Archinect - News

Legal challenge to block Toronto's controversial Ontario Place redevelopment fails in court

2024-06-24T17:06:00-04:00

The Art Newspaper is reporting on the failure of a legal challenge that would have blocked Toronto’s controversial plans to realize a massive spa complex on the site of Ontario Place after the provincial Superior Court of Justice’s June 11th decision.

The project is contentious on both heritage and environmental grounds and has likewise drawn ire from its reported costs north of $650 million CAD ($476 million USD) to taxpayers. Therme, the company behind the plan, had previously signed a 95-year lease with the city government.

The removal of Raymond Moriyama's Ontario Science Centre, which is at the heart of the issue, is also stirring debate after it closed abruptly last week over fears of collapse stemming from the flawed RAAC concrete materials used in its roof. All this is "based on a faulty business case" says a closer analysis from Elsa Lam.

Revived Toronto Quayside master plan is making headway

2023-02-03T17:16:00-05:00

A clearer vision is emerging for the futuristic Quayside project planned to transform a stretch of Toronto's waterfront, one that is shaping up to be one of the most architecturally-distinct pockets of development in the entire country.

Following over two years since the cancelation of the Sidewalk Labs plan to develop Toronto’s Quayside, a new approach to bring a mixed-use community to the lakefront site is being led by public entities Waterfront Toronto, the City of Toronto, PortsToronto, and private landowners. This past December, Waterfront Toronto’s Board of Directors approved an agreement with development partners Great Gulf Group and Dream Unlimited. The development is set to feature buildings designed by the likes of Adjaye Associates, Alison Brooks Architects, and Henning Larsen.

A recently-presented master plan update highlights new details about upcoming features at the site, including information on the Adjaye Associates-designed Timber House, the Alison Brooks Architects-designed Western Curve, and the Overstorey by Henning Larsen. The development will feature residential spaces, including affordable housing, retail, food, and cultural offerings. The master plan also aims to achieve near-zero greenhous...

Toronto’s proposed Ontario Place redevelopment is getting even more contentious

2023-01-10T14:43:00-05:00

New details are emerging in the controversial plan to redevelop Toronto’s mostly decommissioned Ontario Place after the exclusive Toronto International Film Festival unveiled further plans for a partnership with Therme Group, the Austrian entity behind the proposed $350 million project.

Local website blogTO has more details on the community’s negative response to the partnership, which will “promote the role of art and film in creating more human cities” through a series of talks spread over a ten-year period.

The online responses are only the latest thorn in the side of the provincial Ontario government and Premier Doug Ford following last summer’s harsh responses that eventually yielded a revised plan which reclassified a mere 12-acre segment of beachfront property for public use while retaining the original plan to have more than one-third of the site be developed privately.

Previously on Archinect: Toronto reveals still-contentious revised plan for proposed Ontario Place redev...

Toronto reveals still-contentious revised plan for proposed Ontario Place redevelopment

2022-12-14T12:10:00-05:00

Revised plans for the proposed Ontario Place redevelopment in Toronto are once again drawing critical attention after being submitted to the city’s planning officials at the end of November.

Storeys has the details on the updated scheme, which still calls for one-third of the 155-acre site to be privately developed — a contentious provision that has led many Torontonians to call for the plan to be rejected outright in place of something more in tune with its original use as a public attraction. The revision also reclassified a 12-acre swath of beachfront land for public use in what appears as the only slight concession.

Previously on Archinect: Torontonians aren't happy with the city's planned Ontario Place overhaul

The update also includes details for a five-level underground parking structure to be enacted between the Therme Group’s nine-story private spa and the renovated Live Nation amphitheater at the cost of over 800 trees, which is about 40% of the current iteration's total c...

Torontonians aren't happy with the city's planned Ontario Place overhaul

2022-08-30T17:46:00-04:00

Toronto residents are expressing their concerns over the Diamond Schmitt-designed plan for a massive new aquatic theme park at Ontario Place they say is “tone-deaf” and exclusionary of their basic needs.

Spurred on by the recent release of updated renderings and other details of Therme Group's second North American project, opponents say the city's Waterfront Toronto Design Review Panel needs to consider a full-tilt reassessment of the scheme on the basis of accessibility, environmental impact, and a distressing lack of free public amenities.

