46 minutes ago, eastvillagedon said:

 

judging by some of the comments, not everyone is happy about this ☹️

 

It looks awesome, and I’m jealous. 

as usual, usa troubles are canada's gain -- maybe too much so -- hopefully they are importing a few carpenters up there!

 

 

 

Only 3,200 Homes Are Left on Toronto’s Market After Record Year

Ari Altstedter - 6h ago

 

 

(Bloomberg) -- Toronto, a city of more than 6.5 million people, has just 3,200 homes left for sale to start the year after a real-estate frenzy fueled by low interest rates drove the market to record levels.

 

More than 121,000 homes were sold in Canada’s biggest city in 2021, up 28% from the previous year and smashing the previous high set in 2016, according to data released Thursday by the Toronto Regional Real Estate Board.

 

Buyers competed for the dwindling number of properties by bidding up prices: the average selling price for the year was nearly C$1.1 million (about $862,000) in Toronto, also a record and up 18% from a year earlier, the board said. Sales got weaker in the second half as supply dried up. 

 

A year ago, there were about 7,900 homes for sale. 

 

The numbers will add urgency to a growing debate about how to address the cost of housing, which is fast spiraling out of reach for many working Canadians in the largest cities, regardless of whether they buy or rent. Vancouver, long Canada’s most expensive real estate market, reported its own record-breaking year Wednesday. 

 

 

more:

https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/realestate/only-3200-homes-are-left-on-toronto-e2-80-99s-market-after-record-year/ar-AASuKwJ

Maybe some of those folks can move to Cleveland.

 

that's an amazing picture. I believe it's over 50 mi. to Lake Simcoe from downtown Toronto. We used to visit relatives there every summer in the 60's. Back then even people with modest means who lived in Toronto could afford property on the water (not just on Lake Simcoe but in the surrounding areas). I can't remember the exact location, but my great uncle and aunt had a small "cottage" (as everyone used to call them) near a tiny village called Brechin. Honestly, it doesn't look like much development has ruined the area in fifty years. This street view is pretty much what it looked like back then, with the lake in the background. So beautiful, except for the mosquitoes 

 

https://www.google.com/maps/place/2468+Lakeshore+Dr,+Brechin,+ON+L0K+1B0,+Canada/@44.5275973,-79.201122,3a,75y,274.41h,96.26t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sFitH5SvAa-wgsKKgQittoA!2e0!7i13312!8i6656!4m5!3m4!1s0x4cd55289dad0ece3:0xea6c015cad51418a!8m2!3d44.5249423!4d-79.2014245

Edited April 7, 20223 yr by eastvillagedon

as time goes by torono has left chicago in the dust on its way toward its sao paulo of the north goals.

We’re a long ways from a Toronto-style apartment boom, but thankfully I’ve not seen anything as bad as this here yet. 
Some good comments in the thread too. 

Man, they REALLY wanted to make that scissor stair work on a floor plate that's really too large and square to effectively utilize it. The only time I've seen something like this in an appropriate way is in office-to-residential conversions as a result of dead end corridor challenges and super deep floor plates that weren't intended for residential.

 

But to build it from scratch? What a choice.

 

Watching the ballgame today and seeing some nice shots of their downtown skyline. I wonder how many 50+ story towers they have now?  It must be at least 50. Toronto has become the NYC of Canada.

 

Edited August 15, 20222 yr by LibertyBlvd

On 8/14/2022 at 5:15 PM, LibertyBlvd said:

Watching the ballgame today and seeing some nice shots of their downtown skyline. I wonder how many 50+ story towers they have now?  It must be at least 50. Toronto has become the NYC of Canada.

 

 

 

more like on its way to being the sao paulo of north america.

or maybe chinar ?

 

 

The transformation of Toronto over the last 40 years is profound. 

 

Toronto has constructed 80 skyscrapers over 300 feet tall plus another 30 under construction with most of those to be built by 2023. I keep telling you that Toronto was much like Cleveland during the Great Depression and after the war, with little activity and a comparable population size. Between 1932 and 1964, just one building taller than 300 feet was built in Toronto. Cleveland had two (plus a bunch that are 200 feet and taller).

 

And if that doesn't blow your mind, maybe this will....

https://thetowerinfo.com/toronto-skyscrapers-under-construction-proposed/

 

Its very impressive but Toronto had many things going for it that Cleveland never had. Namely it is the financial center of Canada and also the main English speaking city in Canada. As the manufacturing economy stagnated in the 70s and 80s jobs and graduates from universities migrated to the service sector, Toronto, given its place in Canada was well positioned to capitalize on this. Cleveland was not. Larger, more established financial centers in the states existed, like Chicago, New York, San Fran, etc. and were better positioned to take advantage of the new economy. 

