Thornhill residents call 12-storey condo project ‘ridiculous’

Yonge-Uplands plan would feature condo, townhouses and retail

Yorkregion.com
Jan. 15, 2016
By Simone Joseph

How high should a proposed new Thornhill condo be?

How much intensification, including new housing and businesses, is the right amount for an existing community?

These issues were on the minds of residents gathered last night to discuss a proposed development project on the southwest corner of Yonge Street and Uplands Avenue in Thornhill, north of Clark Avenue and south of Hwy. 7.

The owner is in the process of applying to the City of Vaughan to allow the development of midrise and lowrise residential buildings. The application has not yet been submitted.

The open house Thursday night was presented by Ryan Guetter, a vice president with urban design and consulting group Weston Consulting, and Clifford Korman, partner/architect with Kirkor Architects, to show residents in the area plans for the residential project. The name of the owner is Lemine Investments.

Most residents gathered at Thornhill Public School for the 7 p.m. open house were worried the proposed development, including a condo and townhouses, would ruin the character of the area. One resident pointed out that the Uplands neighbhourhood is a beautiful, upper-class area in Vaughan.

“As a community, we have got to stand up. It’s a Forest Hill, a Rosedale,” said Andrew Baldwin. “It (the development) doesn’t match the community. It is very far off.”

Guetter pointed out that the development could have a positive effect, since it will introduce mixed uses to the area - including retail, offices and townhouses, promoting the walkability of the area.

The development would include a 12-storey condo with retail space, seven townhouses up to three storeys high and 248 parking spaces.

Both Guetter and Korman emphasized that this was a design early in the development process.

“This is the first step,” Korman said.

When it was revealed the condo would be 12-storeys, residents’ reaction was swift and negative.

“12? Geez,” said one resident.

“It is incredibly high density for this area,” said another.

“This density is ridiculous. It doesn’t fit into this area” and “Twelve storeys is too much,” complained other residents.

“I have a $5-million home. My backyard would be the townhouses,” said another resident.

When residents also expressed concerns about additional traffic in the area, Guetter responded that a traffic engineer would be doing an impact study.

Dan Simile was not shy about expressing his opinion. “To the residents, it is a little bit of an insult. There is a lot of density for that amount of space. You could do a lot more with less.”

Ward 5 Councillor Alan Shefman attended the open house, sharing his concern that the proposal ignored planning documents Vaughan politicians had drawn up, including The Yonge Steeles Corridor Secondary Plan, which features an eight-storey limit for condos. The plan seeks to protect the Uplands area in terms of height and density.

Yet, the fact that the developer proposes a 12-storey building, while the Yonge-Steeles plan limits buildings to eight storeys does not surprise Shefman.

“There is a history of applications in the city ... developers applying to significantly increase (height) over what the official plan says,” he said.

”I’m concerned people are not respecting the official plan,” he said of council’s policies on how land will be used.

Shefman said he is interested to see how the property owner, urban planning and architect companies will respond to residents’ feedback.