Dufferin-centre study - Planning for low-rises

NRU
July 12, 2017
By Dominik Matusik

The City of Vaughan council is trying to ensure that the built form abutting the Dufferin-Centre intersection remains low rise in the face of high-rise trends to the contrary elsewhere in the city. But opinions vary on how to do this.

On June 20, planning staff recommended the adoption of the Dufferin-Centre Study Report. Through this secondary plan staff sought to encourage transit ridership, and ensure that future development complements adjacent neighbourhoods.

However, unable to get agreement among members, council deferred the secondary plan, pending further comments from stakeholders. At issue was uncertainty regarding provincial land interests at the intersection’s southeast and southwest quadrants, land which had been set aside for a potential Highway 407 interchange.

Ward 5 councillor Alan Shefman supported approving the plan. He told NRU that having a secondary plan in place is the only way to avoid undesirable development in the area.

“I believe the plan is a very good first start in addressing the very profound development issues of that area,” he says. “I want the developments that are proposed there to meet the overall planning vision that we have for that area ... Part of the reason why it’s absolutely necessary to put this plan in place is to be able to respond to [high-rise development applications] not from an ad hoc perspective but from a well-thought-out and consulted planning perspective ... If there is no plan, our ability-at the OMB- to fight a project we do not like, because of its height or its density, is tremendously limited.”

However, outstanding issues complicate the matter. Ward 4 councillor Sandra Yeung Racco supported deferring the study. She says that the city does not have enough information to endorse the study and dismisses the idea that a lack of a secondary plan will result in high-rise proposals.

“We don’t have enough accurate information to go ahead,” she told NRU. “If we’re going to make a decision, we should make an informed decision with accurate information and not sort of guessing or assuming that certain things are coming in.”

She says that the future uses of both the southeast and southwest corners of the intersection are up in the air currently, pending decisions by the province.

As the northwest corner already has an approved midrise commercial development, the only quadrant the study has the potential to address is the northeast corner, which contains a commercial strip mall.

According to Racco, it is doing well and isn’t going anywhere in the near future. She concludes that the likelihood of high-rise applications at this intersection is low.

Additionally, a 56-unit townhouse development proposed by City Park Homes near the strip mall has been approved by council, despite staff’s recommendation to refuse it. Staff’s recommendation stemmed from the application’s non-compliance with the public road network proposed in the Dufferin-Centre Secondary Plan. According to Racco, however, local residents-and council-were supportive of this development for fear that its refusal could result in an application for a tower development instead.

In an email from Vaughan spokesperson Carmela Antolino, staff indicate that developments along Centre Street should be medium density, with the greatest heights concentrated at its intersection with Dufferin–in the quadrant furthest from existing communities-in order to support a future BRT. However, staff would prefer development along Dufferin to be low-rise.

Work is continuing on the Dufferin-Centre study and comments from the province are expected later in the year. Racco expects the final secondary plan will be presented to council in early 2018.