LINKS
1. Toronto Standard: Jane Jacobs Her Current Relevancy
2. Peterborough Examiner: Modern apartments to wrap around old Y
3. Toronto Star: Ontario Place Closes
4. Globe and Mail: Ryerson Architecture App for Toronto???
5. Globe and Mail: European Meats in Kensington Market
6. e-architect: Adaptive Re-use Montreal
7. BlogTO: Fire losses in Toronto
8. BlogTO: History of the Dufferin Gates Toronto
9. The Times: Wonder of ancient city reduced to rubble
10. Wall Street Journal: Recalling Art Deco Stylist Who Defined City
11. Urban Toronto: Rezoning application - 60 Mill Street
12. Toronto Star: Real Jerk fights back
13. Toronto Blog: Mapping Toronto at Koffler Gallery
14. Toronto Star: Faking Destruction of Heritage Buildings
15. Scotsman: New Entrance to Edinburgh's Waverly Station
16. Guardian: Threat to 5Pointz
17. Toronto Star: Odette House - Demolition of historic Toronto house has locals fuming
18. Atlantic Weekly: The Greenest Building is.....
19. New York Times: Changes at the National Arts Club
20. Inside Toronto: North York Council
21. Urban Toronto: Rezoning application-71-95 King Street West
22. New York Times: Historic District in East Village? Maybe not
23. Toronto Star: Canada's Lighthouses in Jeopardy
24. Toronto Star: Wreck from 1812 Uncovered
25. Toronto Star: Lennox Rehab at Queen and Bathurst
26. Toronto Star: Heritage News this week in Toronto
27. CNN.com: Plans to restore crumbling Colosseum cause rumblings in Rome
28. Calgary Herald: A Calgary Landmark Languishes
29. Blog TO: Toronto Can't Keep Up with Developers
30. Blog TO: Fantastic Photo Montages of Sections of Yonge Street, circa 1950
31. CBC: New Historic Places in Canada
32. Globe and Mail: Regency Rebuild
33. Owen Sound Sun Times: Bandstand to be saved
34. Winnipeg Free Press: Bay a high-maintenance gift - Offer of downtown building to U of W must come with long-term plan
35. Guelph Mercury: The Loretto Convent gets a new life!
36. Toronto Star: Bay Street Bus Terminal
37. Windsor Star: Save Building, MPP Urges
38. Property Management: Cleveland Arcade Acquisition
39. New York Times: Slow Permit Process in San Francisco creates Resistance to Historic Districts
40. Toronto Star: Pickering Airport Lands
41. The Star.com: Threat to Ormscliffe
42. Brantnews.com: The future of Greenwich-Mohawk
43. Atlantic Weekly: Learning to Celebrate Brutalism
44. New York Times: Demolition: UNESCO Designation
45. De Havilland Hangar, Downsview
46. Goderich Signal Star: Rebuilding the Downtown
47. Globe and Mail: Review Unbuilt Toronto II
48. Globe and Mail: Rod Robbie Dead
49. Globe and Mail: Lack of Protection for Canada's Federal Heritage
50. Toronto Star: Balancing Commercial and Residential in Toronto Developments
51. Toronto Star: 1812-2012
52. Toronto Star: Good Main Street Business Killed by Landlord
53. Toronto Star: Tax Break Killing Toronto Main Streets??
54. Owen Sound Sun Times: Meaford looks at Heritage District
55. Windsor Star, Shore House faces wrecking ball
56. Winnipeg: St. Boniface's historic fire hall set to become youth hostel
57. David Wencer Blog - Two Solitudes in Heritage Preservation....Youth and Age
58. The Atlantic Cities: Preserving Churches
59. Toronto Star: Elton John near Brighton?
60. Petition to Save Canadian Aviation and Space Museum
61. New York Times: Steve Jobs and Apple Buildings
62. WBEZ: Chicago Doors Open
63. CBC: Goderich Tornado Damage
64. Doug Brown's Eden Smith book Online!
65. Urban Toronto: Architects to Sign their Buildings in Toronto
66. Ontario Capital Precinct Working Group
67. Windsor Star: Ambassador Bridge Expansion and Sandwich HCD
68. Toronto Star: Exhibit Will it be on Display from University Avenue
1. Toronto Standard: Jane Jacobs Her Current Relevancy
Is the work of the great writer/city planner still relevant?
Jane Jacobs published The Death and Life of Great American Cities over 50 years ago, changing radically the way city planners and architects do their jobs. She has become a mythic — some might even say sacred — icon, credited with turning the planning profession on its head. But now, as cities grow and evolve in unpredictable ways, some are beginning to question the relevance of her work.
We talk to Timothy Mennel, a senior editor for the American Planning Association and co-editor of the book Reconsidering Jane Jacobs, about the legacy and the myth.
The Death and Life of Great American Cities has had a profound influence on urban planning practices across the globe. Do you think Jacobs’s ideas are as relevant today as they were when the book was published?
Yes and no. The world has of course changed tremendously in the more than 50 years since the publication of Death and Life, and sometimes it’s hard to relate the neighbourhoods and situations described in Death and Life to our own. As diverse as New York was at that time, today’s cities are far more so, and they face a host of economic challenges that are of a different scale and character than what she focused on in that book. For example, the erosion of the industrial economy, the development of global supply chains, and the rise of China as an economic powerhouse are just a few of those changes.
Nevertheless, Jacobs’s major contribution to planning and countless other fields was to stress the importance of fine-grained attention to all the social and economic qualities that make up a community—and the importance of that hasn’t decreased at all. What will be interesting to see, though, is how our notions of “community” change as our larger frameworks do.
http://www.torontostandard.com/the-sprawl/the-death-and-life-of-jane-jacobs
2. Peterborough Examiner: Modern apartments to wrap around old Y
BRENDAN WEDLEY
Site plan filed for redevelopment of former YMCA site; minor rezoning change before council Monday
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| Design sketches show the view from the air and from street level for the planned redevelopment of the former YMCA site at George and Murray streets. |
A two-level, modern-looking apartment building with ground-level storefronts will wrap around the historic former YMCA building in Peterborough’s downtown.
Design sketches show the view from the air and from street level for the planned redevelopment of the former YMCA site at George and Murray streets.
The main section of the apartment tower will be eight storeys high, the other five storeys.
A site plan recently filed with the city shows how the space inside the renovated and expanded building will be used.
There will be a fitness area, a hair salon, a dining area for the senior residence that would be part of the development, space for the Kawartha Memory Clinic, three stores with storefronts facing George St., plus 48 market rental apartments and 92 residential suites targeted for seniors.
http://www.thepeterboroughexaminer.com/ArticleDisplay.aspx?e=3459112
3. Toronto Star: Ontario Place Closes
Reg Cohn
Ontario Place is dead until further notice
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Ontario Place has been taking on water for years. Now, at 41, the jewel on the lake is sunk — no more bailouts.
So will the signature Cinesphere rise again in a different form?
Make no mistake. For all the uplifting rhetoric about future resurrection, it’s the recurring red ink that prompted the province to shutter an amusement park that fewer and fewer Ontarians found amusing enough to visit.
Until the bleeding is stanched for all time, don’t expect the gates to reopen anytime soon. Ontario Place is proof that if you build it, they will not necessarily come.
Its promised reincarnation, to be led by John Tory, requires a leap of faith. Perhaps the government will one day rebuild it, but for now the Liberals are seizing the moment to dismantle a crumbling structure — with the former Progressive Conservative leader providing convenient political cover.
Editor’s Note: This greatest of all of Eb Zeidler's buildings has NO heritage protection, none, zero, you get the picture. In the early nineties I proposed designation, idea was deep sixed by then Councillor Joe Pantalone.
4. Globe and Mail: Ryerson Architecture App for Toronto???
Dave LeBlanc
Phone app brings Toronto architecture to life
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It is, perhaps, the most memorable scene from the 2002 sci-fi flick Minority Report: performing a sort of upper-body ballet, Tom Cruise whips through pages of information, fast-forwards through video and enlarges stills on transparent computer screens using two-fingered, light-tipped gloves.
Less than a decade later, some of that fiction would become reality when Apple’s finger-flicking-good iPhone was launched and, a few years after that, a popular video game system would do away with joysticks to transform player into controller.
But for Luddites, or those not inclined to pantomime skiing or auto racing in their living rooms, there has been little incentive to embrace this somewhat intimidating new technology.
Until now: Recently released by Ryerson University, a free app for iPhones and Android phones uses geo-positioning for an interactive downtown architectural experience like no other.
Hold the phone in front of you, and the phone’s camera shows the view in real time; “floating” on top of that view are photographs of architectural landmarks in close proximity. Walk towards a landmark and its photo grows larger in a modern-day version of the “You’re getting warmer” game; tap that photo and layers of information appear. In some cases, it’s an archival photograph of what occupied the site a century ago; or floor plans and concept sketches; in all cases, the Ryerson app will deliver text information on the building explaining why it’s significant.
Editor's Note: Here's the link to get the App-kindly sent by Joel Ceresne, from sunny Savannah. Thanks Joey!
http://itunes.apple.com/ca/app/ryerson-university-datamob/id463830694?mt=8&ls=1
5. Globe and Mail: European Meats in Kensington Market
Adrian Morrow
Kensington Market stalwart is on the block
For more than five decades, European Quality Meats and Sausages has been a Kensington Market mainstay, drawing customers from across the city with hearty steaks, spicy kielbasa and tangy cured ham.
But now, septuagenarian founder Morris Leider is contemplating closing the business, the latest sign of a slow shift in the retail makeup of the colourful enclave.
Editor’s Note: The Market is a National Historic Site. This building is not culturally significant in the conventional sense, but its use is such a strong part of Kensington traditions of unique independent businesses.
6. e-architect: Adaptive Re-use Montreal
Stewart Museum
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Montreal, January 27, 2012 - The Arsenal at the Fort on Île Sainte-Hélène, a warehouse for training ammunition and guns, built Between 1820 and WAS 1824 and WAS Converted Into a military museum in 1956. The Stewart Museum HAS large collection of over 30.000 objects and artifacts of New France and the European influence in North America.
http://www.e-architect.co.uk/montreal/stewart_museum.htm
7. BlogTO: Fire losses in Toronto
Chris Bateman
Top 10 buildings lost to fire in Toronto
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Looking back at the irreplaceable buildings we've lost in Toronto — Trinity College, Chorley Park, The Grand Opera House, to name a few — it's clear we only have ourselves to blame. A lack of conservation policy, a misguided attempt at improvement or simple neglect has sent many a worthy building the way of the wrecking ball.
Occasionally, though, disaster intervenes and buildings are taken from us against our will. As a sort of depressing companion to last year's top 10 buildings lost to demolition in Toronto, here's a look at the best buildings, in no particular order, snatched away by fire.
http://www.blogto.com/city/2012/01/top_10_buildings_lost_to_fire_in_toronto/
8. BlogTO: History of the Dufferin Gates Toronto
Chris Bateman
A brief history of the Dufferin Gate at the CNE grounds
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Over the last 133 years the Canadian National Exhibition has evolved from a travelling agricultural show into Canada's largest fair, the one and only "Ex." Once the main entrance to the exhibition grounds, the Dufferin Gate at the foot of Dufferin Street has welcomed excited visitors to a world of innovative, thrilling, ingenious and bizarre exhibits for over well over a century.
