# Will Toronto go bust?



## royal rose1 (Oct 4, 2009)

I ask this because of an article I just read, I'll post it in the link below. It's 2 months old but it makes some interesting points. Such as how Toronto has 148 high rises being built, 105 of which are residential. Compare that to 59 high rises being built in NYC, and it seems Toronto is heading for a rough ride. What do you think? 

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-...ork-in-market-for-condominiums-mortgages.html


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## Xusein (Sep 27, 2005)

There is no subprime in Canada, so I don't think it'll end as bad but once interest rates rise, there will likely be a deflation. But since the Canadians base their interest rates on what goes on in the US, I don't expect a hike to happen anytime soon. 

Meanwhile Toronto has been growing marvelously in the last few years but it still lacks a high rise with that WOW factor. It's mostly glass condos there. Would be nice if it would have a supertall to surpass the FCP one of these days.

But maybe someone from there would know more about the market than I do, so I digress.


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## isaidso (Mar 21, 2007)

You seem to have a good sense of what's happening in Toronto, but I'll add my 2 cents. The high rise construction boom is a perfect storm of forces. Toronto needs residential and has few options other than building vertically.

- A green belt that has curtailed sprawl in favour of intensification
- A downtown that people want to live in
- Massive, sustained population growth

There are fears that these condos are all being snapped up by investors with no real demand for the units. That doesn't seem to be the case as the downtown population sky rockets. The following roughly 4.5 square miles of downtown Toronto increased its population from 132,434 in 2006 to 175,064 in 2011. That is a whopping 32.2% increase over 5 years. I wouldn't be surprised if it hit 230,000 by 2016.










The big fear is if the economy goes into recession. People still need to make their mortgage payment.


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## Fitzrovian (Oct 12, 2011)

isaidso said:


> You seem to have a good sense of what's happening in Toronto, but I'll add my 2 cents. The high rise construction boom is a perfect storm of forces. Toronto needs residential and has few options other than building vertically.
> 
> - A green belt that has curtailed sprawl in favour of intensification
> - A downtown that people want to live in
> ...


There are 175k residents in the central 4.5 sq miles? That's really impressive. Do you have a link for that stat?


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## Huhu (Jun 5, 2004)

^^ That map is basically made up of parts of two federal electoral ridings, Toronto Centre and Trinity-Spadina.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toronto_Centre
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trinity_Spadina

You can find the official stats at Statscan or Elections Canada.


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## rychlik (Feb 14, 2008)

Xusein said:


> Meanwhile Toronto has been growing marvelously in the last few years but it still lacks a high rise with that WOW factor. It's mostly glass condos there. Would be nice if it would have a supertall to surpass the FCP one of these days.


From last summer. These won't change the world but I think they're above average (and better than the Trump building )

[url=http://www.flickr.com/photos/[email protected]/6004605030/] Toronto 057 by Mike Rychlik, on Flickr[/URL]

[url=http://www.flickr.com/photos/[email protected]/6000232341/] Toronto 036 by Mike Rychlik, on Flickr[/URL]


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## Nouvellecosse (Jun 4, 2005)

City Place is your idea of above average? :lol:

Most people in the Toronto forum seem to view it as an abomination. I happen to like many of the buildings personally.


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## isaidso (Mar 21, 2007)

^^ City Place is dense, but it's easily the most coma inducing neighbourhood in the city. You don't even feel like you're in Toronto, but some outer suburb. 



Huhu said:


> ^^ That map is basically made up of parts of two federal electoral ridings, Toronto Centre and Trinity-Spadina.
> 
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toronto_Centre
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trinity_Spadina
> ...


Trinity-Spadina and Toronto-Centre combined (12.31 square miles) are bigger than that area I posted above (4.5 square miles). 

*Toronto-Centre*
130,323
13.34 sq km

*Trinity-Spadina*
144,733
18.55 sq km

*Both Together*
275,056
31.89 sq km or *12.31 sq miles*
22,344 people/square mile



Fitzrovian said:


> There are 175k residents in the central 4.5 sq miles? That's really impressive. Do you have a link for that stat?


