Kwong Centre, 407 Huron St (?, 3s, ARK Inc.) | Page 2

AlbertC · Mar 30, 2020

March 29, 2020

ADRM · May 22, 2020

Hadn’t appreciated how far along this is.

condovo · May 22, 2020

The brick looks very decent and respectful.

AlbertC · May 22, 2020

Apart from the thoughtful restoration on the Victorian, I really like the execution of the rear addition. I know this is for a healthcare facility, but it's structure and scale serves as a good model for gentle intensification on existing heritage properties in the city.

junctionist · May 23, 2020

AlbertC said:
Apart from the thoughtful restoration on the Victorian, I really like the execution of the rear addition. I know this is for a healthcare facility, but it's structure and scale serves as a good model for gentle intensification on existing heritage properties in the city.

I don't see the present-day urban fabric of Toronto as sustainable in the long run as a collection of mainly detached houses and high-rise towers. Market pressures will likely result in the redevelopment of many tracts of detached and semi-detached houses from downtown to Scarborough. High-rise buildings become costly to maintain as they age, which is undesirable.

The missing middle means larger units in smaller multi-residential buildings with lower theoretical maintenance costs, which is really desirable from a livability standpoint. But it's only feasible if you open up "stable" neighbourhoods made up of detached houses to walkup apartment and midrise infill development. That raises the question of what to do with heritage houses and districts.

Razing Cabbagetown or the Annex would be tragic. I always regret that our oldest heritage districts in St. Lawrence and the old Financial District can't stand alongside Old Montreal as stately examples of how we used to build cities in Canada. Gentle infill like this project is an interesting option to resolve the dilemma of how to achieve consistent metropolitan density without losing heritage urban fabric. This sort of infill is still so rare that it seems new and innovative, but it has been around since Jack Diamond did it in the 1970s.

AlbertC · May 23, 2020

https://urbantoronto.ca/database/projects/661-huron

junctionist said:
I don't see the present-day urban fabric of Toronto as sustainable in the long run as a collection of mainly detached houses and high-rise towers. Market pressures will likely result in the redevelopment of many tracts of detached and semi-detached houses from downtown to Scarborough. High-rise buildings become costly to maintain as they age, which is undesirable.

The missing middle means larger units in smaller multi-residential buildings with lower theoretical maintenance costs, which is really desirable from a livability standpoint. But it's only feasible if you open up "stable" neighbourhoods made up of detached houses to walkup apartment and midrise infill development. That raises the question of what to do with heritage houses and districts.

Razing Cabbagetown or the Annex would be tragic. I always regret that our oldest heritage districts in St. Lawrence and the old Financial District can't stand alongside Old Montreal as stately examples of how we used to build cities in Canada. Gentle infill like this project is an interesting option to resolve the dilemma of how to achieve consistent metropolitan density without losing heritage urban fabric. This sort of infill is still so rare that it seems new and innovative, but it has been around since Jack Diamond did it in the 1970s.

Huron Streets has emerged to become an interesting case study in the Annex. As it offers a handful of examples in how gentle intensification can occur in traditional lower-rise heritage areas. The neighbouring building directory beside this at 409 Huron is proposing for a residential addition that partially retains the existing front of a Victorian, and will be geared towards students. Further south at Glen Morris St, there's the Laneway Housing U of T project, and 364 Huron which will eventually replace the building at the corner.

While up closer to Dupont at 661 Huron there's another proposal that is looking to further increase the density on its available surface area, although that one will replace the current buildings on site. Since around the Uno Prii days, the Annex has always been an area that straddles between maintaining an overall historical identity while also working towards providing solutions to increased housing requirements. Hope to see more examples as we go along.