The original Dufferin Gate was built in 1895, seventeen years after the first permanent exhibition was held on the site, to serve as the principal route into the exhibition grounds. The area in front of the small wooden structure served as a natural meeting place for groups preparing the enter the Ex.
In the first years of the 20th century major renovations at the exhibition grounds added several new structures — including Manufacturers' Building in 1902, Art Gallery and Administration Building in 1905, Horticultural Building in 1907, Railways Building in 1908 and Government Building in 1911 - reflecting the increasing popularity of the annual show.
http://www.blogto.com/city/2012/01/a_brief_history_of_the_dufferin_gate_at_the_cne_grounds/
9. The Times: Wonder of ancient city reduced to rubble
Hannah Gardner
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| A worker mines the remains of a bulldozed courtyard house for bricks Jason Lee / Reuters |
Under cover of the Chinese new year holiday and armed only with hand tools, a demolition team moved quietly into a narrow Beijing alley and razed one of the capital’s few remaining ancient courtyards.
Only a pair of lonely red-lacquered gate columns and a corner room with sweeping green-tiled roofs remain of the courtyard house — or siheyuan — that was once home to the man known as the father of modern Chinese architecture and who fought to save old Beijing from Chairman Mao’s modernising zeal.
Liang Sicheng’s home at No 24 Bei Zong Bu Alley once marked the far eastern quarter of imperial Beijing but is now in the very heart of China’s shiny modern capital, where land sells for thousands of pounds a square metre.
The demolition of the courtyard, which sprawled over 400 square metres of Beijing in its heyday, began in 2009 until a campaign by architectural conservationists halted work and the site was recognised as a “cultural relic” by the municipal authorities.
But failure to win recognition at a higher level meant that the vestiges of the courtyard had little legal protection. Residents said that a demolition team armed with sledgehammers and spades reappeared on the site of the aristocratic mansion built during the Qing dynasty (1644-1911) just as the ten-day new year holiday began earlier this month.
http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/news/world/asia/article3303583.ece
10. Wall Street Journal: Recalling Art Deco Stylist Who Defined City
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| Andrew Hinderaker, WSJ - Hildreth Meière's Art Deco decorations can be found throughout New York, including Radio City Music Hall's façadeHer work appeared in churches, office buildings and cocktail lounges across the U.S. and even on ocean liners. |
The spectacular architectural decorations of Hildreth Meière live on in landmarks across the country—from the medallions on the façade of Radio City Music Hall to the floors and ceilings of the Nebraska State Capitol.
But even in New York, where she based her career and her Art Deco style became one of the city's signature visual motifs, Ms. Meière's name has faded into obscurity since her death in 1961.
Now, Ms. Meière's work is being celebrated with an exhibit opening Friday at the Museum of Biblical Art, called "Walls Speak: The Narrative Art of Hildreth Meière."
The show, which opened in St. Bonaventure, N.Y., in 2009 and went to the National Building Museum in Washington D.C., last year, displays the pioneering work of a woman who, beginning in the 1920s, completed more than 100 architectural commissions.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204652904577191172952535482.html?KEYWORDS=deCO
11. Urban Toronto: Rezoning application - 60 Mill Street
Gansevoort Hotel and Condos over Rack House at Distillery District
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http://urbantoronto.ca/database/projects/gansevoort-hotel-condos
Editor’s Note: You be the judge, but this seems a pretty crazy scheme to me. Many in Toronto are excited about Montreal firm Saucier and Perotte designing in Toronto. Interesting new building, but not much left of the historic Rack House. Perhaps we are so numbed to seeing such disjunctures in Toronto's urban fabric we are willing to tolerate it in a National Historic Site. It has definitely become the dominant urban form in T.O. There was a public meeting on this last week. Attendee Cory Lemos reports a general concern about the approach, varying from "wrong building, wrong place", issues about lack of parking (yawn) to suggestions for a follow up public meeting for suggestions about how to be more respectful to the original building. A declaration of interest here, my husband's firm DTAH did the planning for the Distillery District in the 90's. That planning called for infill scaled to the historic buildings, preserving views from the main square. That plan has been largely ignored since then, but it is not clear if there are any ground rules in place now.
12. Toronto Star: Real Jerk fights back
Stephanie Findlay
The Real Jerk plans to fight its eviction
The owners of the Real Jerk restaurant have hired a lawyer to fight their Jan. 31 eviction date.
Co-owner Ed Pottinger says lawyer Albert Formosa is planning to apply for an injunction to delay the eviction from their Queen and Broadview location.
“I’d prefer to sit back and relax and run my restaurant,” said 55-year-old Pottinger, “but if it means it may be taken away from me, you’ve got to get savvy quick and come out swinging.”
Since Pottinger received the eviction notice from Bill Mandelbaum, president of Buckingham Properties and owner of the property, on Dec. 30, he has orchestrated an aggressive campaign to stay in the location that has galvanized his patrons and the community.
http://www.thestar.com/news/article/1123395--real-jerk-plans-to-fight-eviction
Editor’s Note: Interesting situation.....commercial tenants have few rights once a lease expires
13. Toronto Blog: Mapping Toronto at Koffler Gallery
Derek Flack
Mapping the unmappable history of Toronto
"This river I step in is not the river I stand in." That line will likely ring familiar to most Toronto folk who've crossed the Queen Street Viaduct heading east across the Don River. Added to the structure by Eldon Garnet during a renovation effort in the mid-1990s, its thoroughly Heraclitean sentiment is a little reminder of the flux that surrounds us regardless of whatever efforts we might make to suppress the passage of time. It also happens to sum up one of the dominant ideas that Toronto artist Flavio Trevisan explores in his latest show, "Museum of the Represented City."
http://www.kofflerarts.org/Programs/Event-Detail/?recordid=172
http://www.blogto.com/arts/2012/01/mapping_the_unmappable_history_of_toronto/
14. Toronto Star: Faking Destruction of Heritage Buildings
Alexandra Posadzki
Booming house explosion in Clarington part of video shoot
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A half-dozen firefighters, a pumper truck, a fire chief, and an officer from the Durham police explosives unit were the scene of a massive house explosion in Clarington on Sunday.
No one was injured. In fact, despite the thundering boom and the cloud of thick, black smoke, the dilapidated two-storey house didn’t fall down, or even catch fire.
That’s because the special effects technicians that staged the blast used more explosives than fuel.
“It packed the same punch, just less of a fireball,” said James Sled, a special effects coordinator for NEXUS Canada.
The spectacle was rumoured to be part of an Our Lady Peace video shoot. High winds forced technicians to scale back the blast at the Holt Rd. home, but the movie stunt could still be seen from more than two-and-a-half kilometres away.
The abandoned house, which was scheduled for demolition Tuesday, was loaded with seven explosive devices on the main floor and five on the top floor, said Sled.
Editor’s Note: Not sure I see much fun in this video, but interesting nonetheless. House escapes the blast, but will be destroyed very soon. Can readers fill in on why this lovely building is going down?
15. Scotsman: New Entrance to Edinburgh's Waverly Station
Alastair Dalton
Waverley Steps: Walk this way for Edinburghs new rail gateway
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THE train may take the strain, but getting to the station has been a daunting struggle for generations of Edinburgh passengers.
The Waverley Steps, the notorious principal entrance to the capital’s railway hub, provided a 72-step nightmare – especially in the wind and rain.
However, weary travellers will heave a sigh of relief on Monday when they are able to glide up to Princes Street on escalators under a glass roof for the first time in 145 years.
The year-long construction is being completed on time, albeit five years after it should have originally been finished because of delays caused by objections to the scheme.
However, station owner Network Rail also warned that the new roof, which is supported by six tree-like pillars, would not remove the steps’ wind-tunnel effect completely.
Editor’s Note: I studied for a year in Edinburgh, one of the most interesting years of my life. The way the train integrates into the city is really quite wonderful. If you ever get the chance to visit, don't miss it, and do think of taking the train in and out of the city, it is one of the most spectacular arrivals in any city.
16. Guardian: Threat to 5Pointz
Karen McVeigh in New York
5Pointz: New Yorkers prepare to say goodbye to a slice of hip-hop history
A group of rappers in puffy jackets and hoodies are being filmed jumping around in unison against a brick canvas of eye-popping red and yellow street art: a giant, leering Jim Carrey as Firemaster Bill winks out at them.
A short distance away, two men admire a portrait of Jam Master Jay – the Run-DMC deejay who was murdered in his studio in 2002 – spray-painted on to the same giant warehouse of a building.
This is 5Pointz.
Even when closed for the winter, this rambling building in Queens – which covers almost an entire city block – attracts scores of graffiti artists, hip-hop stars and tourists. Guide books advise tourists to take the elevated 7 train, which loops around the outdoor exhibition space, bagging them two New York landmarks in one go. Three, if you count the neighbouring contemporary arts centre MoMA PS1.
But this sprawling public graffiti mecca is living on borrowed time. Last March, its owner, Jerry Wolkoff, announced plans to demolish the building to make way for high-rise condos. 5Pointz, which celebrates its 10th anniversary this year, is unlikely to continue far beyond 2013.
But Wolkoff's plan, say artists and community activists, will not only destroy an important hip-hop landmark, but the vibrant artistic community of Long Island City – one of the largest in New York – along with it.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/jan/17/5pointz-new-york-hip-hop-history
Editor’s Note: Here is where the heritage systems fail. We have a hard time dealing with places that even though they are important to people, memory, sense of place, culture of a people, they don't fit the prevailing focus on architectural landmarks. Ned Kaufman makes the case for change in his book Place, Race and Story, a must read on the subject.
17. Toronto Star: Odette House - Demolition of historic Toronto house has locals fuming
Donovan Vincent
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| Demolition commenced last week on Odette House, a 3-storey Victorian-era mansion at 81 Wellesley St. E. The surprise demolition of the 1800s-era building has upset nearby residents and businesses. |
The “hurried’’ demolition of a 1800s-era downtown house that a Toronto councillor asked to have designated a heritage building, has angry local residents and businesses wondering who would want it torn down.
“At least they could have saved the architectural details and donated them instead of throwing them in a dumpster,’’ says a frustrated Sonja Scharf, who operates a business near 81 Wellesley St. E., which was the site of Odette House, an old two-storey home with a coach house in the back.
The property, near Church St., used to be owned by the Toronto office of Wellspring, a charitable organization that provides support to people with cancer. Wellspring sold the building in September for $4.5 million because the organization lacked the funds to do upkeep on the building, needed more space, and because the house presented accessibility issues.
Wellspring has moved some of its programming to Women’s College Hospital, and is looking for a new home.
After the building was sold local city councillor Kristyn Wong-Tam wrote a letter to city staff in November asking that Odette House be designated a heritage property. But unbeknownst to her a demolition permit was issued Dec. 14. A demolition crew – Lions Demolition—went in last week Wednesday and began tearing down the rear of the property.
http://www.thestar.com/news/article/1121551--demolition-of-historic-toronto-house-has-locals-fuming
18. Atlantic Weekly: The Greenest Building is.....
Emily Badgerjan
Why the Most Environmental Building is the Building We've Already Built
Reusing an old building pretty much always has less of an impact on the environment than tearing it down, trashing the debris, clearing the site, crafting new materials and putting up a replacement from scratch. This makes some basic sense, even without looking at the numbers.
But what if the new building is super energy-efficient? How do the two alternatives compare over a lifetime, across generations of use?
“We often come up against this argument that, ‘Oh well, the existing building could never compete with the new building in terms of energy efficiency,’” says Patrice Frey, the director of sustainability for the National Trust for Historic Preservation. “We wanted to model that.”