 

What impressed me about Toronto was how it usurped Montreal as Canada's largest financial center. However, I get it, given that most of the Western part of Canada did not really relate well with the French speaking provinces. 

 

 

Toronto was NOT Canada's financial center in my lifetime. Montreal was, and with it, Montreal was Canada's dominant city.

 

Imagine a political upheaval in Illinois or New York state that caused its commodities and stock exchanges to relocate to Cleveland in the 1970s, causing all of the major bank headquarters to relocate with them. And why not? Cleveland was still a top-10 city population-wise in the 1960s, leftover from its heady days a few decades earlier.

 

That's what happened to Toronto. There was talk of moving the financial center to Ottawa, but it was too close to Montreal and many didn't want Canada's governmental and financial capital to be the same city. The fates of cities can turn on a dime and can be changed by the conscious actions of a few.

 

You had to be alive back then to realize how stunning the opposite trajectory of both cities was. Data alone doesn't cut it. Perception of the relative economic weakness and stagnation of Toronto in the 1950s and 60 was palpable on both sides of the lakes. It's so foreign a concept now that I find it entertaining how difficult it is for many of you to grasp and appreciate. To you, Toronto is a boomtown and economic center of a vibrant Canada and always been. To those of us of a certain age and older, Canada was a sleepy place in the woods up north and Toronto was its grimy and unattractive has-been story that failed to seize the manufacturing opportunities of Detroit and Cleveland. Only Montreal and Quebec City were worth visiting for their vibrant, European-like settings. Quebec's political instability of the 1970s and Canada's stability since then has erased all of those old perceptions and replaced them with completely new ones.

 

Why? Because a few important people chose a new course for a city.

10 minutes ago, KJP said:

Toronto was NOT Canada's financial center in my lifetime. Montreal was, and with it, Montreal was Canada's dominant city.

 

Imagine a political upheaval in Illinois or New York state that caused its commodities and stock exchanges to relocate to Cleveland in the 1970s, causing all of the major bank headquarters to relocate with them. And why not? Cleveland was still a top-10 city population-wise in the 1960s, leftover from its heady days a few decades earlier.

 

That's what happened to Toronto. There was talk of moving the financial center to Ottawa, but it was too close to Montreal and many didn't want Canada's governmental and financial capital to be the same city. The fates of cities can turn on a dime and can be changed by the conscious actions of a few.

 

You had to be alive back then to realize how stunning the opposite trajectory of both cities was. Data alone doesn't cut it. Perception of the relative economic weakness and stagnation of Toronto in the 1950s and 60 was palpable on both sides of the lakes. It's so foreign a concept now that I find it entertaining how difficult it is for many of you to grasp and appreciate. To you, Toronto is a boomtown and economic center of a vibrant Canada and always been. To those of us of a certain age and older, Canada was a sleepy place in the woods up north and Toronto was its grimy and unattractive has-been story that failed to seize the manufacturing opportunities of Detroit and Cleveland. Only Montreal and Quebec City were worth visiting for their vibrant, European-like settings. Quebec's political instability of the 1970s and Canada's stability since then has erased all of those old perceptions and replaced them with completely new ones.

 

Why? Because a few important people chose a new course for a city.

 

I would say it was caused more by Quebec's linguistic separatism and flirtation with political separatism.   Toronto was the only viable alternative.

12 minutes ago, E Rocc said:

 

I would say it was caused more by Quebec's linguistic separatism and flirtation with political separatism.   Toronto was the only viable alternative.

 

They were clearly the best-run city by that point. It was and is a well-managed city that did the big and little things right due to multiple reforms enacted in the 1950s. So when there's an upheaval (economic, political, environmental, conflict) somewhere, they're more likely to come to you as a lifeboat. And there's always upheavals somewhere in the world, sometimes right in your own backyard.

We visited both Toronto and Montreal in the summer of 1978.  The difference between the two was like night and day.  There was so much activity in downtown Toronto, even late at night.  We  were expecting the same in Montreal, but it was very quiet.  However, we did manage to go to the Kon Tiki at the Sheraton Mount Royal which was nice.  The Kon Tiki in Cleveland was already closed at that time.

canada has five times more people today than when i was born and toronto has three times more. cleveland has about 500k less people. cleveland has been driving people away since rockefeller, while toronto is roping them in. not to be versus, but oof, thats one tough, unavoidable reality you can’t help thinking about when looking at toronto today.

