Here’s why a Toronto condo proposal just quadrupled in height

Two years after a mid-rise condo building was proposed to rise near a GO Train station in Etobicoke, developers have returned with a much more ambitious vision for the site that would rise about four times taller than what was proposed back in 2022.

Developers have proposed a 43-storey tower at the site of 3807 Lake Shore Boulevard West, just steps east of Long Branch GO Station and the Long Branch Loop at the west end of the TTC’s route 501 Queen streetcar.

It’s a site that was envisioned as a mid-rise building just a couple years earlier, so what’s the deal here?

Developer Lake Shore West Co-Ownership, a partnership of Harlo Capital, Toronto Standard, and Major Street Group, have been working behind the scenes to expand their land assembly on Lake Shore.

The site now consists of a group of six properties spanning 3807-3829 Lake Shore Blvd. W., just west of Fortieth Street, currently home to a retail plaza and a group of commercial buildings that host a 2-4-1 Pizza, among other businesses.

In addition to the developer’s acquisition of additional properties on the block — roughly doubling the site in the process — the site has also been placed within the Long Branch Major Transit Station Area since first proposed, one of many such zones around transit where the province is promoting higher-density development.

With these changes in mind, previous plans for an 11-storey mid-rise building were sent back to the drawing board, resulting in a new plan to develop the site with a much taller tower.

Moving from a mid-rise to high-rise plan has also resulted in the project taking on a new name, with updated planning documents now referring to the proposed building as Long Branch Tower.

The updated proposal for a 43-storey tower essentially quadruples the height of the previous 37.5-metre proposal, now tabled to rise over 143 metres, or just shy of four times the December 2022 version’s height.

A design by architects Studio JCI builds on the grouped trio of volumes seen in the 2022 version, swapping in glass and steel in place of brick and extruding the massing vertically to read as three joined towers of varying heights.

The 2022 version shares some similarities with the supersized 2024 version.

As one would expect with such a vast height increase, the proposal’s unit count has also been upped substantially, increasing by more than five times.

The 2022 proposal called for just 106 units, while the updated plan proposes 549 condominium units, representing a 5.18X increase in unit count.

In addition to these condominium units,  14 rentals are planned in the tower to replace existing units on the development site which would be demolished to make way for the new tower, in accordance with the City of Toronto’s rental housing demolition policies.

Though all buildings on site would be demolished as part of the redevelopment, the project does indeed intend to replace a portion of the retail space that would be lost.

A relatively small 165-square-metre commercial space is planned within the base of the building, which would be sufficient to support a cafe or another small retail business.

Despite the project’s enormous size compared to its surroundings, local residents can lower their pitchforks knowing that the proposal would have little impact on local traffic.

A two-level underground parking component is planned with just 72 vehicle parking spaces, compared to the over 430 bicycle parking spots proposed.

The timing of a new condo development amid a waning market may have some onlookers skeptical, though experts are beginning to share more optimistic outlooks on the local real estate game.

Toronto Regional Real Estate Board (TRREB) President Jennifer Pearce noted last week that, “While we are still early in the Bank of Canada’s rate cutting cycle, it definitely does appear that an increasing number of buyers moved off the sidelines and back into the marketplace in October.”

“The positive affordability picture brought about by lower borrowing costs and relatively flat home prices, prompted this improvement in market activity,” said Pearce.