Robust opposition at condo meeting

By Hedy Korbee

The health and safety of children at Birch Cliff Public School will be at risk if the City of Toronto approves a proposed ten-storey condo on Kingston Road between Birchcliff and Lakeside Avenues, according to TDSB school board trustee Parthi Kandavel.

Kandavel told a community public consultation meeting on Monday night that the tall building by Altree Developments will eliminate sunlight and cast shadows over the school property in a way that’s detrimental to the well-being of children.

“My concern… is the effect that would have from a safety and health perspective on frozen areas and patches of ice in that area due to the lack of sun and, of course, the importance that sunlight plays on health and in educational activities,” Kandavel said.

So far, the only shadow studies available show the building’s impact on sunlight between March and September and they illustrate that the southern part of the playground would be in shade.

The planning department has asked the developer to release data for the winter months when the sun is lower in the sky and the building will cast bigger shadows.

Photo depicts the shadow cast from current Lenmore Court buildings on March 3, 2021 at 9:18 am

Rendering depicts the shadow that 10-storey condo will cast on March 1/Sept. 1 at 9:18 am

Kandavel said the TDSB is also concerned about the equity implications of the proposed condo, saying that historically Birch Cliff has been a neighbourhood of mixed socioeconomic backgrounds and that’s a good thing for children.

“My concern is that if this proposal were not to retain that mixed class makeup of students, it actually plays a very vital, limiting role in the development of many children and these perspectives that they develop at a very formative age,” Kandavel said.”

Largest consultation meeting since 2010

Kandavel was one of more than 200 people who attended the virtual meeting, described by Ward 20 Councillor Gary Crawford as the largest community consultation he’s participated in since he was first elected in 2010.

It was the only statutory community consultation session required before the developer’s request for rezoning and an Official Plan amendment proceeds for a decision to Scarborough Community Council and eventually Toronto City Council.

Proposed condo on Kingston Road between Birchcliff and Lakeside Avenues that will replace Lenmore Court. Photo: City of Toronto submission

The meeting began with Altree Developments outlining details of its plan for the site at 1615-1641 Kingston Road. 

The proposed condo will be nine storeys tall and a height of 26.6 metres in the front where it faces Kingston Road. The height goes up to 32 metres if you include the two floors of mechanical penthouses.

From the back, the condo is ten storeys and 30.1 metres tall but tops out at 35.5 metres if you include the mechanicals.

The building will include 264 units plus outdoor rooftop amenity space for a total gross floor area of 208,000 square feet. 

There will be 244 parking spaces for residents and 27 visitor spaces.

Louis Tinker, a planner working for the developer, said the scale of the project is not unique or unusual for Kingston Road, even though it exceeds the six-storey, 20-metre limit allowed under current zoning.

“There has been since the adoption of the revitalization study in 2009, a number of mid-rise developments along Kingston Road that have been approved, either within the framework of the Kingston Road plan or indeed at a greater height or density than was originally approved back in 2009. Each of these were approved through a rezoning or in some cases a minor variance application based on a site specific review of each application,” Tinker said.

Robust opposition from the community

Almost two dozen Birch Cliff residents spoke in robust opposition to the project, led off by Janine O’Flanagan on behalf of the Birch Cliff Community Association and 1,600 people who’ve signed a petition opposing the development in its current form.

O’Flanagan described the project as bad planning and a “density land grab” and urged Altree to go back to the drawing board to accommodate the community association’s five main concerns.

1. No Displacement of Lenmore Court Tenants
2. No Encroachment or Rezoning on Residential Side Streets
3. Limit Density, Width, and Height of any Developments
4. Ensure safe traffic flow and intersections
5. Protect our Bluffs environment and local infrastructure

Lenmore Court apartments. Photo: John Smee/Bluffs Monitor.

O’Flanagan cautioned that Altree’s new plan to rehouse the 32 tenants living in affordable housing at Lenmore Court in the new condo is not guaranteed because it’s not in writing. 

“We want in the public record that despite confusing communications to the contrary in recent weeks, the official application by Altree to the City of Toronto for this development still proposes that the tenants of Lenmore Court are to be rehoused off site, at one of Altree’s proposed new developments in Cliffside,” O’Flanagan said.

