Month: May 2021

TLAB – Chair’s Annual Report

Given the number of Committee of Adjustment applications in our members’ neighbourhoods, many residents and residents associations have been actively involved in TLAB appeals since its inception in 2017. The TLAB appeal process is important to residents as it greatly affects their homes and the character of their neighbourhoods,

We appreciate the comprehensive review and report by TLAB Chair, Dino Lombardi. However, it is apparent that while the report reports on various matters related to the ongoing operation of the TLAB, it fails to look deeper into some of the matters that concern residents. TLAB Public Business Meetings have been established, but these are largely ineffective as mechanisms to provide input from residents. Procedure and rules continue to be added to the processes without effective input from residents.

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Toronto Buildings Review

FoNTRA representatives were part of the consultation process leading up to this report, including a meeting with Will Johnston, Chief Building Official. Our focus in that meeting was on residents as “customers” as residents are impacted by various functions undertaken by Toronto Buildings.

Errors in the reports on variances required for Committee of Adjustment applications and the errors in the use of waivers by applicants cause confusion and delays at the Committee of Adjustment hearings as well as approval of incorrect variances. There is also confusion and concern about issues that are now covered by the Building Code, such as responsibility for safely and damages to neighbouring properties related to construction next door, whether  lot lines or party walls. Also variable and lack of enforcement can be an issue.

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Toronto Street Car

Moving Ontarians More Safely

The Act gives Toronto permission to install safety cameras on streetcars to find and fine drivers who speed by a streetcar at a transit stop, putting riders at risk.

The Act also includes Bill 148 The Doored But Not Ignored Bill to provide better protections for cyclists. Dooring is one of the most common causes of injury for cyclists, but it’s not considered a collision under the Highway Traffic Act.

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Provincial Transit-Oriented Communities Program

We join many community-based groups including resident, business, service, environmental and heritage organizations to express our support for the direction of the staff report, and our concern for the unilateral approach of the provincial government in its Transit-Oriented Communities Program.

We are concerned that what is happening now at the First Parliament site is a preview of what communities may expect anywhere that the province has a planned transit station, and where there is an opportunity to hand land to the private sector to raise revenues!

Based on our experience to date with the Eglinton Crosstown and the Ontario Lines, especially the lack of transparency in decision-making, we fear that the rush to accelerate planning and maximize provincial revenues will compromise long-term community building, heritage conservation, and complete communities, including affordable housing, community space, and public open space on these sites.

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Call to release lease agreement terms for Canada Square

Yonge and Eglinton is designated as a “Growth Centre” and has become an extremely “successful” one at that, i.e. it has far exceeded the population targets set. However this growth has occurred at the expense of quality of life, amid deficiencies in community services that are increasingly apparent to the residents and neighbours.

Most recently the City is reviewing an application for the Canada Square site, a lynchpin to the whole area, given its location at the crossing of the subway and soon to be completed LRT, and the fast developing residential neighbourhoods spreading out from all four corners. The application by Oxford Properties simply cannot be treated like a regular development application given the many factors to be addressed.

FoNTRA supports Councillors Colle and Robinson Motion MM32.5 and recommends that the relevant terms of the 2018 City/Oxford agreement be made public that could affect the appropriate and unfettered decision-making for the Canada Square site.

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