Councillor Bradford and the Planning and Housing Committee have made it official: the Queen St E Urban Design Guidelines are a sham and they have no intention of honouring them. Regardless of those guidelines being developed 14 years ago, they still reflect the sentiment of residents, and the majority of developments that were supposed to be subject to those guidelines have violated them. Now they’re basically obsolete, if they ever were truly valid. I contend the entire process of developing the guidelines was a farce in order to stop residents challenging developments and there was never any intention of following them.

You can read my full deputation below. Councillor Bradford had absolutely nothing to say about any of the stats I brought up, in particular future supply and demand, all he could focus on was the guidelines and one out of date photo. He seemed to take the whole thing very personally, and at one point even had to be put in his place by the chair when he pounced on me and wouldn’t let me finish answering. He also tried to make a motion about my out of date photo, but that got shot down too.

Ironically he made it seem my only focus was the Lick’s condo when he was the one who couldn’t stop talking about it, while my actual concern was the current development and I only mentioned Lick’s to give context to the guidelines. Worst however, was when he projected some kind of false pretense on me, saying, “I think that comes across as misinformed at best or maybe even misleading at worst.” I’m not sure what precisely was misleading about stating the factual history and content of the guidelines and the expectation they would actually guide development. Here is Bradford’s statement with my rebuttals:

“So Adam Smith likes to come down here from time to time with good intentions, but I feel like whenever I listen to his deputations it’s always like opening up a time capsule [I’ve never before spoken of the guidelines or the history behind them until this deputation]. We talk about the Lick’s development from so many years ago, when there was a lot of ink spilled at the time about that. You know I go down to Queen St all the time, I think it looks fabulous, you know [see below for a pic of the empty brick wall]. And so when you have individuals who come down and make deputations it’s almost misleading like these guidelines from 14 years ago are the law [as part of the Official Plan they still a legal document, and as the name suggests, they are meant to GUIDE, that is their purpose], completely ignoring the planning paradigm and the provincial planning statutes that the city is statutorily required to comply with [the province has imposed many inequitable and unjust things on the city since Ford took power, it doesn’t mean we roll over and take it just because Ford says so]. Whether we like it or not we’re not living in 2012 anymore. I think that comes across as misinformed at best or maybe even misleading at worst [the only thing misleading is the guidelines themselves misleading the public]. And I don’t think that’s how we build cities [the current policy of overdensity is strangling the city], I don’t think that’s how we build community [communities are already strained with too much demand for too few services], and I don’t think it’s particularly helpful in the Beaches. So a position like that would likely come at the expense of affordable units for families, for seniors, for workers, that our community so desperately needs [we need CURRENT housing to be affordable, building new affordable housing does nothing for EXISTING tenants]. A position like that would probably come at the expense of the enhanced childcare spaces, on the work that we’re doing in the public realm [one daycare does not justify 350+ more units]. And again I remind folks, these positions and decisions that we make are difficult, but we have to consider all of the factors on front of us, try and come up with a balanced position, and one that moves the city forward, not one that’s handcuffed to a world we were living in 15 years ago [some people want to preserve their neighbourhood, and there’s nothing wrong with that!].”

The other deputant James Gray was clearly a plant, apparently he is part of the pro-development group More Neighbours. He had nothing to say other than, “I live 300m away and I support this development” so that Bradford could then lob leading questions at him.

The last deputant Mark Richardson is the creator of HousingNowTO, which uses affordable housing as thinly veiled advocacy for development in general. If Richardson advocated for fully public affordable housing (not P3s) and rolling back the loss of rent controls his stance would have more credibility; as it stands he comes off as shilling for developers to profit the housing industry under the guise of providing affordable housing.

There was an interesting moment during the first item on the agenda, about tree protection and development. A city staffer said, “Fundamentally, a tree that’s protected by the tree bylaw and it is in healthy condition, forestry staff will generally use the process to protect that tree. However, there’s been very clear direction from council in the past that if a tree would be removed as a result of development that is permitted by zoning, including zoning that’s varied as through a minor variance, that we should not stand in the way of development. We should allow that tree to be removed.” This just goes to show the development-at-any-cost ideology of council.

It really doesn’t matter what information is thrown at council that calls into question the sustainability or need for further development in our already strained city, they will rubber stamp pretty much any development. The real question is, is it because they feel it’s fruitless to resist the province and Premier Ford, because he has gamed all the laws in favour of development, or because they are in on the game?

Here is my deputation with supporting links:

Hello, my name is Adam Smith, resident of Beaches-East York. 1631 Queen E and 1080 Eastern is yet another development that makes a mockery of the Queen St E urban design guidelines.