5 minutes ago, mrnyc said:

canada has five times more people today than when i was born and toronto has three times more. cleveland has about 500k less people. cleveland has been driving people away since rockefeller, while toronto is roping them in. not to be versus, but oof, thats one tough, unavoidable reality you can’t help thinking about when looking at toronto today.

Point taken but I wouldn’t describe white flight as “driving people away”. The race dynamic in American cities is always the elephant in the room when discussing population loss. 

I went to a family function in Toronto as a kid in 1958.  It was dead.  I was told that Torontonians would drive to Buffalo for amusement, lol.   The turnaround took off in the mid 60's.  I remember the construction of their new, at the time, city hall.  Ottawa, my mom's home town,  was similar.  I remember that the drug stores ROTATED being open on Sunday, due to the blue laws.  At that time Montreal was magical for me.  Expo 67 was amazing.  Unfortunately, some of the life was sucked out of it by the political climate, and the linguistic parochialism.  It never felt the same after that.  One of its charms for me had been the intermingling of the English and French styles.

 

PS. For the transit riders here, one of Ottawa's charms was how riders would board busses.  Rather than wedging in to the door, they would spontaneously form a line in the order of arrival at tthe bus stop, smooth, orderly, and polite.

 

 

Edited September 2, 20222 yr by urb-a-saurus

1 hour ago, bumsquare said:

Point taken but I wouldn’t describe white flight as “driving people away”. The race dynamic in American cities is always the elephant in the room when discussing population loss. 

 

white flight is the 60s and 70s, since then its been more about the rustbelt loss of heavy industry and transition away from that. so its more about loss of jobs that drove people away.

 

although of course lately there are jobs, but nowadays it's a competition with many other regions and cities that have similar to attract employees.

5 hours ago, urb-a-saurus said:

I went to a family function in Toronto as a kid in 1958.  It was dead.  I was told that Torontonians would drive to Buffalo for amusement, lol.   The turnaround took off in the mid 60's.  I remember the construction of their new, at the time, city hall.  Ottawa, my mom's home town,  was similar.  I remember that the drug stores ROTATED being open on Sunday, due to the blue laws.  At that time Montreal was magical for me.  Expo 67 was amazing.  Unfortunately, some of the life was sucked out of it by the political climate, and the linguistic parochialism.  It never felt the same after that.  One of its charms for me had been the intermingling of the English and French styles.

 

PS. For the transit riders here, one of Ottawa's charms was how riders would board busses.  Rather than wedging in to the door, they would spontaneously form a line in the order of arrival at tthe bus stop, smooth, orderly, and polite.

 

 

I went to Toronto a lot as a child since I had family there going back to the 1930's (I'm not that old!). But the 60's sounds about right when things started to change dramatically, with, as you stated the new City Hall (and its unusual design), as well as the Toronto-Dominion Bank complex, which completely towered over anything that had been built before. But I believe part of the reason for Toronto's astounding growth was due to the liberalization of Canadian immigration policy, compared to the US, which allowed thousands (millions?) more people to settle there, and would certainly explain Toronto's amazing degree of diversity. Although I didn't have the opportunity to go to Expo 67, I went several times to the Canadian National Exhibition (or CNE or "the Ex" as they call it) in Toronto, which is sort of like a state fair on steroids, which takes place this time of year (still there thru Sept. 5). Fortunately this was not available back in the 60's--

 

i first went to toronto twice during the 80s because via rail used to heavy advertize $99 weekend rail/hotel trips ar bgsu from windsor to toronto. i cant remember the first time, but the second they put us up at the sheraton. after that i didnt go again under more recently. so needless to say the change was startling to see and impressive.

 

that said, i find this city of new artless glass peopleboxes and back offices kind of boring. thats why i even went again as my spouse has employees and a back office there. 

 

canada in general is just not my speed, but funny enough in a last minute thing we will be heading up to montreal next weekend, so i should bite my tongue. 🤭🙂

On 9/2/2022 at 8:49 AM, urb-a-saurus said:

I went to a family function in Toronto as a kid in 1958.  It was dead.  I was told that Torontonians would drive to Buffalo for amusement, lol.   The turnaround took off in the mid 60's.  I remember the construction of their new, at the time, city hall.  Ottawa, my mom's home town,  was similar.  I remember that the drug stores ROTATED being open on Sunday, due to the blue laws.  At that time Montreal was magical for me.  Expo 67 was amazing.  Unfortunately, some of the life was sucked out of it by the political climate, and the linguistic parochialism.  It never felt the same after that.  One of its charms for me had been the intermingling of the English and French styles.

 

PS. For the transit riders here, one of Ottawa's charms was how riders would board busses.  Rather than wedging in to the door, they would spontaneously form a line in the order of arrival at tthe bus stop, smooth, orderly, and polite.

