Riverside Square Community Consultation - Meeting #1

By Ward 30 Bikes member,
Michael Holloway


Riverside Square is a 4 acre neighbourhood development west of Broadview south of Queen St E down to Eastern Avenue.

Streetcar.ca | Welcome to Riverside Square | http://streetcar.ca/welcome-riverside-square/

I attended tonight's meeting representing Ward 30 Bikes.

Streetcar's VP of Development Jason Garland introduced a 20 minute power point presentation by Streetcar's in-house planner Aaron Knight.

Streetcar Developments have submitted to City Planning an application for a two-phased development. Phase I is at 77-79 East Don Roadway; phase II (2-3 years later) concerns properties at 661-677 Queen St. East.

There is another public meeting on this proposal later this month:

Monday March 23, 2015
6:30 - 8:30pm
Ralph Thornton Centre
765 Queen St. East


Ward 30 Bikes position on neighbourhood development revolves around the idea of creating people places - a counter-point to the city building of the past century which focused on car transportation in a pivotal role.

New planning sees people as the point around which city planning revolves. To that, I asked how the Riverside Square proposal might be better connected to the immediate natural resource - the Don Valley - and the Lake Front and Harbour - just to the south. I also mentioned connecting the new neighbourhood to the neighbourhoods across the river and to the existing Lower Don Trail in the Don Valley.

Of coarse this is also about a great increase in population density (if they get approval for several high rise buildings they are proposing) - which will result in more traffic volume on our already congested (and finite) road grid. The solution is not more space on the roads for more or faster, cars - it is - counter-intuitively - less space for inefficient people movers (like cars) and more room on our roadways for mass transit, walking and bicycling transportation modes.

Along with high density comes the need to create spiritually rich public realm; that means lots of green space and active transportation connections to the green spaces that are nearby.

Joined the Stakeholder Group.


Ward 30 Bikes - October 20, 2014 | Does Streetcar's Riverside Square proposal make the Cycling Connection across the DVP? | http://ward30bikes.blogspot.ca/2014/10/does-streetcars-riverside-square.html





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