O’Flanagan ended her presentation by warning that the community association will continue to be “a mighty, vocal, and well-organized community demanding a better proposal for the neighbourhood”.

She also asked Councillor Crawford to publicly state his support for the community’s goals. “As I’ve said a number of times to the community I support the five asks 100 per cent,” said Crawford in response.

Many concerns raised, including traffic

The meeting featured speaker after speaker echoing support for the community association’s position and then honing in on a point of personal concern.

Many people expressed opposition to the developer’s request for an Official Plan amendment to build on the site of two single-family homes just south of Kingston Road at 50 and 52 Birchcliff Ave.

The houses are designated “Neighbourhoods” under the Official Plan but they’ve been purchased by Altree to accommodate a four-storey portion of the building and provide vehicle access to underground parking.

50 and 52 Birchcliff Avenue, the proposed site of a four-storey wing and underground parking entrance

“I bought this house on good faith that the neighborhood would remain a neighborhood with single family homes,” said Rob Carmichael, a father of three who lives across the street from the proposed parking garage. “I did not buy my home thinking that 270 cars would be across the street from my home, exiting and entering day after day, every day, forever. With their lights beaming into my house the whole time.”

Several speakers expressed concern about traffic flow in and out of the Altree development as well as the 50-unit townhome development across the street. 

Local residents anticipate drivers will try to avoid the inevitable lineup at the traffic light at Birchcliff and Kingston and flood neighbourhood side streets to find the quickest access to Kingston Road. 

“The fastest way to get out of the neighborhood is to go anywhere else but Birchcliff and Kingston Road or Warden and Kingston Road for that matter, said Tricia Reid, who has lived in Birch Cliff for 57 years.  “Which means it’s down through the neighborhood, along Kingsbury Crescent, where there is tons of biking traffic and pedestrian traffic, and then to attempt to go up Lakeside, Kildonan, Valhalla, Harding, pretty much anywhere.”

The developer’s transportation and traffic expert, Ryan Sanker, said he didn’t anticipate that condo residents would want to take a circuitous route through the side streets, citing traffic counts, surveys and data. 

But that pitted Sanker against several Birch Cliff residents who said the behaviour is already prevalent and he would be aware of that if he lived in the neighbourhood.

Birchcliff Avenue

There were many other residents who raised objections to the development, including Heather Robertson of Queensbury Avenue who spoke about overall infrastructure. 

“We do not have the transit to support this. We do not have the schools to support this. We do not have the parking to support this. And the programs that are available at the community centre, it’s quite frankly like the Hunger Games trying to get a [parking] spot as it is,” Robertson said.

Why can’t it just be six storeys?

Several community members asked why developers simply can’t follow the current zoning bylaws.

Paul Murphy of Haig Avenue, who took part in the Kingston Road revitalization project more than ten years ago, said the community is pro-development and would love to work with the developer provided they stick with the vision that was articulated for Birch Cliff. 

“We spent a lot of time with the people from the city, developing a future, a look for this community. And everyone came together in partnership. And the city has implemented planning guidelines. And I think it’s essential that the city follow their own planning guidelines here….Where does it stop?

Christian Ventresca, a City of Toronto planning manager, said developers have the right to apply to the city for projects that don’t conform to existing zoning bylaws in the same way that an individual homeowner has the right to seek permission to renovate and increase the size of their house.

“In this case, the applicant and the landowner had filed an application to rezone and amend the Official Plan for their sites as is legally available to them under the Planning Act,” Ventresca said. “And we’re determining if the incremental change is still in keeping with those guiding documents and those planning principles against which we review the application as well as taking in community input, looking at the facts and figures on the ground and determining if departing from those are appropriate. But of course, that decision is not made by staff. It’s made by Council.”

Development applications such as this one often take quite some time to wend their way through the planning process.

City planners and various other city departments are reviewing Altree’s first submission but not all parties have sent comments back to the developer.

Louis Tinker said Altree will consider those recommendations along with the community feedback received over the last several months and incorporate them into a second submission that could be filed with the city in late April or May.

More public consultation has been promised by the developer even though future meetings are not required by law.