tuesday night’s annual general meeting of the Church Wellesley Neighbourhood Association (CWNA) that Wednesday January 23 was the scheduled closing date for the sale of empty provincially-owned land at 11 Wellesley Street West. Barring an unforeseen event, she said, title for the land would rest in the hands of its new owner by 4.30 p.m. Wednesday.  [Editor’s Note: CWNA board of directors member Paul Farrelly posted this update on the CWNA’s Facebook page January 26: “Councillor Kristyn Wong-Tam has been recently advised by the developer that the transaction will not close until the end of February. A visit on Thursday to Land Registry revealed a new construction lien for $650,000 was put on the property by a construction company on Jan 13,2013, but its not clear whether that has anything to do with the delayed closing.”]

Many in the CWNA audience had been hoping Councillor Wong-Tam would announce significant positive developments in her work to obtain at least some of the land for City park space, but she had no such good news to report in her brief update on the subject.  She could say only that the City will continue its efforts to secure part of the property from its new owner. The buyer has not yet been publicly identified.

 

 

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Days numbered for former Bistro 990 building as demolition crews prep site for new condo

1000 Bay Condos

January 19 2013: The former Bistro 990 restaurant building — once a popular Toronto International Film Festival hangout for celebrities and Hollywood movie industry moguls — is being prepared for demolition to make way for construction of a condo highrise

 

 1000 Bay Street Condos location

This development proposal sign, seen on the site one year ago, describes the 32-storey condo tower that Cresford Developments will construct on the property

 

1Thousand Bay condos Toronto

This illustration, from the Cresford website, depicts how the 1Thousand Bay building will look. The condo was designed by Toronto’s architectsAlliance.

 

Bye bye bistro: The building that housed the once-famous Bistro 990 restaurant for nearly a quarter of a century will disappear from the Bay Street landscape soon to make way for construction of the 1Thousand Bay condo tower.

 

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ETFO office construction nears completion

ETFO office building

January 16 2013: Construction of the new ETFO office building at Huntley & Isabella Streets is in the final stages with completion anticipated for this coming March

 

ETFO office building

January 16 2013: A view of the 4-storey building from the east, along Isabella Street

 

End in sight: While the bitter contract dispute between the Elementary Teachers’ Federation of Ontario (ETFO) and the provincial government continues to drag on with seemingly no progress or end in sight, the same can’t be said about construction of the new ETFO’s new headquarters at Huntley & Isabella Streets. Building contractors have been making steady progress there, and the new offices are on target for completion this coming March, less than two years after construction commenced.

The ETFO is the largest teachers’ federation in Canada, representing more than 76,000 elementary school teachers and educational professionals across the province.  The organization has been operating from premises in an office building at 480 University Avenue near Dundas Street for years, but had outgrown those premises. ETFO acquired a site at the southeast corner of Huntley and Isabella Streets, in the 180-year-old Upper Jarvis neighbourhood, and hired Toronto’s Kuwabara Payne McKenna Blumberg Architects (KPMB Architects) to design environmentally-senstive new headquarters that would fit nicely into the predominantly residential area.

 

 

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RCMI Residences rising higher

RCMI Residences

January 10 2013: Looking up from the University Avenue median at construction progress on the RCMI Residences tower at 426 University Avenue

 

Approaching 30: Won’t be much longer before construction of the RCMI Residences condo tower starts to soar above Zurich — the Zurich Insurance Canadian headquarters at 400 University Avenue, that is.

When I passed by the RCMI Residences building site this afternoon, workers told me that tower construction is now up to the 29th floor, on its way to 44.  (I am certain they were mistaken about the final floor count; the project was approved on October 26 2009 by Toronto City Council on the basis of a September 18 2009 city planning report for a proposed 42-storey mixed-use building.)

 

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Milan Condominium rising higher in Yorkville

Milan Condos

December 30 2012: Church Street view of construction progress on The Milan Condominium, which has climbed more than 15 floors near the northeast corner of the Church Street-Yonge Street-Davenport Road intersection. Only 8 months ago …

 

Milan Condos

… construction was just beginning to approach ground level at the east end of the project site, formerly occupied by a parking lot for the Canadian Tire flagship store on Yonge Street (white building at rear left)

 

Milan Condos

May 6 2012: Looking toward the Church-Yonge-Davenport intersection of Yorkville from the east end of The Milan Condominium construction site

 

Steady climb: The Milan Condominium continues to make its mark in Yorkville. As the tower steadily climbs taller on a former parking lot site near the northeast corner of Yonge and Church Streets, it is completely changing the look and feel of the area in the process.

Construction was still below grade last May, but during the summer the building began making its presence felt as The Milan’s podium reached three levels on its way to eight.  The tower has since passed 15 floors, and now commands attention from the east, north and west. I have crossed the Church-Yonge-Davenport intersection several times in the past two weeks, and on each occasion have overheard other pedestrians making positive comments about how different the corner looks with The Milan on the rise. (I haven’t heard any negative feedback about the building, but have heard passersby remark that it’s a huge improvement over the unsightly parking facility that previously occupied the site.)

 

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Pit Stops: Photo roundup of below-ground and at-grade construction activity at 21 downtown condo, office & university building sites

Picasso on Richmond condos

As 2012 drew to a close, some noteworthy downtown building projects had reached different stages of at- and below-grade construction progress. At some sites, like this one for the Picasso on Richmond condo tower, preliminary foundation drilling work was in full swing …

 

Studio on Richmond condos

… while at others, like this one for the Studio on Richmond and Studio2 condo towers just two blocks east of Picasso, site excavation was ongoing.

 

The Yorkville condos

Over the same period of time, underground parking levels were taking shape at some building sites, like this one for The Yorkville condo project on Davenport Road …

 

X2 Condos

… while over on Charles Street East, construction had reached a milestone mark at X2 Condos, where building had started on the ground level of the tower

 

Fall photos: Until condo and office tower construction starts to climb above street level, it can be difficult to track how quickly work is progressing on the dozens of new buildings going up in Toronto’s downtown core. Ground-level views of building sites are often obscured by hoarding and security fences, plus concrete delivery trucks, dump trucks and other construction vehicles maneuvering into and out of staging areas adjacent to construction zones. I find it’s a big challenge to monitor ongoing progress at places where underground levels are taking shape, let alone keep an eye on sites where shovels are just breaking ground or preliminary work is being undertaken to prepare for full-scale construction. The vast number of projects scattered throughout the downtown core certainly doesn’t make the task any easier.

 

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