Preservation Green Lab, the Trust's sustainability think tank, has published a new study today examining this that puts big numbers behind the finding that the greenest buildings aren’t in fact state-of-the-art ones; they’re the ones we already have.
19. New York Times: Changes at the National Arts Club
John Leland, forwarded by Penina Coopersmith
In a Club Fight, Power, Ego and Real Estate
THE president of the National Arts Club, Dianne Bernhard, sat on a loveseat the other day and spoke affectionately about the man she succeeded. Her lawyer sat opposite.
“I miss my friend,” she said, gazing across the club’s plush Victorian parlor toward Gramercy Park. “He hasn’t said anything to me still. He can’t look at me.”
The friend in question is O. Aldon James Jr., who ran the club from 1986 until a group of board members led by Ms. Bernhard ousted him in June. At a club hearing this week, the same group will push to remove Mr. James, along with his identical twin brother, John, and Steven Leitner, a longtime friend, as members of the club and evict them from their apartments in its adjoining residential building. Court papers filed for the board accuse Aldon James of using club checks and debit cards to make hundreds of thousands of dollars of purchases at flea markets and elsewhere for his own use, and of commandeering club apartments and rooms to stow the stuff, causing $1.5 million in lost rental income. They accuse both twins of harassing club members. Deciding the matter will be the club’s board of governors, including the same people bringing the charges.
Editor’s Note: I stayed at the National Arts Club once,reciprocal memberships with several other arts clubs are one benefits the perks of being a member of the Toronto Arts and Letters Club. If you ever get a chance to visit the National Arts Club take it. The interiors are gorgeous, including a Tiffany glass ceiling in the bar, and you may even pass Christopher Plummer on the grand staircase, he is a member.
20. Inside Toronto: North York Council
Lisa Queen, forwarded by Geoff Kettel
Heritage plea for Macphail home gets lukewarm response
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This house at the corner of Millwood Road and Donegall Drive was the home of Agnes Macphail when she lived in Leaside. Macphail was the first woman elected to Parliament in Canada when she was voted in as MP for Grey County in 1921. A bid was recently made to North York Community Council to have the home declared a heritage building.
East York history buffs hoping to have the former home of Agnes Macphail designated a heritage site are disappointed local councillors are indifferent to their campaign.
Lorna Krawchuk, chairperson of the Agnes Macphail Recognition Committee, Geoff Kettel, chairperson of the North York Community Preservation Panel and John Carter, vice-chairperson of the East York Foundation, were upset when councillors at the Jan. 10 meeting of North York Community Council simply received information about designating the home under the Ontario Heritage Act and listing it on Toronto's inventory of heritage properties rather than taking a positio
Editor’s Note: How important does a person have to be to warrant recognition....Every woman reading this should be on the phone to a Toronto Councillor. And it would warrant designation for the unusual architecture too.....and then people complain that the former suburban municipalities have fewer designations....Whose fault is that? Look no further than the local Councillors.
21. Urban Toronto: Rezoning application-71-95 King Street West
Forwarded by Heritage Toronto
King Street West properties in Danger?
http://urbantoronto.ca/forum/showthread.php/18379-71-95-King-East-%2821s%29
22. New York Times: Historic District in East Village? Maybe not
Suzanne DeChillo
Preservation Push in Bohemian Home Stirs Fear of Hardship
The East Village is arguably America’s bohemian capital, home to the major countercultural waves of the second half of the 20th century — beatniks like Allen Ginsberg, hippies like Abbie Hoffman and punk rockers like Joey
New York City is trying to honor the neighborhood’s legacy and preserve it, as well as the signposts of earlier generations that housed and entertained the immigrants, artists and political radicals who peopled the coarse-edged streets.
But the effort to declare the neighborhood’s heart a historic district is being fiercely challenged, and the protesters are not the lingering rebels who are the establishment-rattling descendants of Ginsberg and Hoffman. Instead, they are members of the establishment itself — in this case the neighborhood’s synagogues and churches.
Almost a dozen houses of worship, including the late-19th-century Cathedral of the Holy Virgin Protection and a crumbling century-old synagogue, argue that they are dependent on donations and that including them in a landmark district would make simple projects like repairing a window or fixing a roof more expensive and bureaucratically time-consuming.
Even worse, it would make their buildings and the valuable property on which they sit much less attractive since developers would be restricted in what they could do.
23. Toronto Star: Canada's Lighthouses in Jeopardy
Alyshah Hasham
Preservation advocates battle to save more than 500 surplus lighthouses
Since 1967, Covehead lighthouse has been a beacon of hope on the coast of Prince Edward Island.
A plaque on its side is dedicated to the hundreds of lives lost in a surprise 1851 gale, when waves wrecked nearly 100 boats along the then mostly unlit northern coast of the Island.
The worst disaster in the Island’s history, it led to the creation of more lighthouses — guiding countless mariners to safety.
But Covehead, directly north of Charlottetown and just down the road from Green Gables, is on what lighthouse preservation advocates call “The Doomsday List.” Along with more than 500 others, it is threatened with being sold off or torn down unless communities step in to save them.
“Losing a lighthouse is like losing part of what makes us who we are,” said Carol Livingstone, the 69-year-old president of the P.E.I. Lighthouse Preservation Society, fondly known as the “Lighthouse Lady.”
“Here in Canada our built history is so young compared to that found in other parts of the world,” she said. “Many of our buildings, especially here on P.E.I., are made of wood. If we don’t look after them now, they will not be here for future generations.”
Eighteen months ago, the government designated 541 lighthouses across the country as “surplus to operations,” and a May deadline looms for communities to bid to take them over so that Ottawa will no longer have to maintain them.
24. Toronto Star: Wreck from 1812 Uncovered
Kenneth Kidd
War of 1812 fighting vessel HMS General Hunter came to rest in Southampton, Ont.
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Wearing blue rubber gloves, Ken Cassavoy is carefully unfolding a threadbare flag on a boardroom table at the Bruce County Museum & Cultural Centre.
Though greatly faded, the red, white and blue of a British Red Ensign are clearly visible — a Union Jack in the top left-hand corner, surrounded by a sea of red.
This is the first time Cassavoy has unpacked the flag since he fetched it home on loan from Annapolis, Md., where for two centuries it has been a war trophy at the U.S. Naval Academy Museum.
As flags go, the ensign isn’t shy. It’s nearly 8 feet tall and is still almost 10 feet long, even after being shortened by about 4 feet when, at some point, the naval museum put a linen backing on it.
Its return for a public unveiling this week marks a kind of crowning moment, both for Cassavoy and the War of 1812 fighting vessel that had flown this flag before being captured by the Americans. Three years later, the ship was run ashore, barely a stone’s throw from Southampton’s main street.
Not that any of this was known back in 2001, when low water levels on Lake Huron and retreating ice conspired to expose the tips of what were clearly the ribs of a wooden ship.
“There are 50 wrecks in this area, so we had no idea what it was,” says Cassavoy, a marine archeologist. “We thought it was two or three other vessels for a while.”
25. Toronto Star: Lennox Rehab at Queen and Bathurst
Ashante Infantry
Furniture behemoth Crate & Barrel conquers the Big Bop spot
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The frames are hung, the lamps are lit and the beds are made, all set for CB2’s grand opening at Queen and Bathurst Sts. on Saturday.
It’s the first international location for American retailer Crate & Barrel’s hipper, budget-friendly sister store. And what better spot than the erstwhile home of the iconic Big Bop, the notorious music venue with the garish, peeling purple paint that ruled the corner for more than 20 years, until 2009, hosting jazz artists and raves, as well as at least one fatal shooting?
“The eclecticism of Queen Street West definitely just meshed perfectly with the brand,” said Crate & Barrel Canada publicist Cathy Miller. “It really is the kind of neighbourhood that CB2 likes to live in — it’s fun, funky, great food, great design.”
The company’s architects refurbished the exterior, restoring the brick and placing glass windows all around the ground floor façade. Inside, the small room settings are home to a patchwork of original fittings — tile and concrete flooring, wood staircase and iron and metal accents.
It’s another swanky ugrade for the strip anchored on the east end at Portland St. by the recently opened Loblaws and Winners stores. The overhaul, which began with Starbucks in 2008, will continue with a new Royal Bank branch in a few months.
26. Toronto Star: Heritage News this week in Toronto
Christopher Hume
Heritage is the way of the future
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Even before Crate and Barrel opened its new CB2 store on Saturday, the American furniture retailer was being hailed as a local hero. By restoring the heritage building at the corner of Bathurst and Queen, the chain did the city a huge favour and brought the reclamation of this ratty intersection one giant step closer.
Although long hidden behind a coat of putrid purple paint, the late 19th-century structure turns out to be a modest but utterly appealing rediscovery. Despite having lost its finest architectural feature — a high mansard roof dominated by a north-facing cupola — it retains a sense of balance and scale that stand it in good stead all these years later.
Now comes word that the magnificent 1905 Bank of Commerce at 197 Yonge just north of Queen will also be cleaned up and brought back to life. This remarkable building, a genuine temple of commerce, has sat empty for 25-odd years, an embarrassment to the city. The price of restoration is steep — a 60-storey condo tower directly behind the impressive neo-classical heap, but the developer will also give land on Victoria St. to Massey Hall, which has seen better days but remains Toronto’s finest concert venue.
On the other hand, Odette House, an exquisite late-1800s Second Empire residence at 81 Wellesley St. E. was quietly town down last week to make way for — what else? — a condo. Because the house wasn’t listed or designated as a heritage site, which it obviously was, the city issued a demolition permit without a second thought. Indeed, the trees around the Wellesley property had more protection than the building itself.
http://www.thestar.com/news/article/1119955--hume-heritage-is-the-way-of-the-future
Editor’s Note: We are still waiting to see what happens to 205 Yonge Street, sold by the City of Toronto, but still sitting empty.....
27. CNN.com: Plans to restore crumbling Colosseum cause rumblings in Rome
Laura Allsop
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| The Colosseum in Rome, pictured December 2010, when Diego Della Valle of luxury brand Tod's put in a bid to restore the site. |
London (CNN) -- It sits in the ancient heart of Rome and is an emblem of the city's imperial history as well as an icon of Italy.
But plans to restore Rome's nearly 2,000-year-old Colosseum are causing rumblings among heritage workers and restorers, compounded by reports in December that small amounts of powdery rock had fallen off the monument.
The current $33 million (25 million euro) restoration plans to restore the Flavian amphitheater, which once hosted spectacular shows and gruesome gladiatorial battles, are being sponsored by Diego della Valle, of luxury Italian brand Tod's, in exchange for advertising rights.
http://edition.cnn.com/2012/01/06/world/europe/rome-colosseum-restoration-plan-protests/index.html
28. Calgary Herald: A Calgary Landmark Languishes
Jeremy Klaszus
A Landmark Languishes
When Calgary lawyer and theatre impresario Jacob Bell (J.B.) Barron set about building the city’s tallest office tower in 1949, he deliberately put a movie theatre at its heart. The Uptown would require two storeys, with a spacious lobby containing a large staircase. The theatre would have a steep rake, allowing all patrons an unobstructed view. It would have comfortable seats. It would use the finest equipment. In short, the Uptown would be the best.
