At the October 6, 2015 Toronto and East York Community Council meeting, neighbouring Councillor for Ward 19, Mike Layton and I moved a motion to request a review of development on Bloor Street West, between Christie Street and Lansdowne Avenue. 

The ten blocks of Bloor Street West, between Christie Street and Lansdowne Avenue, are unique in the City of Toronto due to the fact that much of the original built form still remains.  Many of these two and three storey buildings were designed and built at the turn of the 20^th century, with further development taking place between the 1920s and 1930s.

The purpose of this City Planning review is to focus on the unique character of the properties along Bloor Street West, between Christie Street and Lansdowne Avenue, and how to effectively plan for new development that will complement the existing built form and heritage attributes. 

The request for this review comes at a time when development pressure is making its way to Bloor Street West, between Christie Street and Lansdowne Avenue.

Toronto and East York Community Council passed our motion and has recommended that:

1.  City Council request the Director, Community Planning, Toronto and East York District to conduct a review of development on Bloor Street West between Lansdowne Avenue and Christie Street, including an inventory of current applications and current development pressure in the area, and to work with the Director, Transportation Services to review potential streetscape improvements on Bloor Street West in the context of current and future development proposals.

2.  City Council request the Director, Community Planning, Toronto and East York District and the Director, Urban Design, City Planning to assess the applicable policy framework in the area and consider developing additional urban design and built form guidelines, including an assessment of heritage resources, to be used to inform the review of current and future development proposals, and to develop an understanding of what defines the character of the street.

3.  City Council request the Director, Community Planning, Toronto and East York District to report to Toronto and East York Community Council in the second quarter of 2016 on the status of this work.

I look forward to this item being discussed and hopefully passed at the next City Council meeting. 

Our new Community Office recently opened at 1240 Bloor Street West. It will continue to be open every Wednesday, Thursday and Friday from 10am-6pm. I wanted to take this opportunity to share the good news and outline how this space will be used to serve Ward 18 residents going forward.

It was a picture perfect spring day on May 2nd for the Official Opening celebration. Residents came from the surrounding Bloordale area and across Ward 18 for this event; which featured a BBQ, live musical performances, face painting and plenty of good neighbourly conversation. We temporarily closed Margueretta Street from Bloor to the laneway to accommodate hundreds of residents who joined the fun. Activities also took place in Susan Tibaldi Parkette as well as on Brock Street, where Bloordale Play Day festivities were being held in conjunction with our office opening. There was something for everyone and everyone was welcome to take part.

Everyone is also welcome to take part in the new Community Office. It is a place to meet me and my staff with regard to local issues and a space to serve our many community groups. It represents my continued and enhanced commitment to our community by providing a consistent presence in the heart of our neighbourhood. It promotes a strong connection to the issues that matter most the Ward 18 residents and quick responses to local concerns. The door is open for you to walk in and share your ideas for local projects and ways we can make Ward 18 an even better place to live, work and play.

In addition to these local hours, you can also contact my City Hall office every week day from 8:30am to 4:30pm. By working together in our community and at City Hall, there is no limit to what Ward 18 can accomplish.

I always welcome your feedback and ideas, so please do not hesitate to contact me by coming for a visit when you're in the neighbourhood. You can also call 416-392-7012 or email [email protected] any time.

I look forward to seeing you in the community; whether at my office, a community meeting, or at the many local events taking place this spring and summer.

In the meantime, you can view photos from the grand opening event on my facebook page.

Information Release: March 25, 2015

Save the date for the BIG on Bloor Festival, August 22/23, 2015 when car-free Bloor Street from Dufferin to Lansdowne welcomes up to 80,000 people to Bloordale and celebrates arts, culture, community & small business. Share our unique community and city-building festival featuring hundreds of events, activities and exhibitions including:

BAAF: BIG Alternative Art Festival: The Art of Participation!

BIG Awards: Community Appreciation!

BIG Market Place: More than 200 arts, crafts, and information tables!

Card-Yard: Recycled materials animated by architecture, art and poetry! 

Celebrate Here: Main Stage performance!

JOY / JOYEL: Programs of play and pleasure!

PlayFair: Games for children and adults! 

Savour Bloor: In the stores, restaurants, patios, and the Bloordale Food Court!

After Hours: Local Bloordale restaurants and bars! 

