Vaughan residents fear increased traffic after developer proposes condo abutting family home

McKenzie Street residents say development will make for a dangerous drive, developer disagrees

Yorkregion.com
Jan. 23, 2023
Brian Capitao

Highway 7 and Kipling Avenue isn’t the safest stretch of road. Plenty of nearby car collisions have happened in the past, and with the proposed 12-storey mid-rise development on Highway 7, next to the residences on McKenzie Street, residents are worried they are faced with a death trap every time they leave their homes.

Large vehicles like York Regional Transit buses and trucks coming from Kleinburg hurry down the hill. It wouldn’t be the first time a motorist has hit a bus nearby.

Making a left turn off McKenzie Street already seems almost impossible. With intensification happening, residents fear it’s going to be a lot worse before it gets better.

One of the biggest issues with the proposed development residents have is the increased traffic from the driveway leading into the mid-rise condominium.

“Usually, I make a left to go to work. It's going to impede me even to get out of my driveway, which is a big thing. And it's only going to create more traffic because we already have two buildings and other buildings (stacked townhouses),” said Maria Petrolo, who lives on McKenzie Street with her parents.

“What happens if my parents need an ambulance? How are they going to get here?” added Petrolo.

However, this concern may be unfounded, according to the developers behind the building, First Avenue Developments.

“We have done lots of work through our process to design access points, particularly on the Highway 7, to ensure that there's going to be sufficient opportunities for traffic movements, once the building is built,” said Adam Grossi, director of planning and development at First Avenue.

Some residents like local Ron Morro, have suggested a widening of the road to allow more accessibility. However, this isn’t consistent with modern urban planning trends.

“Contemporary urban planning is not pushing for more roads to get more cars. On the contrary, we're pushing for more transit to make an efficient use of taxpayers’ money to get less traffic and less jammed roads,” said Naama Blonder, architect, urban planner, and co-founder of SmartDensity.

Contrary to popular belief, mid-rise buildings are not missing middle housing, Blonder explained. That type of housing consists of duplexes, triplexes, courtyard buildings, and multistorey apartment complexes among others.

However, the City of Vaughan’s Urban Design Guidelines promote mid-rise development as the missing middle. So, mid-rise buildings are planned out in low-density neighbourhoods with single and semi-detached houses. Mid-rise buildings in Vaughan are often between five and 12 storeys.

“To me, a 12-storey sounds like something that is more appropriate, near transit, and not in the core of a single-family neighbourhood," Blonder said. "It will be a little bit out of scale and out of proportion. And I'm saying this as an architect that supports growth and intensity.”

Blonder cites Vancouver as a municipality defining missing middle housing as six storeys rather than the typical four. The current rate of intensification is a result of policies that were implicitly biased, not allowing for adequate development in North America for 40 years.

There are still implicit biases that go on to this day, argues Blonder.

“Are these privileged homeowners that are being asked? But what about future residents, what about future generations? What about those who are moving here and are not being consulted as of now because they don't live there yet,” said Blonder.

According to Grossi, the development was planned with angular planes to mitigate impact on residents.

“One of the things we looked at was how do we ensure that the majority of the mass of our building is directly as close to Highway 7 as possible. How do we implement things like angular planes and building articulation. All of these things that can be used to have a building design that pushes it, again closer to the street, away from the neighbourhood, (and) have as minimal impact as possible for things like shadows and overlook,” said Grossi.