Such an establishment needed a worthy edifice. To this end, Barron’s architect, Jack Cawston, layered office space atop the theatre, designing an Art Deco-style tower unlike anything Calgary had seen. From the Uptown marquee, limestone stretched skyward. Metal-framed ribbon windows and yellow brick extended horizontally from this centre. The building stepped back on the eighth floor, and almost as an afterthought, Barron added an 11th and final floor: a sunny penthouse apartment, complete with rooftop garden. He would live up there.
The $1.25-million Barron Building, completed in 1951, towered over nearby offices on 8th Avenue S.W. Petroleum companies such as Socony Vacuum (which later became Mobil Oil), Sun Oil and Halliburton bought up leases, securing some of the most prestigious office space in Calgary, which then had a population of 127,057. At street level, the Uptown sparkled with shiny black granite.
That was then. Time has eroded Barron’s vision. Today the building is caught up in numerous lawsuits; recent buyers and sellers are fighting over who owes what on the property. The current owner, a numbered company associated with private landlord Strategic Group (the firms have the same address and Strategic CEO Riaz Mamdani is the numbered company’s president), shut off the water in the building in November, citing concerns over freezing pipes. The Uptown Stage and Screen subsequently shut its doors — temporarily, it hopes — and is suing its landlord, trying to get an injunction to restore utilities. In documents filed in court, the numbered company that operates as the Uptown argues that it can’t properly heat the theatre unless the landlord heats and insulates the rest of the building. The landlord counters that it’s necessary for the Uptown to install a new heating system before the building can be redeveloped.
http://www.calgaryherald.com/Landmark+Languishes/6028591/story.html
29. Blog TO: Toronto Can't Keep Up with Developers
Robyn Urback
A lesson in heritage neglect at Church & Wellesley
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It wasn't a heritage site, but the request for designation had been signed and submitted. "An enormous gap in communication," says Councillor Kristyn Wong-Tam, is what allowed the demolition of 81 Wellesley Street East to move forward — this only a few days after we were all so gushy about the restoration efforts at the former home of the Big Bop at Queen & Bathurst.
The building — buildings, actually — housed the Wellspring Cancer Support Centre for nearly 20 years. The three-storey Odette House and two-storey coach house in back were sold this past September after Wellspring announced it couldn't bear the cost of the renovations needed to maintain the site. Originally listed for $3.25 million, the 19th century properties (or perhaps more importantly, the land) ending up selling for a reported $4.5 million.
As is typically the case when such changes of ownership occur, people in the community became concerned about what might happen to the roughly 100-year-old structures. They alerted Wong-Tam, who then submitted a request to city staff to have the site reviewed for heritage designation. That request was sent in on November 2.
http://www.blogto.com/city/2012/01/a_lesson_in_heritage_neglect_at_church_wellesley/
Editor’s Note: Yet another reason why citizens need to be more engaged in identifying heritage property in Toronto. Chronic understaffing combined lack of funding for heritage property owners, and a process that demands perfection when good might do, guarantees that Heritage Preservation in Toronto can never keep up....let alone get ahead. A colleague sent me the real estate listing for this one. It stated as one of the features, no heritage designation.
30. Blog TO: Fantastic Photo Montages of Sections of Yonge Street, circa 1950
Chris Bateman
What Yonge Street looked like in the 1950s
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In the winter of 1950, as Yonge street was being torn up for Canada's first subway line, a photographer worked ahead of the moving construction site taking pictures of storefronts along the route. The pictures were presumably for surveying purposes but stitched together they provide a compelling snapshot of Yonge Street on a typical chilly day some 62 years ago.
Stored as jumbled images in the Spadina Records Centre and online in the Toronto Archives, the set was a puzzle to reassemble and, like a jigsaw, some pieces were missing while others don't seem to fit in anywhere at all.
The gaps between the pictures didn't always line up exactly as I would have hoped, but I've tried to preserve store signs and architecture over other things visible in the frame.
So let's take a tour starting on the west side of Yonge at Edward Street and head north to check out some vintage store fronts. Click the links above each image to see full size versions.
http://www.blogto.com/city/2012/01/what_yonge_street_looked_like_in_the_1950s/
31. CBC: New Historic Places in Canada
Ryan Wemiorz
Parks Canada designates new historic places
The federal government has named the city of Westmount, Que. one of Canada's "iconic neighbourhoods" for its architecture.
The tiny enclave west of downtown Montreal is one of four places Parks Canada has added to the list of historically significant sites in Canada.
Bragg Creek, Alta., is being noted for the founding of the first youth hostel in North America. The Cataraqui Cemetery in Kingston, Ont. — the final resting place of many prominent leaders such as Sir John A. MacDonald — is also receiving historic designation. Prince Edward Island, once known as Ile Saint-Jean, has been designated for the tragic deportation of Acadians in 1758.
"I am pleased that we are recognizing the special role these communities have played in Canada's history," Environment Minister Peter Kent said Tuesday in a media release.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/story/2012/01/17/westmount-historicplace.html?cmp=rss
32. Globe and Mail: Regency Rebuild
Dave LeBlanc
An Ontario Farmhouse Reno: Folly or Fabulous?
It has been a difficult rebirth.
In fact, Shannon Kyles almost christened her relocation and rebuild of an 1830s Regency cottage Shannons Folly. But, on the second last evening of 2011, as I watched ice pellets hit 180-year-old 4 x 8 sash windows in the grand, high-ceilinged living room heated by a roaring Rumford fireplace and a forced-air geothermal system, folly was not a word that came to mind.
As I wrote in April 2010, the home was known as The Grove when it sat in Ancaster, Ontario. While it had been well-loved by its then-owner, Helen Vanner, it was ready to crumble when Ms. Kyles, an architecture professor at Hamiltons Mohawk College, was called in to assess its health. Despite walls that were soaked through and flaking floor joists, Ms. Kyles ended up striking a deal with Ms. Vanner to take away everything elseincluding 45-foot long beams, original floorboards and those gorgeous windowsif she could do it within a few weeks.
33. Owen Sound Sun Times: Bandstand to be saved
Denis Langlois
Plans move ahead for bandstand
The Queen's Park bandstand in Owen Sound needs a new foundation, floorboards and some new joists, but a community group says most of the near century-old structure can be restored.
"From probably about an inch above the floor up can be saved. So the pillars, the roof, the railings, within reason we may need to replace a railing or two can be saved," said Francesca Dobbyn, spokeswoman for the Owen Sound Bandstand Project group.
Brian Breukelman, a structural engineer and group member, donated his time to evaluate the structure's condition earlier this month.
Dobbyn said the assessment was key to determining how to proceed with the project.
"We had to look at whether or not this was a complete rebuild or a renovation of it," she said.
At this point, based on the engineer's assessment, the group's plan is to lift the structure off of its supports, build a new foundation and floor, reattach the top section and address any cosmetic issues.
http://www.owensoundsuntimes.com/ArticleDisplay.aspx?e=3436974
34. Winnipeg Free Press: Bay a high-maintenance gift - Offer of downtown building to U of W must come with long-term plan
Dan Lett
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It's a tremendous opportunity but one that might prove difficult to accept. Sources have confirmed the Hudson's Bay Co. has offered to give its downtown flagship store on Portage Avenue to the University of Winnipeg for what is believed to be a nominal cost, perhaps as low as $1.
At first blush, it seems like a pretty cool deal. The U of W has had, for some years now, an interest in the HBC property. It is an iconic structure, both in terms of its architecture and the relationship the company has with the history of Winnipeg and Manitoba.
For the university, which has been aggressively expanding its footprint, the HBC property also represents an important building block in the establishment of a downtown campus proper. Two years ago, the new U.S.-based owners of HBC offered the U of W 21/2 floors of the six-storey building rent-free. The plan was to use this new space to establish a national centre for aboriginal study, arts and culture, a dream that university president Lloyd Axworthy has enunciated publicly for some time. The new offer apparently sprang out of those negotiations.
http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/breakingnews/bay-a-high-maintenance-gift-137265068.html
35. Guelph Mercury: The Loretto Convent gets a new life!
Susan Ratcliffe
Museum with a view
ACO Guelph Wellington is very excited at the impending opening of the new Guelph Civic Museum next month. In 2006, the Hamilton diocese applied for a demolition permit of the 1957 Loretto Convent on Catholic Hill. The nuns had long departed leaving the building empty and expensive to care for.
Guelph City Council of those years was NOT heritage friendly and it looked as if the building would be replaced by a memorial cairn, a pile of stones where once stood a proud piece of our heritage.
The community mobilized, ACO Guelph Wellington was formed, and the citizens of Guelph spoke up against the Grumpy Old Men. We saved the convent.
Now, as you can read in this article, a magnificent new museum in a stunning setting is set to open.
We are proud of ourselves.
http://www.guelphmercury.com/news/local/article/653215--museum-with-a-view
36. Toronto Star: Bay Street Bus Terminal
Kate Allen
Landmark bus depot loses its lustre
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| Historic photo of the interior |
The week before Christmas, the Toronto Coach Terminal celebrated its 80th birthday.
The building’s two dozen staff dropped into their conference room for a combined Christmas-and-birthday party, noshing on doughnuts and coffee from Kramden’s Cafe, the snack bar in the travellers’ lounge downstairs.
No one sent a birthday card.
“The whole thing went by with nothing, just a whimper,” says Gerry Brown, senior terminal manager.
It was a predictably modest celebration for the once-dignified, now-dismal Bay-Dundas landmark, the city’s main bus depot for passengers travelling on carriers such as Greyhound and Coach Canada.
Like so much transit infrastructure in the GTA, traffic at the terminal, which is owned by the TTC, has far outpaced its Depression-era facilities. When it was built in 1931, the population of Toronto was 631,200. Today, the terminal sees more than a million passengers a year.
“It’s crowded, it has outlived its size,” says Brown, who started his career at the terminal 40 years ago as a freight handler.
PHOTOS: Historical photos of the Toronto Coach Terminal
But a make-it-or-break-it moment awaits, in the form of secretive plans for a new Metrolinx-built GO bus terminal near Union Station.
A Metrolinx spokesperson confirmed to the Star this week that the agency is “contemplating” building a new bus terminal at 45 Bay St., currently a parking lot just east of the Air Canada Centre. Metrolinx is also looking at other sites adjacent to Union Station, the spokesperson added. The current GO bus terminal is south of Front St. between Yonge and Bay.
Greyhound and Coach Canada have been offered spots in any new GO terminal that is built, according to TTC documents and both bus companies.
“We, as well as Greyhound, have indicated that we want to participate,” says Don Carmichael, president of Coach Canada, adding that talk of a new bus terminal has been swirling for years.
“It is a possibility,” says Timothy Stokes, a spokesperson for Greyhound. “Nothing has been finalized, but we are interested in hearing more from Metrolinx and continuing these conversations with them.”
Says Brown: “If they move, this place will close.”
Greyhound and Coach, which operates Megabus, represent almost all of the passenger traffic in the current Toronto Coach Terminal. According to the terminal’s 2011 budget, platform rental and ticket commissions accounted for $4.9 million of the terminal’s $5.4 million yearly revenue.
Any move by the big carriers will render the entire terminal obsolete.
But if the bus companies decide to stay — and there are a lot of ifs, with Metrolinx only begrudgingly acknowledging that plans for a new GO terminal even exist — the bargaining chips are back at Bay and Dundas.
The Toronto Coach Terminal has pitched Metrolinx for its own new bus facility, a total overhaul of the current site that would combine the original building and a later Elizabeth St. annex. Ideally, the roomy new structure, which could fit more than double the current number of bays, would be complete by the Pan-American Games in 2015.