Save the Date: Saturday, August 22, Sunday, August 23

Get involved: Apply to rent a table, volunteer, perform on stage, be a sponsor www.bigonbloorfestival.com

BIG Festival Planning Meetings, open to all:

First Wednesday of the month, 7:00 pm, New Horizons,

1140 Bloor Street West

More information please contact:
Dougal Bichan, Festival Director, [email protected] 416.645.0295

Jason Campbell, BIG Chair, [email protected]

Kevin Putnum, Director of Publicity, [email protected]

Facebook facebook.com/BigOnBloorFestival
Twitter #bigonbloorfest
Web www.bigonbloorfestival.com

Hello Bloordale Residents,

Do you have a toaster, bicycle, vinyl records or an old computer taking up valuable space in your garage or basement? Are you keen on meeting your neighbours, but can’t find the time? Then why not get your stuff together and participate in the 2nd Annual Bloordale Community Garage Sale!

Back by popular demand, once again Bloordale residents are invited to join in and make this year the biggest community garage sale this city has ever witnessed!

Pick one or more of the following dates. For each date selected, please indicate whether it’s your 1st, 2nd or 3rd choice. When done, you can email your list to [email protected]

Please ensure that you submit your list by Wednesday April 8^th!!! The winning date and rain day will be announced Friday, April 10.

June 13, rain date June 20th        (  )1st   (  )2nd   (  )3^rd

June 20, rain date June 27th        (  )1st   (  )2nd   (  )3^rd

June 27, rain date July 4th            (  )1st   (  )2nd   (  )3^rd

Your street address: ________________________________________

Your email address: _____________________ ______ (if you want to receive updates!)

ATTN: Volunteers are desperately needed. We need help with posters before the event and signage on the day of. If you can lend a hand, please indicate on your submission. And if you’re internet savvy, feel free to make liberal use of Twitter, Instagram, Blogs, Craigslist and Kijiji.

2015 Bloordale Laneway Crawl

The Laneway Crawl will temporarily repurpose three Bloordale laneways (marked on the map) as space for recreation, gathering and community. The event will transform our laneways for the afternoon and turn them into pedestrian space, where local residents, businesses and organizations can lead free activities for neighbours and visitors - things like an outdoor art gallery with the Toronto School of Art, a fashion show with the Bloor-Gladstone Library, a barbecue, a sidewalk chalk zone and more.

The Laneway Crawl will take place on June 13, 20, or 27, at the same time as the Bloordale Community Improvement Association's Community Garage Sale. Before that, The Laneway Project will lead an ideas charette and brainstorming session as part of the May Day celebration on Brock Avenue on May 2. Come out and let us know what activities you'd like to see at the Laneway Crawl!

This weekend, on May 2nd, 3rd & 4th, Torontonians will hit the sidewalk for the 8th annual Jane's Walk festival. There are three walks taking place in Ward 18 and I wanted to promote this great local initiative and encourage you to take part!

1. Bloordale: A Work in Progress

May 4, 2014 @ 2PM with walk leaders Shalana Haslip, Rakesh Tiwari

Meeting Place: Dufferin and Bloor

2. The Cornucopia on Dundas West: Geologic, Ethnic & Personal Experience

May 4th, 2014 @ 3PN with walk leader: Alec Keefer

Meeting Place: St. Luke's Elementary School

3. Anatomy of a Street Festival - Year 2

May 4th @ 11AM with walk leader Helder Ramos

Meeting Place: Lakeview & Dundas St.West

By James Armstrong  Global News

TORONTO – Small business owners within Bloordale Village are leading the charge towards gentrification while still holding on to the “gritty” aura of the neighbourhood.

And they don’t all like the word gentrification either.

“I think a neighbourhood thrives when you have lots of different kinds of businesses that appeal to lots of different kinds of people owned independently by a family or individuals,” Liza Lukashevsky, owner of Nuthouse said. “[If a] large business that’s owned by a corporation were to come into this neighbourhood, there would be backlash and people would be very upset.”

Lukashevsky owns Nuthouse, a health food store on Bloor Street West, a block east of Lansdowne Avenue. The store, like the name suggests, sells a variety of nuts and the storefront is crowned with a giant walnut.  It’s easy to find.

She opened the store three years ago with her husband. They have lived in the neighbourhood for 11 years and were frustrated they couldn’t find a local health food store to buy food for their kids.

“We kept waiting and waiting for someone to open a shop that we would shop in and it just never happened,” she said. “We just decided we couldn’t wait anymore and we would open a store that we would want to shop in.”

She said her family criticized her for not doing any market research. Her retort? She was the market. She and her husband wanted the store to serve the community it’s in.

“It’s been very busy since then,” she said.

Like Queen Street West, Regent Park and Leslieville before it, Bloordale Village is in the early stages of gentrification. It still has a “scrappy” attitude and several stores with boarded up windows, but residents say the neighbourhood has changed dramatically.

“Safety has increased tremendously, ten years ago, my god, Bloor and Lansdowne was not a good neighbourhood to visit,” area-councillor Ana Bailao said. “Having that safety, people walking on the street and families going down to Bloor and Lansdowne to have a brunch and at night to have a coffee, it’s great.”