The guidelines were a reaction to the Lakehouse Beach Residences at 1960 Queen E, aka the Lick’s condo, which saw a 6 storey condo rise up over a row of one storey retail shops, leaving a massive empty brick wall looming over the streetscape. This chicken bone development, whereby corner buildings are much larger than the buildings mid-block, used to be considered bad planning, but it seems Toronto has completely discarded what used to be good planning principles.

The guidelines intended to rein in plans at Queen and Woodbine, the Heartwood condos, aka the Shell Station, and while they were being developed there was a moratorium on development applications. The city held massive meetings with the community, planners, and developers present, and the resulting guidelines residents thought were in good faith. Then a funny thing happened.

During a short window when the guidelines were submitted but yet to be approved by council the moratorium was lifted, and the developer snuck in their application during that window, and discarded the guidelines. The guidelines required a setback at 3 storeys and to preserve the view of the historical clock tower, but the developer ignored this to build 6 storeys straight up, the sad irony being that the guidelines still contain this violated requirement. No amount of testimony at the OMB mattered, it was ruled that the guidelines didn’t apply because the development application predated them.

The Murphy’s Law condo at 1684 Queen E also violates the guidelines, and so does this development. While the Queen St building only goes an extra storey, putting an 18 storey tower directly behind it completely negates the purpose of the guidelines in keeping building heights in line with the character of the neighbourhood.

As you can see, the tower planned on Eastern will dominate the landscape for blocks, and any claim this doesn’t set a precedent is false. The community was told the Licks condo was not supposed to set a precedent, but when it came to the Shell station application the developer cited the Licks condo as an example. As if this development isn’t paving the way for another 18 storey tower next door where the Beaches Cinema is. The official plan may have changed, provincial planning laws may have changed, but what hasn’t changed is the community’s desire to preserve the nature and character of our neighbourhood.

The completely useless deception of the urban design guidelines aside, there are more important issues with this development. Like the majority of recent development applications this is another example of overdensity. The WestBeach condo has 89 units, the Queen and Ashbridge condo added 551 units, the Murphy’s Law site has 216 units planned, and now with this development we are supposed to absorb another 328 units? This is not a major transit hub, have any of the planners tried to take the 501 or 503 downtown during morning rush hour? Have any of the planners tried to get childcare in this area, or fought to be first in line to sign their kids up for extracurricular activities? Duke of Connaught is the only public school in the catchment area, and it’s fully at capacity.

If we project future demand none of this makes sense. I won’t go into each item on this list, but if you look at the vacant units section, there are over 46,000 units vacant or under construction.

VACANT UNITS

Units for rent: 8864

Rental units under construction: 5475

Unsold condo units under construction: 10,000

Vacant homes: 2161

Vacant under appeal: 17437

TCHC vacant/under repair: 2770

TOTAL: 46707

The next 30 years will also see over two hundred thousand units become available as the Boomers move on. When you add up all the aged care beds currently and under construction, and then look at the 65 and over population, a generously conservative estimate of all remaining seniors being coupled up in homes means there will be potentially 223,000 housing units that will be vacated within the next 30 years. When the 447,000 seniors not currently in aged care need that type of housing, why are we focused on rentals when the real demand is for senior living communities?

AGED CARE

Private retirement homes: 8996

Long-term Care: 15184

Under construction: 5364

TOTAL: 29544

HOUSING VACANCY PROJECTION

Population 65 and older: 476990

Pop. 65 and older minus aged care beds: 447446

Potential newly vacant units next 30 years: 223723

Canada also just depopulated due to the drop in immigration targets combined with our below-replacement-value birth rates, rates that are declining world round since the 70s. Project these numbers and it makes no sense to build more units for a population likely to plateau or even decline in the next decades. Do these numbers ever enter into calculating how many units we actually need to serve future demand, or are we just blindly building?

Then there is the ongoing issue of affordability. Less than a third of these units are slated to be affordable, and according to staff at the Oct consultation they haven’t even determined what type of affordable that will be. Market rates are unaffordable to anyone not in the top 30% of incomes, if we’re not building ALL units to be affordable we aren’t serving the needs of residents.

I ask every city planner and councillor, how does any of this development frenzy qualify as good planning? It wouldn’t have ten years ago. It’s not based on evidence or best practices or projections of demand, it is purely ideological to prop up flagging economic growth and the profits of the housing industry. Toronto should be fighting the province at every turn, not caving to their environmentally destructive and unsustainable developer-driven agenda. Thank you for your time.

Adam Smith, 21st Century