It was an analysis done by a forum member on SSP and UT named J. Will. He compiled the information based on census tracts and then posted his findings. I took them at face value, but they seem right to me. I live in the area in the area in that 'downtown map' he made. The 38,903 people/square mile looks right as its quite a bit denser than Trinity-Spadina/Toronto-Centre taken together.

Here's a link to a table of Toronto neighbourhoods in 2006. Keep in mind this is before the downtown condo boom, but the density numbers are already quite high for the downtown neighbourhoods. My neighbourhood, Church & Wellesley is 1.4245 square miles and had a density of 24,358 people/square kilometre; that's 63,087 people/square mile. The conversion rate is 2.59.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_neighbourhoods_in_Toronto#Downtown_Core_.28Central.29


I've tried to compile the downtown neighbourhoods taken from the link above (2006):

St. Jamestown (165,151 people/square mile)
Bay Street Corridor (112,712 people/square mile)
Church & Wellesley (63,087 people/square mile)
Garden District (41,041 people/square mile)
Alexandra Park (35,247 people/square mile)
Yorkville (27,959 people/square mile)
Grange Park (27,954 people/square mile)
Kensington Market (26,908 people/square mile)
Harbourfront/City Place (23,901 people/square/mile) *
Discovery District (18,125 people/square mile)
Fashion District (12,269 people/square mile)
Financial District (3,020 people/square mile)

* Note that this neighbourhood has seen a massive condo tower development that has drastically increased the population and density.


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## rychlik (Feb 14, 2008)

Nouvellecosse said:


> City Place is your idea of above average? :lol:
> 
> Most people in the Toronto forum seem to view it as an abomination. I happen to like many of the buildings personally.


Yeah I do. Problem? :gunz:They're at least getting creative. People who say they're an "abomination" are stupid.

I like this one.
[url=http://www.flickr.com/photos/[email protected]/6913371347/] Modern Toronto by Mike Rychlik, on Flickr[/URL]


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## isaidso (Mar 21, 2007)

They're not terrible, but he said WOW factor, not snooze factor. They're about as cookie cutter as you can get. He meant that Toronto's still waiting for 1 Lamborghini to make its mark after watching 100 Chevrolets roll off the assembly line.

City Place and Maple Leaf Square are Chevrolets. They're very very average.


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## Fitzrovian (Oct 12, 2011)

isaidso said:


> ^^ City Place is dense, but it's easily the most coma inducing neighbourhood in the city. You don't even feel like you're in Toronto, but some outer suburb.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


That would mean though that the remaining portions of Toronto Centre and Trinity Spadina have a density of only about 12k psm (100k / 8 sq miles). Does the density drop off that much?


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## isaidso (Mar 21, 2007)

Clever bugger, and you're correct about the roughly 12,000 psm in the remaining portions. kay:



Fitzrovian said:


> That would mean though that the remaining portions of Toronto Centre and Trinity Spadina have a density of only about 12k psm (100k / 8 sq miles). Does the density drop off that much?


It drops off a bit as one moves west of Bathurst and east of Parliament, but the big culprit is that those 2 federal ridings include 2 very large low density tracts of land. 

One is Rosedale, the richest suburb in Canada. It's a neighourhood of multi-million dollar houses on huge lots. Rosedale takes up almost half the land area of Toronto-Centre (everything north of Bloor), but only 7,672 people live there. 

The other tract of land is the Toronto Islands which is basically a massive park with perhaps 400 people living there (262 houses). It's pictured below in the riding of Trinity-Spadina. To put things in perspective, it's 570 acres vs. 843 acres for Central Park in NY.

*Trinity-Spadina*









*Toronto-Centre*


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## Nouvellecosse (Jun 4, 2005)

rychlik said:


> Yeah I do. Problem? :gunz:They're at least getting creative. People who say they're an "abomination" are stupid.





isaidso said:


> They're not terrible, but he said WOW factor, not snooze factor. They're about as cookie cutter as you can get. He meant that Toronto's still waiting for 1 Lamborghini to make its mark after watching 100 Chevrolets roll off the assembly line.
> 
> City Place and Maple Leaf Square are Chevrolets. They're very very average.


Exactly! 