A Metrolinx spokesperson says the agency has not been presented with a formal proposal, but has been “made aware of the potential for renovating the Bay and Dundas terminal.”
There is, of course, a third option: that the bus companies stay but Metrolinx not approve the renovation, leaving everything exactly the way it is now.
For passengers like Camille Hollett, that’s not good news.
“The brown (decor), the tiles from 1980, the benches, the disgusting washrooms,” she said, listing complaints. But she added: “it is what it is — that’s why you pay $85 return to Montreal.”
Others had backhanded compliments.
“It’s alright to me. I just came out of jail — four years,” said Mani Perez, holding a clear plastic bag full of possessions and boarding a bus to Windsor on Friday.
“Better than prison” is probably not how Toronto Coach Terminal’s earliest customers would have described it.
On Dec. 18, 1931, the eve of the building’s ribbon-cutting ceremony, the Star reported that “this fine addition” to Toronto will “lead as the first exclusive structure in the Dominion to be designed and built especially and exclusively for the service of interurban motor coach travellers.” The next day, the acting premier of Ontario cut the ribbon with a pair of gold scissors.
The terminal was originally named after Gray Coach Lines, the TTC’s interurban bus carrier which was launched in 1927 to taxi passengers between southern Ontario communities. The TTC sold Gray Coach Lines in 1990 but kept the terminal, because renting platforms to other bus companies, which truck in passengers from all over North America, was profitable business.
Archival photographs of the building’s original interior show a grand lobby with soaring ceilings studded by art deco-inspired chandeliers. The airy lounge is flooded with light from stained-glass windows, including one centrepiece with the vermillion Gray Coach crest.
That window remains above the original central stairway, as do some of the chandeliers, but the rest of the interior is unrecognizable since a 1990 expansion meant to ease some of the strain on the terminal.
Today, passengers in the new lounge area sit below netting and spikes designed to thwart pigeons that infiltrated the building en masse several years ago. The birds snuck inside via automatic doors to the bus bays and promptly roosted in the ceiling, fouling the seats below. That’s all been fixed thanks to manually-operated doors, though the nets remain, just in case.
More troubling for many passengers is the roofed-in bus-boarding area. When the terminal was built, coaches were the size of short school buses, making boarding a prompt and orderly affair.
Today, the buses are easily three times as long and some are double-decker. Last week, when Greyhound needed five to depart for Ottawa at the same time, the lineup snaked around the bus bays and down Elizabeth St.
Besides being cold and uncomfortable, the long lineups often mean that incoming buses have to carefully nose through lines of passengers, a safety hazard that repeats itself at peak hours. Worse, those standing in line are forced to breathe in diesel fumes from the idling buses.
Ridership at the Toronto Coach Terminal is actually down from the 1970s and ’80s, when bus travel was at its peak. In fact, the terminal ceased generating a profit a couple years ago, until it introduced a new facility fee to ticket prices; Brown notes that, financially, the terminal “stands on its own two feet.”
But passenger traffic has still massively outgrown a facility designed six years after the city’s first set of traffic lights was installed.
Many decisions will hinge on Metrolinx’s proposed new GO bus terminal, details of which are scarce.
In 2007, 45 Bay St. was purchased by Ivanhoe Cambridge, the real estate subsidiary of Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec, a pension-fund managing giant based in Quebec City. A spokesperson for the company said that a 50-storey office tower is planned for the site, and confirmed that the company is talking with various outside parties, but would not divulge details.
“It’s still early in the game for us,” says François Gaboury, Ivanhoe Cambridge’s director of public affairs and communications.
http://www.thestar.com/news/article/1112225--landmark-bus-depot-loses-its-lustre#comments
37. Windsor Star: Save Building, MPP Urges
Julie Kotsis, Janet Cobban
Save Historic Building, MPP Urges
The saga of Kingsville's Shore House, continues
http://www.windsorstar.com/Save+historic+building+urges/5983093/story.html
38. Property Management: Cleveland Arcade Acquisition
forwarded by Robert Allsopp
Skyline International Acquires Historic Cleveland Mall and Hotel
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Toronto-based Skyline International Development Inc. has recently entered the U.S market in acquiring the oldest indoor shopping mall in America, the Cleveland Arcade in Cleveland, Ohio.
The landmark complex dates back to 1890 and was the first large-scale, indoor shopping mall in the U.S, as well as the ninth building to be listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
The property was acquired by the Toronto-based firm at auction for $7.7 million after previous owners invested roughly $70 million in acquiring and restoring the Arcade, but then defaulted on a mortgage.
Michael Sneyd, Skyline CEO, sees this acquisition as a major milestone for the company. He noted, “It’s the right time for Skyline to expand beyond Ontario and Canada. The Arcade is the kind of mixed-use, legacy property where Skyline has expertise. It was an exceptional deal. It’s a well-known hotel and Cleveland is a relatively nearby destination for us, and a city that’s definitely on the move.”
The Atrium of the Cleveland Arcade
Company Founder and President, Gil Blutrich, further noted, “Cleveland is already filled with outstanding architecture, internationally famous chefs, top attractions like the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and sporting facilities. With these new additions Celveland is poised to become a big regional draw for both meeting and leisure travelers.”
He also sees valuable parallels with the company’s ownership and asset management interest in Le Meridien King Edward Hotel in downtown Toronto, built in 1903, as well as the 115-year-old Deerhurst Resort in Muskoka, Ontario.
http://canadianpropertymanagement.ca/SkylineAcquiresHistoricClevelandArcade.aspx
Editor’s Note: Holy Dinah--anyone fancy a trip to Cleveland this year!
39. New York Times: Slow Permit Process in San Francisco creates Resistance to Historic Districts
forwarded by Adam Sobolak
An Unlikely Group Rebels Against Preservation Districts
Susan Beckstead stepped out of her sky-blue, three-story classical revival Victorian on Pierce Street — the one with bay windows, dentil and egg-and-dart molding, a modillion cornice and balustrade-lined flat roof — to show a visitor around her 120-year-old neighborhood bordering Duboce Park in central San Francisco.
A nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization providing local coverage of the San Francisco Bay Area for The New York Times. To join the conversation about this article, go to baycitizen.org.
Across the street her neighbor was finishing a $1 million remodeling of his 1898 taupe-colored, three-and-a-half-story Queen Anne Victorian, a process that so far has taken a year because of delays in getting permits. At the opposite end of Ms. Beckstead’s block, workers toiled on the roof of a pink, 1905 Queen Anne triplex, where restoration is still under way a year after the initial permit application, owing in part to a dispute with neighbors over the appropriateness of a proposed street-facing dormer window.
Ms. Beckstead said she has her own plans to replace her windows and fix up her garage, but she is loath to start, in part because of the difficulty her neighbors have had getting permits. Her biggest fear, she said, is that the city will make it even harder to obtain permits by declaring her neighborhood a historical landmark district, which would empower Planning Department officials to reject any changes that they decide might violate a building’s historical integrity.
40. Toronto Star: Pickering Airport Lands
Liam Casey, forwarded by K Chandler
The GTA
A giant swath of land northeast of Toronto has been dying for decades. The land itself is pristine, but is littered with ruins. Mary Delaney has watched Brougham, a village in northern Pickering, slowly die since 1980.
“There’s not much of a community left,” she said. “And there is nothing new around here. Nothing. Look around, everything is either old or really old.”
That’s because the area near Brougham has been forgotten in many ways. Dozens of homes are boarded up, the coffee shop is barren and schools have been shuttered.
About five houses burn down every year — all are suspicious, according to Gord Ferguson, Pickering’s deputy fire chief. Teenagers party in other abandoned homes and someone recently built a dungeon in a property that has been boarded up since 2005. No one was killed or tortured there, but the police have no one in custody.
The land’s owner has let the properties slip into dereliction. The owner, the federal government, has had plans to build an international airport on the site for 40 years. There were grand plans that involved a “super highway” and high speed transit, in rail or hovercraft form.
In July, Transport Canada released a report that said the GTA needs an airport in about 15 years and this area is the spot for it. Demolition of abandoned homes has picked up since then.
Delaney pointed out more than two dozen homes slated for demolition as she gave the Star a three-hour tour of the land.
“These are beautiful homes that the government just let rot,” Delaney said. “Some of these old brick homes are more than 150 years old.”
41. The Star.com: Threat to Ormscliffe
Leslie Scrivener
At Norris Crescent: Ormscliffe Estate
Hidden behind the apartments of the Amedeo Garden Court are remnants of the age of elegance: Ormscliffe, a rare Edwardian-era property that has survived modern development.
"It is the last great Mimico Beach estate," says Michael Harrison, who grew up nearby and argues the site should be preserved intact.
The estate, or parts of it, is now threatened with demolition as the owners redevelop the property that fronts Lake Ontario. The plan is not finalized but will include rental apartments and condos, some mid-rise but some up to 45 storeys.
In the 1950s, Amedeo Longo, the current owners' grandfather, built six brick low-rise apartments on the site, preserving Ormscliffe and other old buildings among the newer ones.
The main house, a Queen Anne-style beauty built in 1909 for metal manufacturer Albert Benjamin Ormsby, is at the heart of the estate. Occupied by tenants, it's now worn down and trailing with vines.
Dino and Larry Longo, the brothers who run Longo Development Corp., say they've had to get their head around the heritage aspects of the property. But they've hired a heritage architect and recognize that the main house and garden are of significance. The other five buildings, less so.
http://thestar.blogs.com/queenstreetcar/2011/12/at-norris-crescent-ormscliffe.html
42. Brantnews.com: The future of Greenwich-Mohawk
Sean Allen
Preliminary estimates in a draft report on the condition of buildings on Brantford's Greenwich-Mohawk brownfield site pegs the cost of saving four of the structures at almost $4 million.
The estimates are contained in a structural engineering report by Picco Engineering, which was completed in conjunction with a heritage impact assessment by Taylor Hazell Architects. Cole Engineering oversaw the project.
All three firms will appear before a joint meeting of the city’s heritage and brownfields committees on Thursday to present their findings.
The heritage assessment recommends the city preserve and maintain parts of four buildings that are significant to the industrial heritage of Brantford and all of Canada.
“The historic importance of the Greenwich-Mohawk brownfield site is beyond dispute,” project manager John Chadwick wrote in the report summary.
The heritage assessment notes that Brantford was a key manufacturing location as early as 1848 and that the combined Greenwich-Mohawk site was one of the most important in the country.
In considering the current condition and historic value of each building, the consultant team recommends preserving all or part of four buildings on the 52-acre property.
It notes that the Cockshutt Plow Co. offices and time keeper’s office located at 66 Mohawk St. should be kept and repurposed. The report says only the front portion of the larger office building should be kept, since the rear portion of the building is a warehouse that was an addition to the building.
Both buildings have already been designated by the city under the Ontario Heritage Act.
http://www.brantnews.com/index.cfm?page=news§ion=read&articleId=12082
Editor’s Note:
The Heritage Impact Assessment - Greenwich Mohawk report by Taylor Hazell Architects Ltd. completed on the structures present at the Greenwich Mohawk brownfield site in Brantford, Ont., along with the other 3 reports can be seen at, http://www.scribd.com/collections/3417177/Greenwich-Mohawk-documents
43. Atlantic Weekly: Learning to Celebrate Brutalism
Llewellyn Hinkes-Jones
The Case for Saving Ugly Buildings
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The Brutalist AT&T Long Lines building in New York is a looming grey monolith, a giant stone scabbard thrust into the heart of lower Manhattan. In Washington, D.C., the Third Church of Christ, Scientist is an almost windowless octagon resembling a military bunker more than a religious chapel. The University of Toronto's Robarts Library resembles an oppressive, stone Transformer with little access to sunlight. L’Eglise Ste-Bernadette du Banlay in Nevers, France, is an oblique, oversized, confusing stone bubble seat. Then there are the hundreds of worn, crumbling public housing projects, lifeless abandoned tombs more reminiscent of J.G. Ballard-style prison complexes than anything someone would willingly live in.
