It's nice to see those shabby sliding windows in the heritage building finally been replaced! Those have bothered me for 2 decades since I was a kid!

Im going to miss the fountain though, I think this glass addition is a downgrade from the original addition.
 
holden90 said:
I always forget that the Park Hyatt is located in one of the city's most busiest corners. I'm so unimpressed with the renovations, the facade is still so bland - it looks like a hospital from certain angles. And more of that stupid glass box design that you seem to see on every refurbished building.
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What facade?
 
MoObserves said:
They really need to widen the sidewalks of Avenue Road, From Bloor all the way up to St. Claire. The pedestrian experience over there is abysmal.
With this renovation, it would be great to allow for a driveway, benches and greenery in front of the Hyatt and across the street along the Church.
There is a pilot project by the city to do so, but so far the plans are for the stretch north of Dupont.
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There is a great series of photos on the Toronto Archives website, under the title "Avenue Road Widening" that shows how the street looked in 1959 before being widened from four to six lanes:

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Insanity! It seems that as the automobile took over so did the issues of narrow streets that were laid out for a much smaller city. So a wholesale slaughter of trees for wider streets. One can see this all overToronto in areas that were developed pre auto.
 
thecharioteer said:
There is a great series of photos on the Toronto Archives website, under the title "Avenue Road Widening" that shows how the street looked in 1959 before being widened from four to six lanes:

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Thanks for sharing these. Now more than ever I'm convinced that Avenue needs to be totally reconfigured, not for nostalgia, but for it to work for this century. Bike paths, wider sidewalks, ground level retail etc that can expand the appeal of Yorkville as a village within the city.

I was initially against the bike lanes on Bloor, west of Avenue, seeing that there are parallel ones on Harbord, but seeing the how the vibrancy of that whole community increased through the more "pedestrian" traffic is great. Avenue can and should be replicated in a similar manner, especially at the corner of Bloor where the Hyatt sits, across the ROM, and facing Queen's park.
 
I've never enjoyed what the impact of this renovation would do to the building itself...a glass addition on top will always look terrible on a masonry building, but the elevator shaft like structure and suburban office style extension north is a huge disappointment.
Avenue Road as it currently stands needs a refurbishment (And obviously has for a while*)...at this point I think it'll be dangerous to leave the road as is for the nect thirty years. Hopefully the city will try to make this stretch more akin to itself from over 80 years ago.
 
LUVIT! said:
Insanity! It seems that as the automobile took over so did the issues of narrow streets that were laid out for a much smaller city. So a wholesale slaughter of trees for wider streets. One can see this all overToronto in areas that were developed pre auto.
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We had to adapt our infrastructure from what was laid out for a small city to something more appropriate for a metropolitan city. At the same time, what was done was too narrowly focused on maximizing space for drivers. They should have engineered the reconstructed street for trees to be able to grow as tall and healthy as what was cut down. You can find just as healthy street streets along major streets in a variety of European cities. There should have been more sidewalk space, too.
 
Transit was doing a fine job of displacing cars on Avenue Rd. Note that 3 May 1928 was a Thursday.
 
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