“This seems like another plan to take away space, livable space that we are already so short on demand of down here,” a concerned area resident recently told the CBC.

The proposed Therme Toronto development. Image courtesy of Therme.

The new development is scheduled to stand on the site of a 155-acre public park and entertainment venue from renowned local architects Michael Hough and Eberhard Zeigler that has sat mostly abandoned since closing i...

Considering the Quayside failure as proof futuristic Smart Cities may be a thing of the past

2022-06-30T18:16:00-04:00

Smart city technology should do things like shorten commute times, speed the construction of affordable housing, improve the efficiency of public transit, and reduce carbon emissions by making building technology more efficient and providing less polluting transportation alternatives to the car. But often its proponents focus on what it can do rather than what it should. If Sidewalk’s Quayside failure taught us anything, it’s that these technologies need to respond better to human needs.

The MIT Technology Review took a dive into the abandoned pre-pandemic conversion of Toronto’s 12-acre Quayside waterfront plot into an elaborate “Smart City” development by the hands of Sidewalk Labs. The revitalization was recently repackaged as a mixed-use green corridor concept to be overseen by Adjaye Associates, Henning Larsen, and Alison Brooks Architects. Sidewalk Labs has said it was planning to redevelop the vacant brownfield site “from the internet up.”

Previously on Archinect: Sidewalk Labs' Quayside project in Toronto is cancelled

Author Karrie Jacobs considers the history of urban planning concepts such as the 15-Minute City and Ville Radieuse in relation to the rebuked concept, which has dominated the past two decades of planning, and will be felled, she predicts, by an “emphasis on the optimization of everything” and the contradictory desire to “eradicate the very thing that makes cities wonderful.”

Toronto’s Quayside is back with projects by Adjaye Associates, Alison Brooks, and Henning Larsen

2022-02-17T10:07:00-05:00

Toronto’s Quayside project is back online, almost two years after Sidewalk Labs’ plans to develop the site were cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The new development will instead be delivered by a consortium led by developers Dream Unlimited and Great Gulf Group, featuring buildings by Adjaye Associates, Alison Brooks Architects, and Henning Larsen.

Quayside Aerial - Full view of proposed development. Image courtesy of Waterfront Toronto

The 12-acre (4.9 hectare) site will contain five towers, as well as one of Canada’s largest residential mass timber buildings. Over 800 affordable housing units will be contained in the scheme, with an emphasis on family-sized units. The team behind the development also claim the project to be “Canada’s first all-electric” masterplan.

A rendering of the Western Curve Building. Architect: Alison Brooks Architect. Image courtesy of Waterfront Toronto.

New buildings along the waterfront site will include the Western Curve Building by Alison Bro...

Safdie Architects' design for the ORCA mega-development in downtown Toronto finally clears a major hurdle

2021-06-18T21:17:00-04:00

A new multibillion-dollar development has been approved in Toronto, clearing the way for what could potentially be the latest in a string of high-profile projects, including 55 Yonge and Gehry's King Street West, altering the city’s skyline over the next decade.

Situated above a 10.5-acre park that straddles the King West district between the city’s downtown and waterfront, the proposed Over Rail Corridor Area (or ORCA) aims to create a mega-district west of the CN Tower by decking eight residential towers along a 16.5-acre railyard site that will add 3,000 new units of housing connected to the park via series of ramps and elevators.

A view of the interlinking towers, courtesy of Safdie Architects.

Safdie Architects is responsible for the multi-use development that will incorporate shopping and office space into the residential design in what the architect hopes is going to unite the continent’s, reportedly, most diverse city.

"Our design aspires to forge a reconnection in the commun...

After the Sidewalk Labs split, Waterfront Toronto has plans for a more 'locally-led vision'

2021-03-18T21:34:00-04:00

Waterfront Toronto, established by the Government of Canada, the Province of Ontario, and the City of Toronto, launched a competition last week to select a development partner for the Quayside lands. The announcement comes close to a year after Sidewalk Labs announced it would drop its smart city plans for the area, citing "unprecedented economic uncertainty."

Sidewalk Labs presented an ambitious plan to transform Quayside into a "smart city." Yet, during our reporting of the project's cancelation last year in May, the reason for the project being called off was tied to the pandemic according to a report from the Toronto Star.