These behemoth structures of Béton brut, most built in the 1960s and ‘70s, are slowly crumbling from wear and disrepair, ignored by communities that no longer want the burden of upkeep of a giant, lifeless rock. But even horrendously ugly and soulless abominations are part of our architectural heritage and need to be preserved for future generations.
Even horrendously ugly and soulless abominations are part of our architectural heritage
Technically, many of them have to be. Their place in history and uniqueness as architectural oddities warrant their preservation from a legal perspective. They satisfy Criteria C for the National Register as having "distinctive design/construction techniques." They are the pinnacle of High Modernism: the architectural trend that started in the early 20th century with minimalism, Bauhaus, van Der Rohe, on down to Le Corbusier. Defined by sleek lines, little embellishment, and grandiose structure, High Modernism captured the attention of the architectural world at a time when it was eager to embrace something new.
http://www.theatlanticcities.com/design/2012/01/case-saving-ugly-buildings/913/
Editor’s Note: It is hard to see Robarts Library in Toronto used as the poster child for ugly buildings..... I have always enjoyed this building. Interesting argument, based in heritage theory, but misses the environmental argument...concrete structures contain a very high level of embodied energy because of the energy costs involved in producing cement, steel, as well as extracting and transporting the aggregate.
44. New York Times: Demolition: UNESCO Designation
Steven Erlanger, forwarded by Stephen Otto
What Does Unesco Recognition Mean, Exactly?
WORLD HERITAGE is big business, bringing hordes of tourists to poor countries that can use the jobs and the cash. It can also overwhelm the very sites it is designed to protect with all the less-savory aspects of mass travel, from chain hotels and restaurants to the impact of thousands of sport-shoed feet treading on fragile ground.
Multimedia
But World Heritage can also be an odd business, giving recognition to traditions (like premodern tribal dances and giant French family meals) that might have little aesthetic value to any group except the one that practices it.
Whatever the merits, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (Unesco) has embraced the concept. In fact, Unesco loves heritage so much that it has created two treaties to enshrine it.
The first, the World Heritage Convention, dating from 1972, builds on the notion of the United States national parks system, which was set up to defend a wild landscape before it disappeared. The second, the Convention for the Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage, was introduced in 2003 to defend traditions, not places, and is more controversial. Some 188 nations have ratified the first convention. To date, there are 725 cultural, 183 natural and 28 properties combining the two, in 153 countries. The World Heritage list represents a catalog of marvels. Italy, needless to say, includes the Leaning Tower of Pisa (the whole Piazza del Duomo, to be fair) and Venice and its lagoon. Jordan has Petra and Wadi Rum. France even lists the banks of the Seine.
Russia has the Kremlin, Red Square and Lake Baikal. The United States lists Yellowstone, the Grand Canyon and the Everglades (cited as endangered). Independence Hall is on the list, but not the White House. Funny, that.
Luxembourg pretty much lists itself; Afghanistan includes the sad remains of the great Buddhas of Bamiyan, blown up by the Taliban.
http://travel.nytimes.com/2012/01/08/travel/whats-up-with-all-the-unesco-sites.html?ref=todayspaper
45. De Havilland Hangar, Downsview
Government decisions are made based on citizen push back. So far all officials have deferred to others....the most recent was Mayor Ford characterizing the abandonment of this highly significant landmark of Canadian aviation history as a private matter between landlord and tenant.
Nonetheless ten thousand signatures have been collected on the petition, and there is a place on the website to contact politicians and decision makers.
Right now it feels a bit like the debate at the beginning of the Wychwood Park/Barns discussion. Some wanted a classic trees and grass"park" Some wanted to use the buildings as a bigger idea of arts and culture as part of a "park". It took several years for the tide to turn, but now no one would wish away the renovated Wychwood barns. Downsview is a pretty big park, this building represents a fantastic opportunity.
Even though it is, as Lloyd Alter points out, a tough nut to crack....lets make sure there is lots of push back to the sluggards at all levels of government who don't think this matters much.
46. Goderich Signal Star: Rebuilding the Downtown
Heritage District Streetscape views unveiled
As downtown rebuilding continues, Heritage Goderich is giving a few sneak peaks as to what it's all going to look like. Heritage, with permission from the architects, is printing a few streetscape views of some of the buildings being erected.
"We wanted to share them with the town because there are exciting things happeneing when we rebuild," said Heritage Chair Kevin Morrison. "With Coffee Culture the exciting thing is there will be eight new apartments. The Avis building, same thing. Four residential units above. Prior to the tornado you didn't have any."
The new Caldwell Banker building will become one of Goderich's most unique, he said, as it is the only one being constructed with Max brick - about one-third larger than regular residential brick.
Included are the Coffee Culture building at 56/58 Courthouse Square, 56-62 West Street - the future home of Avis Architects, 138 Courthouse Square, the former Laurentian Bank and the new dentist office going in at the corner of North and the Square.
http://www.goderichsignalstar.com/ArticleDisplay.aspx?e=3423385
Editor’s Note: There are some pics of proposed replacement buildings.
47. Globe and Mail: Review Unbuilt Toronto II
John Bentley Mays
A Toronto that might have been
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If things had worked out as planned, Torontonians might now be wrapping up the year-long celebration of our first centenary in the business of tunnelling subways. It was back in 1911, after all, that the city invited bids on the construction of its very first underground railway, slated to run up Bay and Yonge Streets from Front Street to St. Clair Avenue.
If high-rise engineer John Maryon had seen his dream come true, many Torontonians might be working or living in one of the tallest buildings on earth. Mr. Maryon’s slender modernist skyscraper, announced with much fanfare in 1971 for a site near the corner of College Street and Yonge Street, would have topped out at 140 storeys, a world record for height at the time.
A few days after the launch, however, the visionary project was scotched by the Eaton family, owners of the site, who said they hadn’t heard a thing about it.
Had the subway or the tower been realized, we would today have a city different from the one that actually came to pass. This difference, illustrated by these and numerous other examples, is the theme of Mark Osbaldeston’s fine new portfolio Unbuilt Toronto 2: More of the City That Might Have Been (Dundurn, $26.99).
Editor’s Note: A great read, and if you get a chance to hear Mark lecture on his book, don't miss it. And we may get a chance to see books on Unbuilt other cities as Dundurn searches for authors to explore the unbuilt history of other Canadian cities.
48. Globe and Mail: Rod Robbie Dead
James Adams
SkyDome and Expo '67 architect Rod Robbie dead
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The architect for two of Canada’s most famous buildings – the SkyDome in Toronto and the Canadian Government Pavilion at Expo ’67 in Montreal – has died at 83 in Toronto.
Roderick “Rod” G. Robbie died Wednesday morning in St. Michael’s Hospital where he’d been admitted Christmas Day for treatment to alleviate the restriction of blood flow to his small intestine. Until shortly before this hospitalization, Mr. Robbie visited the offices of Robbie Young + Wright/IBI Group Architects daily.
Toronto city councillor Adam Vaughan, a long-time family friend, described the architect, an Officer of the Order of Canada since 2003, as “one of the most extraordinary craftspeople that’s ever graced the industry in this country . . . When my dad [Colin, now deceased, a former Toronto councillor and architecture partner with Mr. Robbie] talked about Rod Robbie, he talked about the best person he’d ever practised architecture with, bar none . . . The guy was just brilliant, as close to a genius as anyone, I think, in Toronto, the way he could transform ideas onto paper and from paper into reality.”
A native of England where he obtained degrees in architecture and town planning, Mr. Robbie immigrated to Canada in 1956, eventually becoming an associate at the highly influential modernist firm of Peter Dickinson Associates, Ottawa. In 1966, he moved to Toronto as partner in Ashworth, Robbie, Vaughan & Williams Architects and Town Planners.
Editor’s Note: I worked with Rod Robbie while I was at Young and Wright Architects. He was a real joy to be around, always curious, enthusiastic, energetic and pretty funny too. I saw him on the street only a few weeks ago, no time to chat but did have time to yell across the street that he was looking terrific. His death must have been sudden and unexpected. Rest in peace Rod.
49. Globe and Mail: Lack of Protection for Canada's Federal Heritage
Peter Rakobowchuk
Canada's historic buildings at risk without legal protection
The century-old Pantages theatre, with its ornate interior and scenic canvas paintings, was torn down last April and plans are to replace it with a high-rise condo development.
The Empress, an elegant red-brick building built in 1888, was slated for demolition; after a local heritage group stepped in to try saving it, an arsonist burned it down.
A frustrated spokesperson for the national heritage foundation says it's time the federal government stepped in with legislation to at least protect designated historical buildings in Canada.
Carolyn Quinn points out that federal buildings — especially those on land belonging to Crown corporations — have no real safeguards against the wrecker's ball.
“Canada is really the only G8 country without laws to protect historic places owned by its national government,” said Ms. Quinn, whose foundation is privately run.
50. Toronto Star: Balancing Commercial and Residential in Toronto Developments
Jayme Poisson
A bolder and more balanced Toronto
A new planning research report that recommends, among other things, pedestrian-only streets, is painting a vision for the city that could help its future growth.
Commissioned by Etobicoke-Lakeshore Councillor Peter Milczyn, an architect by profession, the Balanced and Bolder report came in for discussion in a city committee Thursday and will influence this year’s review of Toronto’s Official Plan.
A key issue in the report, which takes stock of what other countries are doing, is finding a better balance of mixed-use development, which combines residential and commercial space. Some good Toronto examples include the new North Toronto Collegiate high school, which sits below a 24-storey condo tower, and the Shangri-La hotel, which when finished will also house condos.
Toronto is doing “not nearly enough” of such development, Milczyn said. “We’re doing phenomenally well in attracting residential development, but extremely poorly in attracting new office and commercial development.”
London, England, for example, requires 25 per cent commercial use in certain projects.
Another recommendation is to put in place planning rules designed to promote more intense development along new transit lines, such as the upcoming Eglinton-Scarborough Crosstown LRT line. Hong Kong, Madrid and Vancouver offer some models.
The report also suggests improved incentives for heritage preservation and turning “dead” urban alleyways into welcoming, beautiful corridors.
http://www.thestar.com/news/cityhallpolitics/article/1111377--a-bolder-and-more-balanced-toronto
51. Toronto Star: 1812-2012
Dean Beeby
Feds hire consultant to inject war into Canada Day bash on the Hill
OTTAWA— The Harper government has hired a consultant to inject a little war into this year's Canada Day bash on Parliament Hill.
A Toronto theatre expert has been asked to find ways to insert a War of 1812 commemoration into the July 1st festivities that typically include pop music, dance and pyrotechnics.
"I do big-ass special events all the time, so they asked me to do that," artistic producer Paul Shaw said in an interview. "It's sort of tricky to do a War of 1812 theme when you've got so many modern things in and around it."
The Conservative government, which has been promoting Canada's military culture and heritage, has earmarked money and resources throughout the year to commemorate the bicentennial of the outbreak of War of 1812 in North America.
