ABCRA Winter Newsletter

Check out our new website

Welcome to ABCRA’s Winter 2023 newsletter. In this edition, we want to share updates and news from the neighbourhood, upcoming events and opportunities to get involved in your City.

What have we been up to? Lots! First off – there’s our new website (you’re looking at it) and and we hope you’ll take it out for a thorough test drive and let us know what you think.

Finally, a plan for Avenue Road

Avenue Road proposed interventions

In a significant development last month, the City of Toronto unveiled new designs for Avenue Road at an open house event, signalling progress in addressing the long-standing issues. The designs aim to transform Avenue Road into a more pedestrian-friendly, people-friendly environment, prioritizing safety, comfort and connectivity.

1080-1088 Yonge Street development

1080-1088 Proposed condo development

We are writing to express our opposition to the 1080-1088 Yonge Street – Official Plan and Zoning By-law Amendment Application and request a deferral on the item. We have been in negotiations with the Developer and acknowledge the good steps that have been taken in reducing the massing on the west side of the site, but are of the opinion that more work needs to be done.

Eye-popping 11-storey tower proposed for site of historic Toronto homes

171 Lowther proposal submitted to City of Toronto

A row of homes dating back almost 125 years could be transformed by an impressive 11-storey tower, if a new development application is approved by the city. Not surprisingly, local residents have questions about the growing intensity in a quiet section of one of the city’s oldest neighbourhoods where a number of proposals to increase density are piling up.

Winners Announced for the 2023 Heritage Toronto Awards

Albert Campbell Branch Library

Canadian architects and urbanists were at the helm of five projects that were among the winners of the the 2023 Heritage Toronto Awards. The Heritage Toronto Awards bring together leaders, innovators and emerging professionals from across cultural, development, and policy-making sectors to celebrate achievements in Toronto’s heritage. The event is also Heritage Toronto’s major fundraiser of the year and raises monies in support of its public programming.

Advocacy groups call on Toronto for full moratorium on unhoused evictions

Homeless man resting in doorway in Toronto

An advocacy group is calling on the mayor and city council to vote in favour of a full moratorium on evictions and address “service restrictions” practices across the entire shelter system. Voices for Unhoused Liberation wrote an open letter outlining demands, including investment in more indoor space and starting an accountability process, including people in Toronto’s homeless population and advocates.

City of shadows

Shadows created by tall buildings on Bloor Street's "Mink Mile"

The new buildings were just what Toronto needed. More than 800 new rental apartments, about a third of them permanently affordable. These new homes would rise on the site of an old provincial building. The problem: They were too tall. One tower would rise 50 storeys into the air, and so it would cast shadow on a park half a block away – covering about a quarter of its surface – for up to three hours a day.