 

 

My aunt and uncle emigrated from England to Canada in the early 60s. They had a choice of Toronto, or Edmonton. They chose the latter. When I asked him about that decision a few years ago, he said that, back then Toronto was seen as basically a rust-belt city. Not that the term existed back then. 

^ i got an aunt from montreal. shes loves cle, but misses it.

 

Look at that Toronto crane count.

 

I've always been skeptical of these counts. As far as I know, this only counts freestanding cranes, not building-mounted cranes. Which means places like NYC, where freestanding cranes are exceptionally rare, get undercounted. There are way more than 14 cranes in NYC right now.

 

Not to diminish the realities of the Toronto construction boom. It's kind of insane how much is being built and for how long this level of construction has been ongoing. It's never-ending!

On 10/14/2022 at 8:37 AM, jmicha said:

I've always been skeptical of these counts. As far as I know, this only counts freestanding cranes, not building-mounted cranes. Which means places like NYC, where freestanding cranes are exceptionally rare, get undercounted. There are way more than 14 cranes in NYC right now.

 

Not to diminish the realities of the Toronto construction boom. It's kind of insane how much is being built and for how long this level of construction has been ongoing. It's never-ending!

 

 

is this really true? why the heck would mounted cranes not count for something like that? so odd.

 

14 cranes in nyc gotta be kidding me -- i guess staten island right here around me has about six of them lol. 

anyway, back to developments -- here is a recent cool view of the one construction:

 

 

via benito

 

47 minutes ago, mrnyc said:

anyway, back to developments -- here is a recent cool view of the one construction:

 

Fantastic!  Imagine taking that picture!  By drone or hanging over the edge of the roof  😉? 

 

 

I should've invested in Hamilton, as I was at the cusp of doing in 2015...

 

 

 

I can't believe there aren't lots of people in Toronto saying "Enough! Stop with this already."

 

^ stop with what?

 

putting up the blandest buildings that were ever possible?

 

i think people must be finally saying something, actual architecture is picking up and that building is a very good case in point! 😅

21 hours ago, mrnyc said:

^ stop with what?

 

putting up the blandest buildings that were ever possible?

 

i think people must be finally saying something, actual architecture is picking up and that building is a very good case in point! 😅

 

I just don't understand the obsession with having to have the tallest building (or the Manhattanization of every city). I remember when this was the tallest building in Toronto (and apparently in the entire British Commonwealth)--

 

https://torontoist.com/2008/05/historicist_tal/

 

Now dwarfed by everything around it, the Canadian (Imperial) Bank of Commerce Building (25 King Street West) once dominated the Toronto skyline. For three decades, its 34-storeys and 141-metre height made it the tallest building in the Commonwealth. In the early 20th century, new construction methods and civic pride shuffled the “tallest” title from city to city with regularity. Yet the bank tower, one of the last major buildings constructed in Toronto before the onset of the Depression, held the title from December 1930 until 1962. Almost forgotten in the tangle of bank towers, its style—described by some as Romanesque and by others as Art Deco—recalls the glamourous age of high finance.

I used to love doing weekend trips to Toronto in the 70s & 80s. The last one I did was in 1990 and hated seeing what it had become. I have no desire to ever go there again.

On 4/21/2023 at 3:04 PM, eastvillagedon said:

I can't believe there aren't lots of people in Toronto saying "Enough! Stop with this already."

 

Oh no! Toronto isn't endlessly suburbanizing and encroaching ever further into it's rural landscape to accommodate wasteful, fiscally irresponsible, publicly subsidized single-family housing and industrial parks! What a travesty. 

It's great that some people want to live in the country and exurban enclaves, that's good for them. But as many people can live in a city center is better for the economy, stretches infrastructure dollars further, and protects undeveloped land for actual farming, wildlife, heritage, and parkland uses -- to which Metro Toronto has amazing, sprawling parks! When banks and corporations can build their headquarters in these dense city centers, it promotes increased land value and minimizes the amount of land wasted on suburban business parks. Not everyone likes buses and trains, and there's not a problem with that! However, the "Manhattanization" word gets thrown around a lot in urban development conversations, and it just leads me to believe that all the people on this site that yearn for "what Cleveland used to be," or Milwaukee, or Detroit, or Toronto, wouldn't have really liked that place at all. When, in Cleveland, ~1.1 million people were within city limits during business hours in the 1950s. Poor "Manhattanized" Cleveland, thank God we got all those people out and it's better now. lol

I'm glad Toronto was able to continue to grow, and really heal some of it's scars from 60s and 70s era planning policy. They seem to be on a good trajectory.

