Kat_YYZ
Senior Member
This is an extremely funny comment to make in this thread, because the elevator at 241 Redpath apparently did not take kindly to the planned destruction of the building, and took its revenge on the developer.
BACKGROUND:
The soon-to-be-demolished 12-storey building at 241 Redpath had only one elevator. Even so, I thought it was pretty decent. It went out of service a couple of times a year, and usually it was fixed pretty quickly. Except for the time it needed a repair during the elevator repair worker strike of 2013, so we couldn't get anyone to fix it for a couple of weeks. Our landlord actually gave us a $50 credit towards the rent for one month because of the inconvenience — even though the strike was outside of his control. He wasn't a bad guy.
APRIL 2022:
The elevator had started to regularly break down. According to our contact at MOD Developments, it needed a new selector. However, since the elevator is extremely old, various parts that would fit no longer exist and have to be custom made (in the U.S.) and shipped to us. This ended up taking longer than originally anticipated, during which time the elevator was used sparingly, sometimes being put in service mode so that you had to call the Super to ask him to use it. It was having trouble with overheating as well. MOD announced that we would receive a 50% reduction on our June rent, to compensate us for the inconvenience.
MOD had hired Greenwin to property manage the building, and they put a "concierge" in the lobby from 7 am-10 pm who could be asked to help you carry things up and down the stairs (like groceries, laundry) to make it easier. Of course, you still had to haul yourself up the stairs, but at least you could get some help. I was on 10 and got a lot of exercise.
As this situation dragged on into mid-June, MOD said they would give us a second 50% rent reduction in July. This essentially amounted to one month of free rent.
I was away on the days of the big repair, but I know the elevator was taken completely offline, the motor had to be carried down the stairs in pieces (on an extremely hot day in June) and there was some talk of maybe using a crane to get the new parts back up?! I don't know how they did it, but it was finally operational again in July 2022. In August of 2022, we were given our 6-months' eviction notice.
In mid-June MOD Developments said "We don’t yet know the full cost of all elevator-related decisions, but we’ve committed to in excess of $100,000 so far." So they paid over $100,000 to fix an elevator that was only going to run another 8 months before the building was emptied out and basically closed!