One of the most exciting city building projects going on in Toronto right now is the revitalization of the 715-acre Port Lands area (here’s a map if you’d like to get situated). Despite its massive scale, it doesn’t seem to be receiving a lot of… Read More
My good friends over at Urban Capital recently released a short film about the making of their River City project here in Toronto. (If you can’t see the embedded video above, click here.) For those of you who aren’t familiar, River City is a 4-phase… Read More
Real estate, as they say, is a local business. Every market has its local nuances. For example, once of the first things that Studio Gang asked us when we started working together was, “does Toronto do PT?” What they were referring to was post-tensioned concrete… Read More
One of my favorite public spaces in the city is easily Sugar Beach at the foot of Jarvis Street. So I couldn’t resist sharing this before and after tweet by Waterfront Toronto. Sugar Beach turns 10 years old next week. It’s nearly a teenager. For… Read More
Today I am going to talk about 3 things that recently happened and/or that are on my mind. Sidewalk Labs pulled out of Toronto. I think this is sad. A lot of people have said that they’re surprised, but not surprised. The official reason is… Read More
In June of this year, Sidewalk Labs released its draft Master Innovation and Development Plan (MIDP) for Toronto’s eastern waterfront. I wrote about it here. It was a draft document that was subject to further discussion and refinement, with October 31, 2019 being an important… Read More
Last weekend I went by Sidewalk Toronto’s “experimental workspace” at 307 Lake Shore Blvd East. It is open to the public every Sunday from 11am to 5pm if you’d like to drop in. This week they had their #BuildingRaincoat on display, which is an adjustable… Read More
Yesterday Sidewalk Toronto released its draft site plan for Quayside. Here’s what it looks like: There’s a big emphasis on people-first streets and on the public realm. I like the idea of a waterfront plaza at the tip of the Parliament slip and of a… Read More
A few months ago when I wrote about “Toronto’s great streets” I mentioned that Queens Quay West – while magnificent – has had its share of issues. Cyclists and pedestrians often find themselves battling for space. And drivers are consistently driving in the wrong places.… Read More
Last week Sidewalk Toronto held a roundtable discussion here in the city and released some preliminary design ideas and strategies for Quayside. (That’s why Dan Doctoroff was talking on BNN Bloomberg.) I went through the full presentation this morning and below are a bunch of… Read More
BRANDON DONNELLY 