The hostilities led to a stalemate almost three years later between the United States and Britain's budding settlements in Canada, and some historians consider the war a pivotal moment in Canadian nationhood, though it is little known outside academia.
The Canadian Heritage Department normally injects patriotic themes into the Canada Day noontime show on Parliament Hill, giving the National Capital Commission a free hand to organize the evening show with singers and fireworks in a party atmosphere.
But a recently posted document indicates that the war theme will appear in both shows.
"The events on Parliament Hill also present a key opportunity of the federal government to foster enthusiasm and excitement around other significant events," says a tender document from the commission.
"In 2012, the Government of Canada is commemorating the War of 1812 and this theme must be incorporated in both the Noon and Evening Shows."
52. Toronto Star: Good Main Street Business Killed by Landlord
Kate Allen
The Real Jerk restaurant set to close after 28 years
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Over the past 28 years, their kitchen has filled the bellies of loyal hordes, Island-born and not.
Wesley Snipes was a regular. Jack Layton came on bike for the jerk pork. Michael Jackson, Serena Williams, and LL Cool J all ordered takeout.
But at the end of the month, The Real Jerk, a Caribbean-food institution since 1984, will close its doors — hopefully temporarily, staff say.
Ed and Lily Pottinger, the husband-and-wife team who own the Real Jerk, were given a month’s notice to vacate after their longtime landlords sold the building to a company called Buckingham Properties in late December.
“The way this came down really put a sour taste in our mouth,” Ed Pottinger said in a phone interview from Jamaica, where he was visiting family when he learned the news.
“It came as a shock,” says Natalie Williams, who has worked at the restaurant for 18 years.
Pottinger said they intend to reopen in a new location and will continue to run a catering service until they find the right spot.
The three storefronts east of The Real Jerk were also purchased by companies run by Bill Mandelbaum, president of Buckingham Properties, according to property records. Mandelbaum was not available for comment on Monday.
53. Toronto Star: Tax Break Killing Toronto Main Streets??
Catherine Porter
A tax break that
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I counted nine empty storefronts walking down one small block of my local commercial strip Monday afternoon.
Then I turned around and counted the storefronts that contained actual stores, deliberating before the jewellery shop showcasing one bare mannequin neck after another. They numbered 18, so one-third of the strip was empty.
Their dirty windows were blocked with drab sheets or cardboard. The glass in places was broken. Their tattered awnings were folded in unevenly, like broken pigeon wings.
Many didn’t even muster a “for rent sign.”
The block I was walking was on the east end of the Danforth, a few subway stops from the bustle of Greektown. But, it could well be a slice from Gerrard Street E., Queen Street, or Bloor St. W. Our city is full of ghost towns.
You could blame it on the lousy economy — the retail business is cutthroat in the best of times. But some of these spaces have been empty since I moved into the area seven years ago.
In that time, the value of my house has gone up $200,000 and a farmers’ market has started in the local park, crowded each week with people like me who are anxious to shop locally. As proof, a beautiful natural food store and toyshop opened recently and both are making good business, the owners tell me.
You’d assume the greedy hands of Adam Smith were rubbing together and local landlords were gleefully signing out leases left, right and centre.
http://www.thestar.com/news/article/1113159--porter-a-tax-break-that-s-bad-for-business
54. Owen Sound Sun Times: Meaford looks at Heritage District
Bill Henry
Meaford takes first step to protect heritage buildings
Just days after one of Meaford's most recognizable old brick buildings was demolished, council has taken the first steps to preserve built heritage properties.
In a 5-2 vote Monday, council set aside $25,000 in the 2012 budget to begin the two-year process leading to a defined heritage conservation district.
Such a designation has been part of Meaford's community improvement plan for several years, but was not in this year's budget until Monday's vote.
It's unclear if the now-demolished former factory building known most recently as The Harbour Moose might have been protected under such a plan, said Coun. Barb Clumpus, whose motion it was to fast track the heritage conservation district application, which was to begin in 2013. But she said the upset within the community at the sudden demolition of the old factory building at the harbour late last week highlights the need for a heritage protection plan.
Workers were still at the site Monday, where the former mill, then fitness centre, then restaurant, among other uses, was pile of red rubble on the waterfont.
"It certainly brings this to the forefront," Clumpus said before the council meeting. "It reinforces the fact that we do have many, many buildings in our community with heritage architecture."
Councillors Lynda Stephens and Deborah Young voted against the resolution, while Clumpus, Mike Poetker, James McIntosh, Deputy-mayor Harley Greenfield and Mayor Francis Richardson also supported starting the approval process this year.
Poetker reminded council the Harbour Moose was the second heritage building in Meaford to fall within a month, including a house on Nelson Street he said has been described as architecturally "important."
He said after the meeting losing those buildings, especially the former factory building on the waterfront, influenced Monday's council decision.
"Everybody is disgusted, appalled and upset. Do we have any say in the matter when it's private and in tough shape? It's down and it's down," Poetker said.
McIntosh also urged council to approve the motion.
"We need to move this forward. If we just sit here for another year, we're going to lose more buildings," he said.
Objections from Young and Stephens to the heritage protection process starting this year focused on finances.
Stephens said it was already proposed for 2013 as part of the community improvement plan. Moving it up means cutting something else this year, she said.
"Where is the money coming from?" Stephens asked.
She also said building owners would be caught off guard by the decision, which under terms of the conservation district would eventually restrict what they can do with their buildings.
"We haven't even looked at what we would be requiring of people," Stephens said. "Some people have the money to do this, others do not."
She urged council to instead spend 2012 learning more about the designation and its impact on the business community.
Clumpus said initiating the process would lead to all those answers. She also suggested taking the money from $50,000 not used in 2011 for harbour development.
Young objected to the focus on urban Meaford and said any heritage protection should also include significant buildings throughout the former Sydenham and St. Vincent townships.
"Once again, it's Meaford first," Young said. "It has to be done for the whole municipality because the whole municipality pays taxes at the same rate."
She also worried that related regulations could mean unexpected expenses if building owners appeal.
Planning director Rob Armstrong said the heritage conservation district program deals with designating specific areas, while protecting isolated individual properties would be a different program.
Armstrong also confirmed if Meaford ends up at an OMB hearing, legal expenses could be significant. And he told council the $25,000 would start the process and pay a portion of consulting fees which could total as much as $100,000 over two or three years.
Greenfield said he supported the project, but would rather it encompass the whole municipality, citing Leith Church as a building to protect, along with Bothwell Manor.
He also said if $25,000 isn't enough to get started this year, he would happily amend the motion to $40,000 or more to get going on it.
Clumpus said after the meeting the approval just starts a process which will answer all the questions and give the community a chance to decide what's important to protect. She said the historic downtown buildings are "the main concern" along with stately older homes, but the process could designate the entire downtown or specific areas or buildings. She said some protection and enhancement of the built heritage which attracts visitors and new residents is vital and has long been something the business improvement area representatives have asked about.
"There's not many small Ontario communities around now that still have all of the original architecture and this has driven a lot of folks to really be concerned about preserving it," Clumpus said. She pointed to the former Meaford Opera House, now Meaford Hall, and the multi-million dollar renovation and restoration project led largely by community volunteers.
"This heritage architecture and ambience contributes to a pride of place in our municipality that speaks to solid values of conservation and heritage preservation," she said. "There's just a real commitment in our community to preserve what we've got and to value it."
http://www.owensoundsuntimes.com/ArticleDisplay.aspx?e=3430077
55. Windsor Star, Shore House faces wrecking ball
Janet Cobban
Shore House Faces Wrecking Ball
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Last fall Kingsville ON Town Council voted against the advice of its own Municipal Heritage Committee, and removed the Shore House from the Heritage Inventory.
The local historical society calls the Shore House "one of the five most architecurally significant buildings ever constructed in Kingsville" and the property has been nominated to Heritage Canada's endangered buildings list.
The new owner of the Shore House applied for a demolition permit. Community appeals for delay were not supported by Council, so the permit will be issued today, ten business days after the application was filed.
Editor's Note:
This house is gorgeous. The community has written to Michael Chan to ask for provincial intervention, ask your MPP to press Michael Chan.
See photos of the property and more information on Facebook Save the Shore House
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Save-the-Shore-House/186446368102859
http://www.windsorstar.com/technology/...Kingsville+house.../story.html
56. Winnipeg: St. Boniface's historic fire hall set to become youth hostel
The Lance (Canstar) - Arielle Godbout
Fire hall on track to becoming youth hostel
Entreprises Riel has been given the go-ahead by the city to explore the idea of transforming a historical St. Boniface fire hall into a youth hostel.
The city has asked Entreprises Riel an economic development agency for Winnipegs French districts to perform a feasibility study before it agrees to sell the building, said executive director Norm Gousseau.
The fire hall built in 1907 is located at 212 Dumoulin Rd., directly behind the old city hall building on Provencher Boulevard.
The city invited proposals for the development of the fire hall through an expression of interest in 2010.
Gousseau said a youth hostel would be a boon for the area.
He said the hostel would hopefully attract youth studying at the Canadian Museum for Human Rights, which hopes to draw as many as 20,000 young people each year with student programming.
Having some of those students stay in the area would provide a boost to St. Bonifaces economy, he said, as they would eat at local restaurants and shop at area stores.
We see this as a tool to increase the economic impact of the area," Gousseau said, adding Entreprises Riel would also like to see a hotel built on Provencher to serve museum visitors.
Oai Truong, chair of the Provencher BIZ, said the hostel is an exciting prospect for area businesses.
"Having close to 100 students staying in the area, eating at our restaurants and using the services available will make a positive contribution to the surrounding businesses," Truong said.
"More permanent residents living in the area and more tourists staying at hostels or boutique hotels on or near Provencher Blvd. are the key to the growth and vitality of Winnipeg's historic French Quarter."
While cautioning the plan is in its preliminary stages, Gousseau said the hostel would have as many as 100 beds.
Since it would likely be too expensive to bring the fire hall itself up code to allow people to sleep there, Gousseau said Entreprises Riel is looking at demolishing a 1960s addition to the building, and constructing new sleeping quarters.
He added the agency is working with partners including the Economic Development Council for Manitoba Bilingual Municipalities (CDEM), and French youth groups Le 100 noms and Conseil jeunesse provincial to explore creating not only a hostel, but a youth hub.
Gousseau said Entreprises Riel would ideally like to see the hostel operated as a co-operative, rather than a private enterprise.
"We think the ownership should remain in the community," he said.
The buildings heritage is also important, he said, adding a collection of fire hall memorabilia is currently stored in the building.
Gousseau said hed like to see some of those artifacts including a fire engine from 1920 become a permanent display at the hostel that would be open to the public, but again cautioned all plans are preliminary.
Gousseau said he believes the best way to preserve heritage buildings is to reuse them.
"It would be a shame to see (the fire hall) demolished, or underutilized."
57. David Wencer Blog - Two Solitudes in Heritage Preservation....Youth and Age
David Wencer
Talkin' 'Bout My Generation
I’ve been active with the Toronto heritage community for about 4 years now and, when I’m at a meeting or attending a heritage-related event, I expect to be the youngest person in the room by about 15 to 20 years. I’m 29.
As such, I am frequently asked by those around me what it is that got me into history, as if I am some sort of aberration. They then ask me if I have any tips on how to draw more young people into history and heritage.
