{"id":31221,"date":"2022-05-05T17:53:03","date_gmt":"2022-05-05T21:53:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=31221"},"modified":"2022-05-12T19:13:11","modified_gmt":"2022-05-12T23:13:11","slug":"yonge-street-apartment-approved-amid-traffic-retail-issues","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/yonge-street-apartment-approved-amid-traffic-retail-issues\/","title":{"rendered":"Yonge Street apartment approved amid traffic, retail issues"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Council has approved zoning bylaw amendments which will pave the way for an apartment complex at the southwest corner of Yonge and Irwin Avenues \u2013 but, in doing so, a Councillor opposed to aspects of the project questioned whether his colleagues were \u201cafraid\u201d of developers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The question was raised by Councillor John Gallo at last week\u2019s Council meeting where lawmakers approved amendments to the Town\u2019s Official Plan, allowing a six-storey building along Yonge Street \u2013 and eight storeys at the rear of the building \u2013 with bonusing to allow for heights above and beyond what is currently allowed in the OP.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bonusing allows for some flexibility on height and other components of the build if there are trade-off benefits for the community at large, such as public spaces.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Through this lens, Councillor Gallo said the plan does not go far enough, nor does it allow for ground floor retail as prescribed in the Town\u2019s plan for the Aurora Promenade.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Developers filed a report with the Town in April of 2021 stating there isn\u2019t a business case for ground floor retail, citing seven vacant retail spaces within a short distance of the property.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAs of today, only one of those seven [are] empty,\u201d said Councillor Gallo. \u201cAll the rest of them have small businesses in them. To me, that says one of two things: either what they\u2019re saying is incorrect, that\u2026we\u2019re getting over a pandemic and there is the ability to rent those units, and they are also saying that adding more ground floor retail will add additional competition for, in their view, limited businesses that would want to move downtown.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI don\u2019t subscribe to that. I don\u2019t have an issue with amending the Official Plan if there is community benefit and we have all said this across the table that we work very hard to maintain our official planning documents because they are important to us. In this case, the only benefit in amending the Official Plan is to the developer; there is no benefit to the Town in removing that ground floor retail, which is a big part of our upper downtown.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Planners stating that some ground floor units would be convertible to retail, without much of the necessary infrastructure planned to be put in place, is a \u201cred herring,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Councillor Rachel Gilliland offered a similar view, stating it \u201cdid not sound like an easy conversion,\u201d but she was not in support of Councillor Gallo\u2019s motion to refer the matter back to staff.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI am in support of the extra housing,\u201d she said. \u201cAs much as I want to defer this, I am not sure how much that is going to change the mind of the developer at this point. I am okay with the design as it is now and will vote against the referral.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Councillor Michael Thompson was of a like viewpoint with regards to the potential of changing developers\u2019 minds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cEnough conversations have happened around retail that if the applicant wanted to do it they would do it,\u201d he said. \u201cI don\u2019t see the referral changing and I think we\u2019re back in the same spot, except we run the risk of it just being pushed to the [Ontario Land Tribunal (OLT) for appeal]. At the end of the day, we\u2019re long overdue to make a decision. If you agree that retail must be there, vote no. If you can live with the application as is, vote yes.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As the discussion continued, Councillor Gallo said, \u201cultimately what I hear is we\u2019re afraid of the developer and that is not what I stand for,\u201d a statement which sparked disagreement from other members of Council.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cJust because I am not totally in love with retail for this site doesn\u2019t mean I don\u2019t believe in the OP and that I am afraid of developers,\u201d said Councillor Sandra Humfryes. \u201cWhat I would like to see is that we\u2019re providing appropriate housing in the appropriate areas of our Town. I have seen enough empty retail on the bottom of apartment buildings and condos. It\u2019s a shame. This is north of Wellington, it is further out from our downtown core. I can\u2019t see anyone using those except the people who live in the building and they will probably be using it conveniently when they want or heading out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHousing is an issue. We need to increase that, but this development, to me, doesn\u2019t mean that it is out of the window because we don\u2019t have retail on the main floor; it has way more benefits than negatives for me.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mayor Tom Mrakas also pushed back on the claims that Council members were \u201cafraid\u201d of developers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI believe we need to make a decision,\u201d he said. \u201cAny Councillor who believes this is not right, vote against this. Let\u2019s make a decision. That is our obligation to the community: making decisions on their behalf. We\u2019re hearing it from the Province constantly that they want to take away our powers to decide how our community grows and here we are giving them a prime example of why they want to take those powers away.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cLet\u2019s stand up, make a decision and show the Province that we are adults and we can make those decisions. I will not be in favour of the referral.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The amendments were approved by Council on a vote of 5 \u2013 2 with the dissenting votes coming from Councillor Gallo, as well as Councillor Wendy Gaertner who had previously voiced infrastructure concerns over the plan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThere are just too many unresolved issues,\u201d she said. \u201cIf we\u2019re going to amend the OP, there should be a substantial community benefit and that just isn\u2019t here. I think this application needs more work.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Brock Weir
Editor
Local Journalism Initiative Reporter<\/strong><\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Zoning changes approved for apartment complex at Yonge and Irwin while Councillor questions whether colleagues are “afraid” of developers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-31221","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-87z","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-08-14 15:05:19","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31221","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31221"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31221\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31221"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31221"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31221"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}