PLANNING IMPACT
END OF WATERFRONT DREAMS
When plans were announced by the politicians that the three levels of government would work together to transform Toronto’s waterfront into a clean, green neighbourhood, the people of the city were truly enthusiastic.
- Torontonians dreamed of being able to wander along the water’s edge, stopping at cafés, enjoying the boats and scenery of the spectacular location.
- Former Mayor Mel Lastman expressed his enthusiasm by saying, “…Bring back thousands of acres of wetlands, green corridors, parks, forest and wildlife. We’re going to restore beaches and clean up the water.”
- Waterfront Toronto’s Annual Report for 2006/07 states, “The overall objective of Waterfront Toronto’s mandate is to position Toronto’s revitalized waterfront as a new and critical economic asset for the city, province and country.”
But the politicians and planners have gone out of their way to sabotage their own redevelopment plans. The most fundamental principle of planning is to separate industry from residential communities. But on Toronto’s waterfront we are doing exactly the opposite.
In the west end of the harbour, adjacent to a bird sanctuary, the city’s most loved park and the newest and most interesting and exciting condo developments, a 215-acre airport has expanded. It spews out pollutants and excessive noise, attracting high levels of traffic and generally making life in the communities intolerable. In the Port Lands, just east of the harbour and on the shore of the turning basin, the provincial government is building a electric power generating plant worth $650 million. Two enormous industrial land uses; two impediments to waterfront dreams.
The massive 3000% planned expansion of the island airport will have a huge impact on the redevelopment of Toronto’s waterfront. A major negative effect will be on adjacent property values and associated property tax revenue losses for the city. Studies show that busy commercial airports tend to devalue adjacent residential properties from 20% to 25% compared to similar properties elsewhere. Commercial rents also decline compared to the same type of property in non-airport areas.
Unlike Pearson International Airport, the island airport is flanked by 20- and 30-storey condominiums and high rise coop communities. The closest are 200 metres away from the main runway. Thousands of other units are planned along the entire central waterfront, adjacent to the busy flight path. It is expected that 100,000 people will live on the waterfront and another 100,000 will work there when the project is finally completed.
The several billion dollars of existing and committed waterfront developments are underway, partly because a previous Toronto City Council passed and enforced the Tripartite Agreement to limit the scope and scale of airport operations. Now that these restrictions are not being enforced and the airport is being allowed to ramp up to many times its current passenger volumes, it will wreak havoc on adjacent property values and city tax revenues.
The City of Toronto has a dream of a high tech “convergence centre” on the Port Lands. If traffic at the airport is massively expanded, in line with the Toronto Port Authority's vision, this dream will die because the Port Lands are immediately under the main flight path to the airport.
A clear example of the stunting effect a local airport can have on a knowledge-based economy can be found in California’s Silicon Valley. Hewlett-Packard, the valley’s biggest employer, has warned the City of San Jose that its regional airport, close to the downtown, is “spoiling the nest” and Hewlett-Packard may be forced to look elsewhere to invest. While most of Silicon Valley prospered through the 1990s, San Jose lagged far behind, due to its unfortunate position as home to the regional airport.
Toronto is a major film production centre. In 2006 production companies spent $704 million filming on location in the city. In the Port Lands new film studios and sound stages are under construction, the infrastructure for a much expanded film industry. The Port Lands are perfect for filmmaking, and the city is courting this industry, but the Port Lands are on the flight path of the island airport. No director or film crew will shoot in a location where they have to stop filming or recording every time an airplane flies overhead.
The same noise and pollution problems, which will deter high-tech investment in the Port Lands, will also dramatically interfere with the plan to create housing there. Once again, city property tax revenues will be lost…this time in the order of hundreds of millions of dollars per year.
Expansion of the island airport, and the resulting air and noise pollution, will wreck other aspects of the waterfront economy. These include outdoor entertainment attractions at Harbourfront, the Toronto Music Garden, HTO Park, the Molson Amphitheatre and Ontario Place. Restaurants, tour boats, recreational boating, and activities at the island park will also be affected. Each of these represents a significantly larger part of the Toronto economy than the island airport.
Toronto’s Waterfront already has over 5 million visitors a year. Will they continue to come if the environment is disturbed with the constant sound of airplanes going over head?
The expansion of the island airport will seriously deter economic activity and the development of communities along the waterfront, but it will generate no new jobs in the Toronto region. The expansion will merely steal business from other airports in the region and add to the existing problem of overcapacity in the local airport network.
The expansion will drive a stake through the heart of the dream of a clean, green waterfront.