However, Waterfront Toronto recently shared its new plans for the site and what they plan to accomplish. Waterfront Toronto CEO George Zegarac shared with Smart Cities Dive: "A critical difference for Quayside now will be that the design of public realm, parks, streetscapes, and open community spaces will be led by Waterfront Toronto. As we move to build Quayside we are now looking for development teams that have the experience, capacity and passion to deliver a distinctive neighborhood that gives expression to our vision."

Sidewalk Labs' Quayside project in Toronto is cancelled

2020-05-07T12:09:00-04:00

The Quayside project developed for the Toronto waterfront by Alphabet-backed Sidewalk Labs has been officially called off.

In a Medium post announcing the death of the project, Sidewalk Labs CEO Daniel L. Doctoroff writes that the economic collapse that has resulted from the COVID-19 pandemic has made the controversial $1.3 billion plan to reprogram a portion of Toronto's post-industrial waterfront into a new smart city prototype no longer viable.

Previously on Archinect: "Mass timber and high-tech meet in Sidewalk Labs' vision for Toronto." View of the Sidewalk Labs plan for its now-cancelled Toronto smart city project. Image courtesy of Picture Plane for Heatherwick Studio.

In the announcement, Doctoroff writes, "For the last two-and-a-half years, we have been passionate about making Quayside happen — indeed, we have invested time, people, and resources in Toronto, including opening a 30-person office on the waterfront. But as unprecedented economic uncertainty has set in around th...

Mass timber and high-tech meet in Sidewalk Labs' vision for Toronto

2019-06-25T18:56:00-04:00

Sidewalk Labs, Snøhetta, Michael Green Architecture, and Heatherwick Studio have unveiled a controversial $1.3 billion plan to reprogram a portion of Toronto's industrial waterfront into a new smart city prototype that envisions a wireless, data-driven, and mass timber-filled future for the city.

Site plan for the Sidewalk Labs Quayside development. Image courtesy of Picture Plane for Heatherwick Studio and Sidewalk Labs

The thorough and graphically-slick plan aims to articulate "a new approach for inclusive growth" by developing a 12-acre site with a mix of mid- and high-rise housing towers, shared pedestrian plazas, and commercial uses. The plan is being submitted for consideration by Waterfront Toronto, a government-funded corporation that is tasked with redeveloping the 1,977-acre Toronto Waterfront. The group selected Sidewalk Labs as a potential developer for a portion of the site in 2017. Since the initial proposal was unveiled, there has been a significant amount of public c...

Sidewalk Labs' Toronto waterfront smart city raises dystopian concerns

2018-08-10T14:40:00-04:00

Sidewalk’s vision for Quayside — as a place populated by self-driving vehicles and robotic garbage collectors, where the urban fabric is embedded with cameras and sensors capable of gleaning information from the phone in your pocket — certainly sounds Orwellian. Yet the company contends that the data gathered from fully wired urban infrastructure is needed to refine inefficient urban systems and achieve ambitious innovations like zero-emission energy grids.

Last fall Sidewalk Labs, a Google-affiliated company, announced plans to build a new smart city model on 12 acres of the Toronto waterfront named Quayside. The design would include infrastructure with sensors and data analytics with the claim of building an overall more streamlined, economical, and green urban space. Sidewalk Labs' partnership with Canada is the beginning of an urban model they hope to expand globally.

While the goal may look utopian, many see an ominous future where governance is under threat rather than the projected promise of urban innovation. Concerns center around tech monopolies, the collection and commodification of city data, and a democratic process of decision making for our environments.

An army of underground robots will collect waste and deliver parcels

2018-05-28T22:36:00-04:00

Initially Sidewalk's deal with the organisation will cover a 12-acre site but it is believed it wishes to expand this to the whole area - which at 325 acres will represent a huge land-grab....As part of the planning process of bidding to develop the waterside location, the firm looked at 150 examples of smart cities, including those built from the ground up such as Masdar, in Abu Dhabi and Songdo in South Korea.

Jane Wakefield chatted with both critics and proponents of a, Sidewalk Labs, proposed project on Toronto's Eastern waterfront.