There are some
mighty changes coming to a forlorn corner of downtown Toronto --
right near the mouth of the Don River. Roads are being moved, and
neighbourhoods will start popping up, so I wanted to take a snapshot
of this forgotten zone before it starts a new life.
If you’ve been
looking for a high end automobile, or ever taken a train into the
city from the east, you probably know this old industrial zone
better than most Torontonians. The majority pass blithely above the
area, navigating from the Don Valley Parkway onto the Gardiner
Expressway. Few drivers are going to look down onto a dingy flood
plain that abuts a degraded, channelized river.
Yet Toronto is
reclaiming its past. The former Gooderham and Worts distillery at
the foot of Parliament Street has become a snazzy hang-out, and
developers and city politicians are looking eastward. If you haven’t
been down to the arty Distillery District, know it’s impossible to
pick up a bottle of hard liquor there, but you can snag a six-pack
of micro-brewed “coffee porter”. It has to be tried.
Now attention
is turning to the ex-industrial zones east of Cherry Street and
south of Lake Shore Boulevard. After botching an earlier attempt to
clean up the soil, the authorities are again ready to create more
city at the end of Front Street. Few motorists know that Front
continued right to the edge of the Don River, as through traffic is
shifted north and sent over the water via the Eastern Avenue bypass.
Across the riverbanks from the end of Front Street is the converted
factory that now houses BMW’s mega-showrooom -- where shiny
full-size cars are displayed like an adult’s MatchBox carrying case.
Front and
adjoining streets have now been temporarily shut, and savvy drivers
can no longer make that big swing south from Lower Bayview Avenue
toward lower downtown. The industrial buildings have been leveled,
and this quadrant is preparing to metamorphose.
Only a few
short blocks north of here is an unassuming little street -- hardly
even a streetlet. Apparently no one has even bothered to name it,
but when it closes forever a lot of big-city drivers may get all
emotional. Most downtown commuters on busy Bayview Avenue never see
this tiny connector, as they abandon the major north-south
thoroughfare further north. As it nears Front Street, “Lower Bayview”
squeezes into a tight-two-lane corridor between the Don River and a
steep hillside.
Incurious
drivers miss out on a messy warren of underpasses and flood-prone
riverbanks, and have never discovered how our nameless little
conduit squirts you up onto King or Queen Streets, ready to go east
or west. Right now this wee street seems more crucial than ever, as
the city has temporarily blocked Lower Bayview and all traffic must
use it.
Because the Don
River is very likely to breach its corrugated banks, a major
flood-prevention berm will be built to protect the new
neighbourhoods. It’s not like there won’t be alternative routes, but
it looks like progress will spell the demise of the street that
never had a signpost.
On the bright
side of road construction, I should point out that a longstanding
nuisance has been removed from Lake Shore Boulevard, just a few
blocks away. Near Jarvis, you may have noticed raised strips of
pavement clear across the westbound lanes. More than a year ago I
had failed to properly communicate with the city on their
whereabouts. However they were starting to feel like bona fide speed
humps, and after another phone call I’m glad to report that works
crews flattened them in late March.
See crappy
pavement in the City of Toronto? Call 416-599-9090, punch in “#100”
and leave the details.
Ed Drass
edrass@nationalpost.com