But property values are increasing. Data collected by Global News shows the average price of a home in the neighbourhood jumped 37.5 per cent from 2005 to 2012. The average price in 2005? $436,441. In 2012? $600,136.

Councillor Bailao says skyrocketing property values are a “challenge.”

“Property values are increasing all over the city, we know how our real estate is doing in Toronto and this neighbourhood is no different,” she said. “Actually property values have been going up substantially and that’s definitely something that needs to be addressed. How do we keep affordability in this place?”

Bailao pointed to co-op housing and rooming houses in the area that need to be welcome and not “pushed out” during gentrification.

And it’s the relatively cheap rents that have brought some business owners to the area.

“I was looking between either Parkdale or Bloordale,” Amanda Somerville said.

“It’s still reasonable as far as rents go and it’s cool to be a part of the gentrification in a sense that you’re bringing a good thing to a neighbourhood that has so much potential and there’s a need for it.”

Somerville owns the Through Being Cool Vegan Baking Company – a store serving prepared foods and baked goods. But everything, as the name suggests, is vegan.

As for gentrification? She’s ok with it. She sees it as a “natural thing” that happens in a big city but wants a “vibrant” community post-gentrification and one that’s free from the spectre of large corporations.

“I think for now Bloordale is safe from Starbucks. There’s too many local independent owned stores here for that to happen yet.”

As for the corporate coffee-shop moving to the neighbourhood, Lukashevsky suspects one of the other businesses may be keeping it at bay.

“We have a strip club across the street and I think we all agree in this neighbourhood that as long as that strip club is there, a Starbucks probably won’t come in.”

- With files from Mark McAllister 

This story originally posted http://globalnews.ca/news/1088102/bloordale-residents-want-independent-stores-to-lead-gentrification/

Jack Frost has landed in Toronto, and with the cold weather our construction crews will be packing up shortly for the season, to return in the early spring 2014 to finish the job to Montrose Avenue.

Crews will be working hard over the next week to complete the road resurfacing west of Bartlett Avenue, and tidy up the completed work zone. Street trees and pit covers will be installed in spring 2014. Until then, the contractor will back-fill all tree pits for sidewalk safety.

Post-and-ring bike locks have been returned, with two additional bike racks to be installed in the near future.

Sidewalk paver installation in progress

New decorative pavers are being laid at intersection corners. You may have also noticed the new detectable warning plates, also known as tactile pavers. These bumpy plates signal to pedestrians with reduced vision that they are approaching an intersection. Expect to see these kinds of plates installed across the city with each new sidewalk reconstruction project.

Bloordale Blooms: stainless steel flowers

Steel flower art installed in sidewalk

Thanks to the Dyan Marie with the Bloordale BIA, you will now see a number of stainless steel flowers inlaid in the cement sidewalk. Crews are still in the process of cleaning off construction residue, but we are already hearing praise and appreciation from people passing by. More flowers will be installed next year as the additional decorative treatments are applied at some connecting street intersections.

Visit the Bloordale Facebook page for more great photos.

Thank you all for your patience and cooperation. You may see some small crews working on a few tasks during any warm spells we might get in early 2014, but otherwise we won't be pulling up any more sidewalk or roadway until the spring.

Sidewalk reconstruction and base asphalt is complete on the south side of Bloor Street from Lansdowne to Havelock. Traffic has now been switched from the north side to the south side of Bloor Street.

The contractor is now working on removing and reconstructing the north sidewalk from Lansdowne and working east towards Havelock. The anticipated completion of sidewalk reconstruction, base and top course asphalt from Lansdowne to west of Havelock is December 21, weather permitting. 

Sidewalk reconstruction and base asphalt is complete on the south side of Bloor Street from Lansdowne to Havelock. Traffic was switched from the north side to the south side of Bloor Street on Tuesday, November 19th. Contractor is now working on removing and reconstructing the north sidewalk from Lansdowne and working east towards Havelock. Anticipated completion of sidewalk reconstruction, base and top course asphalt from Lansdowne to west of Havelock is December 21st, weather permitting.

Starting this week, construction crews will begin putting out pylons and restricting traffic in order to prepare for construction on Bloor Street.

Construction will generally follow a loop, starting on the south side at Havelock Street, working westward towards Lansdowne Avenue. Then switching to the north side, from Lansdowne Avenue eastward all the way to Montrose Avenue. And finally back to the south side from Montrose Avenue westward to Havelock Street.

To speed up construction, the contractor will have two crews working 6 days a week.  The crews will focus on two blocks at a time.  This will minimize disruption to the businesses.  This method of construction has been successful on other projects within the City and due to the time of year allows the contractor to complete full sections of roadway (both sides) prior to proceeding on.  It should take an average of 5-6 days per block, weather permitting.