The thing is, I know that young Torontonians are into this city’s history. Several colleges and universities offer programs in heritage-related fields. In recent years, Toronto culture websites such as blogTO and Torontoist, generally popular with the younger crowd, have run far more historical interest pieces than the traditional news and television outlets. A look at the comments sections of these articles will reveal excitement over the content, and laments for the loss of long-gone buildings. More personally, I have met many young Toronto history and heritage fans through Twitter, people who are interested in old stories, old buildings, and just old Toronto in general.
58. The Atlantic Cities: Preserving Churches
Kim A O'Donnell
The Trouble With Church Preservation
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When it comes to the holy trinity of art, architecture, and religion, few buildings are more significant than the 1898 Methodist Church in Norwalk, Connecticut. Anchoring a main street, the Romanesque-style church features a stained-glass rose window designed by Louis Comfort Tiffany himself. The founders of American Methodism preached there. Given its prominence and pedigree, should the church’s governing body be allowed to sell the building for development, as it is currently trying to do?
The U.S. Constitution, according to many observers, says yes, but historic preservationists beg to differ. Who decides?
In cities nationwide, churches are struggling to maintain the physical plant. Congregations are dwindling, budgets are tight and buildings are becoming aging white elephants. Many denominations, perhaps most notably the Catholic Church, are closing and selling off their buildings to stay afloat.
But these old churches are beloved landmarks, whether people worship there or not. Churches are key to a city’s architectural character and its social and religious history, preservationists say. Often, these advocates will stamp a capital L on these landmarks through official historic designation. At the state or local level, such designations can limit what happens to church buildings by preventing significant alterations or demolition.
http://www.theatlanticcities.com/arts-and-lifestyle/2011/11/trouble-with-church-preservation/583/
59. Toronto Star: Elton John near Brighton?
Carola Vyhnak
Is the Rocketman planning a lakefront landing?
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Pop superstar Elton John is building a fabulous mansion on Lake Ontario, just outside Brighton, 90 minutes east of Toronto.
Nestled in the iconic rolling hills of Northumberland County, the estate will be a quiet country retreat for his family when he’s not on tour. And who knows, maybe he’ll perform in the town square’s gazebo, given his preference lately for smaller venues.
Or so the story goes.
Brighton’s abuzz with rumours that the legendary British singer/songwriter is adding a local piece of property to his collection.
“How can it be anyone else, it’s so humongous,” reasons Bonnie Gruen, who drives by the muted olive-hued stucco and stone building on a weekly basis. “Most people agree it’s definitely true.”
The story has made the rounds of lawyer, dentist, courier, financial adviser, post office and even city council, say residents.
“We heard it from our neighbour who heard it from his mother who heard it at the hairdresser’s,” says Frances Linton-Schell, who runs Loughbreeze Bay B&B, about 10 minutes west of Brighton. “We have no accurate information at all. But it’s so massive and with the satellite surveillance signs, it looks like someone very important.”
The town of 10,000 is the latest stop on a grapevine that has wound its way around the province. Rumour has it that Sir Elton and his Toronto-born partner, David Furnish, have bought or built homes in Caledon, Stouffville, Cobourg, Hamilton and Port Stanley. They’re even said to be proud owners of a private island in Prince Edward County.
News of the Rocketman’s lakefront landing really took off last summer when Belleville radio personality Justin Anderson repeated what he’d heard from three different sources.
“Word has it,” he says, “that (John’s) husband wants to be closer to his family in Cobourg. His yacht has been there many times.”
The Brighton estate has all the trappings of a celebrity fortress, says the afternoon show host on MIX 97. “It’s got a guardhouse, a big-ass fence, the whole deal.”
One believer tells of a neighbour being approached about a fence with a note signed by the music man himself. But Laurence Stevenson, who lives across the road, nixes that notion.
No offence, says the electric violinist, “but I’d rather have Sting or Phil Collins or Peter Gabriel as a neighbour.”
Stevenson complains the drive-bys never stop. “Four or five every day,” he says. “Everyone wants to know whose castle that is. They say, ‘Is that Elton John’s place?’ ”
Definitely not, declares the office manager for builder Jeffrey Wallans, insisting the house belongs to a local family.
“People have been talking since they put the first shovel in the ground,” she sighs. “They say, ‘You guys must be excited.’ But it’s actually Brighton, England, where he’s building a house.”
“Connections,” she confides, have said he’s buying a waterfront condo in Cobourg.
Gruen suggests a smaller town like Brighton is more likely to leave John alone. She’s half-expecting to bump into the Crocodile Rocker stocking up on homemade scones at Lola’s, the popular coffee shop.
“He seems to be adopting Canada,” she says. “If you put the pieces together, it won’t be long before he’s appearing at the gazebo in Brighton.”
http://www.thestar.com/news/article/1088202--is-the-rocketman-planning-a-lakefront-landing
60. Petition to Save Canadian Aviation and Space Museum
To support efforts to save the Museum, and its building for future generations go to:
61. New York Times: Steve Jobs and Apple Buildings
James B. Stewart
A Genius of the Storefront, Too
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WHEN the architect Peter Bohlin arrived for his first meeting with Steve Jobs, he wore a tie. “Steve laughed, and I never wore a tie again,” Mr. Bohlin recalled.
Related
“The best clients, to my mind, don’t say that whatever you do is fine,” Mr. Bohlin said last week, a few days after Mr. Jobs’s death. “They’re intertwined in the process. When I look back, it’s hard to remember who had what thought when. That’s the best, most satisfying work, whether a large building or a house.”
Just as Mr. Jobs transformed the notion of the personal computer and the cellphone, he left an indelible stamp on architecture, especially the retail kind, traditionally a backwater of the profession.
“No one in commercial architecture has ever channeled a product into architecture for a client the way Peter did for Apple,” said James Timberlake, a founding partner of KieranTimberlake, who is now designing the new American embassy in London. “Most commercial architecture is under-detailed, under-edited and under-budgeted. It’s gross and ugly, and most of it is an eyesore on the American landscape.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/16/business/steve-jobs-a-genius-of-store-design-too.html?_r=1
Editor’s Note: Amen from an committed Apple user
62. WBEZ: Chicago Doors Open
Lynette Kalsnes
Architecture tour offers sneak peek into hidden Chicago
Architecturally savvy people — or those of us who are just a little nosey — can tour sites that are usually off-limits to the public this Saturday and Sunday.
Open House Chicago lets visitors get into more than 130 secret nooks and crannies throughout the city. Organizers tout that participants will be able to stand onstage at Millennium Park’s Pritzker Pavilion, or explore the rooftop garden at Lake Point Tower, a high-rise that looms just off of Lake Shore Drive.
“There's no standard experience here,” said Bastiaan Bouma, the managing director of Open House Chicago. “Every one is unique. Every site is unique.”
Bouma says the tours go far beyond Chicago’s downtown by showcasing changing demographics and points of interest in its far-flung neighborhoods.
In the North Lawndale area, people can go into the former Sears, Roebuck & Co. tower where WLS-AM (World’s Largest Store) used to broadcast. They also can walk by the old Sears Administration Building. In its heyday, it sent out about 35,000 mail-orders a day.
http://www.wbez.org/story/architecture-tour-offers-sneak-peak-hidden-chicago-93165
63. CBC: Goderich Tornado Damage
Goderich to receive $5M in disaster relief Premier McGuinty vows to help rebuild 'Canada's Prettiest Town'
Premier Dalton McGuinty has announced that the Ontario government will allocate $5 million to a disaster relief fund to help Goderich, Ont., after a powerful tornado ripped through the town's centre on Sunday.
McGuinty said the funds will be put toward cleanup, recovery, and to help homeowners and businesses in cases where their own insurance won't cover the damages.
"You're not alone," McGuinty said in a Monday afternoon news conference, adding that 13 million Ontario residents are behind them. "We are with you and want you to take heart. We want you to know that we are in your corner."
Environment Canada has confirmed that the tornado that ripped through Goderich, Ont., on Sunday afternoon — causing massive damage and killing a man, as well as injuring dozens — was an F3.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/story/2011/08/22/goderich-tornado.html
Editor’s Note: ACO Council will be meeting in Goderich on September 24 as a show of support for local efforts to restore lost heritage.
64. Doug Brown's Eden Smith book Online!
Catherine Nasmith
Hurrah
Doug Brown's terrific Eden Smith book is now on line in pdf format.
65. Urban Toronto: Architects to Sign their Buildings in Toronto
Isidoros Kyrlan, forwarded by Stephen Otto
The City of Toronto To Better Acknowledge Architects June 28, 2011 10:44 am | by ... | Comments
Toronto's Planning and Growth Management Committee has adopted a small but significant recommendation that will acknowledge architects contributions to our city by placing their name near the front entrance of new buildings. Councillor Peter Milczyn, himself a trained architect, put forth the proposal. The recommendation reads:
“The Chief Planner and Executive Director of City Planning require as a standard condition of Site Plan Approval for any new building of 1,000 square metres or greater in Gross Floor Area, that recognition of the Architect of Record, or primary Design Architect of the building be affixed or inscribed on the building at a location near the main entry or prominent façade of the structure. That the lettering for this recognition cover an area of at least 0.2m by 0.3m, or 0.06 square metres.”
http://urbantoronto.ca/news/2011/06/city-toronto-better-acknowledge-architects
Editor’s Note: very interesting idea....it is nice to recognize the work of architects in this way
66. Ontario Capital Precinct Working Group
Catherine Nasmith
A citizen's group formed to celebrate and argue for protection for Ontario's Capital Precinct
Take a look at this website, more to come.
As the election heats up, ask your candidates for MPP what they intend to do to protect the heritage views of the Legislative Assembly building in Toronto.
If they don't know how to answer suggest they take a look at this site. And email them the link:
67. Windsor Star: Ambassador Bridge Expansion and Sandwich HCD
Dave Battagello
Bylaw foes engaged in 'fantasy'
Opponents of a bylaw that prevents demolition of abandoned homes near the Ambassador Bridge are engaged in "innuendo, speculation and fantasy," a Superior Court civil trial was told Thursday.
"I heard 2½ days of submission and all I heard were strange conspiracy theories totally unsupported by the facts," said lawyer Christopher Williams, who is representing the City of Windsor. "If you are making serious allegations against a municipal corporation you have to do more than just connect the dots."
Editor’s Note: Nice to see the Windsor Council fighting to protect an HCD in Sandwich, but if you look at the side articles you will also see that a citizens group has formed to argue for demolition. Messy, painful, heritage preservation is not for the faint of heart.
68. Toronto Star: Exhibit Will it be on Display from University Avenue
Unobstructed views on display at Exhibit
Developers: Bazis International Inc., Plazacorp, Metropia Urban Landscapes
Size: 32 storeys
Architect Rosario Varacalli didn’t need to look very far for inspiration when he was designing Exhibit Residences, a 32-storey condo soon to be built directly across from the Royal Ontario Museum.
Daniel Libeskind’s Crystal, the striking 2007 addition to the ROM, was an obvious muse.
Varacalli, director of design and construction for Exhibit builder Bazis International, felt that the north side of Bloor St. should not merely serve as a “background of architecture” for Libeskind’s iconic work. (The Exhibit site is currently home to a McDonald’s and several other businesses).
Instead, Varacalli wanted his tower to have what he describes as an “understated dialogue” with the ROM adjunct.
Editor’s Note: This building is very close to the corner of Bloor and Avenue Road. City staff have tested the views from College and University, but we are not sure whether it is visible from further south. Hope not