6 hours ago, eastvillagedon said:

 

I just don't understand the obsession with having to have the tallest building (or the Manhattanization of every city).

 

Skyscrapers become iconic of the city where they exist.   They also are physical manifestations of human capability.  The taller, the moreso.   

Better to build up than out.

2 hours ago, ELaunder said:

 

Oh no! Toronto isn't endlessly suburbanizing and encroaching ever further into it's rural landscape to accommodate wasteful, fiscally irresponsible, publicly subsidized single-family housing and industrial parks! What a travesty. 

It's great that some people want to live in the country and exurban enclaves, that's good for them. But as many people can live in a city center is better for the economy, stretches infrastructure dollars further, and protects undeveloped land for actual farming, wildlife, heritage, and parkland uses -- to which Metro Toronto has amazing, sprawling parks! When banks and corporations can build their headquarters in these dense city centers, it promotes increased land value and minimizes the amount of land wasted on suburban business parks. Not everyone likes buses and trains, and there's not a problem with that! However, the "Manhattanization" word gets thrown around a lot in urban development conversations, and it just leads me to believe that all the people on this site that yearn for "what Cleveland used to be," or Milwaukee, or Detroit, or Toronto, wouldn't have really liked that place at all. When, in Cleveland, ~1.1 million people were within city limits during business hours in the 1950s. Poor "Manhattanized" Cleveland, thank God we got all those people out and it's better now. lol

I'm glad Toronto was able to continue to grow, and really heal some of it's scars from 60s and 70s era planning policy. They seem to be on a good trajectory.

Have you traveled much north of the 401, west on the QEW toward Hamilton, in Peale, Durham, Brampton, Markham, or through the Regional Municipality of York?  If you do, you will see single family homes and town homes, strip centers and malls, and industrial parks galore, just like here.  Interestingly, while many inner areas of Cleveland have had undesirable reputations, inner Toronto has the opposite problem, unaffordability.  What you could call the Toronto agglomeration covers an immense area.

Edited April 22, 20232 yr by urb-a-saurus

Toronto has the "missing middle" because of how it was sleepy then exploded in the 1970's. Older 3 story walkups and side by sides, and single family homes and then tall modern skyscrapers. Walk around and try to find mid century 5-20 story offices or apartments, its tough. That said I love Toronto.

17 hours ago, LibertyBlvd said:

I used to love doing weekend trips to Toronto in the 70s & 80s. The last one I did was in 1990 and hated seeing what it had become. I have no desire to ever go there again.

 

yes! that used to be highly promoted. how did you do that from the cle area?  we did it when i was at bgsu a couple weekends in the 80s — on via rail from windsor. i remember it was $99 for a long time. tbh i liked detroit a lot better than toronto in those days.

We drove up.  It took about 5 hrs. Initially, we stayed downtown, but in later years, due to the high cost of downtown hotels, we started staying on the outskirts.

17 hours ago, urb-a-saurus said:

Have you traveled much north of the 401, west on the QEW toward Hamilton, in Peale, Durham, Brampton, Markham, or through the Regional Municipality of York?  If you do, you will see single family homes and town homes, strip centers and malls, and industrial parks galore, just like here.  Interestingly, while many inner areas of Cleveland have had undesirable reputations, inner Toronto has the opposite problem, unaffordability.  What you could call the Toronto agglomeration covers an immense area.

You're right about all of this, and every part of the Toronto area is basically unaffordable. My sister and brother-in-law (who are a lot, lot older than me 😅) just recently sold their modest home in the western suburbs, 35 miles from downtown Toronto. They moved there when the development was new--54 years ago, and paid $24K (!) for it. It sold for almost 38X that amount. I don't understand how anyone can afford to move there--

Edited April 23, 20232 yr by eastvillagedon

On 4/21/2023 at 3:04 PM, eastvillagedon said:

 

I can't believe there aren't lots of people in Toronto saying "Enough! Stop with this already."

 

 

Are you kidding? I would be in seventh heaven if this were happening to Cleveland. Heck, I'd be happy if what's happening in Niagara Falls, Ontario were happening in Cleveland! 

 

 

More...

 

https://fcr.ca/properties/ontario/toronto/2150-lake-shore-boulevard-west/

 

 

ooh ok cool, cool -- look at 'ol people boxy mississauga getting some real arkyteksure -- 👍

 

 

M City | 649 ft | 60 Floors X 2

 

via GeneralLeeTPHLS

 

 

via GeneralLeeTPHLS

 

More Mississauga...

 

Toronto obsesses over angular planes, meanwhile Mississauga allows unlimited height and density directly adjacent to single family homes at City Centre.

 

(Image is a rendering for M City, which is like half built)