They' may not be abominations, but they're quite possibly the very definition of average. After all, the average Toronto condo built during this boom is a contemporary-styled, flat roofed point tower sitting on a pronounced podium with blue or untinted glass window wall, is between 100m and 200m, and is built with more attention paid to being affordable than to being luxurious. 

There are both buildings that exceed the average and buildings that fall short of it that have been built in Toronto. City Place contains a few of the latter, but is so far devoid of the former.


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## Xusein (Sep 27, 2005)

They aren't ugly. In fact, I think they are very nice. Believe me, I love the contemporary styles of high rises these days.

But my point was that I think that, amidst the boom, there needs to be a distinctive tower that will leave an influence on the skyline.

Would be so nice if Toronto got a supertall.


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## desertpunk (Oct 12, 2009)

Nouvellecosse said:


> Exactly!
> 
> They' may not be abominations, but they're quite possibly the very definition of average. After all, the average Toronto condo built during this boom is a contemporary-styled, flat roofed point tower sitting on a pronounced podium with blue or untinted glass window wall, is between 100m and 200m, and is built with more attention paid to being affordable than to being luxurious.
> 
> There are both buildings that exceed the average and buildings that fall short of it that have been built in Toronto. City Place contains a few of the latter, but is so far devoid of the former.


'Distinctive' costs more money and what often fuels condo booms is exactly the opposite: affordability. Toronto probably could support one or two highly distinctive towers but ask yourself this: how large is the market there for $20-30 million condos? The lack of a market for condos that expensive is what sunk Chicago Spire. Aside from all the other shenanigans related to its developer, banks refused to finance a tower that was unlikely to ever make a profit given the weak market in Chicago for extreme high-end condos.


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## Nouvellecosse (Jun 4, 2005)

The post that you replied to was not talking about _Toronto_, it was talking about _Cityplace_, and when I was talking about average and above/below average, I was talking about more than design. I was also talking about quality and details. This boom has given _Toronto_ buildings that are both above and below average, but _Cityplace_ only has average and below. Not saying Cityplace is bad, it just isn't an example of how Toronto is building more above average buildings.

Besides, I'm not sure if I agree with your assertion. A building can be unique and interesting and raise the standards of design without being earth shattering enough to be displayed in an architectural textbook. To have very high standards of fit and finish and very high quality materials requires lots of money. But there are plenty of reasonably priced developments around the world that were not designed with a cookie cutter. A few examples have even popped up during this building boom. 

In Toronto, condos in buildings like X Condos and Absolute in Mississauga are not filled with $20-30 million units and they've managed to set themselves apart from the herd. They may not be earth-shattering, but they also aren't blue glass boxes like the rest. At the same time some of the priciest condos in Toronto are fairly conventional. Four Seasons, Ritz-Carlton and Shangri-La for instance are above average in terms of quality and detail, but in terms of design they're fairly conventional. No textbook entry for them. But that's ok as they're still very welcome additions.


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## Kensingtonian (Nov 8, 2008)

I hope it goes bust. I don`t want to rent for the rest of my life.

And it would be pretty great if Toronto got an eye-catching supertall out of this boom, but it doesn`t look like it`s going to happen. Maybe next time.


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## isaidso (Mar 21, 2007)

I don't think any one wants a bust. I'd rather things just cooled off as far as prices. Thousands of people would be ruined by a real estate market crash.


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## mrgrieves (Jun 26, 2008)

Something else to consider is that public transit in Toronto is inadequate outside of the city's two subway lines. The current state of Toronto's subway system is appropriate for a much smaller city.

Commuting from many parts of the city to the "core" is a nightmare, which has created an artificially smaller than necessary area where the high density building is being achieved. 

Once the Eglinton Crosstown LRT and (eventually) a Downtown Relief subway line get built that should ease the situation and result in many more mid-rises getting built.


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## isaidso (Mar 21, 2007)

Valid points. I rarely travel anywhere in Toronto unless I can get there by subway. At this point, I limit travel to places close to either Bloor-Danforth or Yonge Street. I'm waiting for the following subways: DRL, Queen, Eglinton, and Sheppard expansion.


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