Toronto’s race for Canada’s tallest building is gaining international attention

International viewers are now learning about Toronto’s megalithic pissing contest between developers vying to claim the title of Canada’s tallest building, a battle that has included a back-and-forth of height changes and been fraught with high-profile legal challenges.

Toronto’s two supertall belligerents —The One at Yonge and Bloor and the Skytower at Pinnacle’s One Yonge complex — are featured in a new video from The B1M, the leading YouTube channel covering megaprojects around the world, with 3.4 million subscribers.

And, while the video asserts that these two under-construction projects are putting Toronto on the map as one of the world’s fastest-changing skylines, it also pulls back the curtain to reveal to the world the not-so-rosy issues associated with the city’s vertical growth.

The video dedicates the majority of its runtime to covering problem-plagued megatower, The One, which is gaining international attention for both its impressive profile and its neverending series of hurdles.

The One’s challenges have included construction delays, cost overruns, alleged debt soaring to a staggering $1.7 billion, and its lead developer and visionary Sam Mizrahi being booted from key roles when the project was placed into receivership. The project is now reportedly being shopped around with a price tag of $1.2 billion.

The One was set to be the tallest building in Canada when first approved, and is currently approved to reach a height of 91 storeys, with a roofline sitting at just over 328 metres after additional height was granted by the City.

At that height, it is primed to rise 30 metres taller than the current tallest in the country, First Canadian Place.

However, it will almost certainly be Pinnacle International’s Skytower development that lays claim to the title of Canada’s tallest.

This tower was also granted a height increase from the City that will see it rise a mind-melting 105 storeys to a height of over 345 metres — roughly equal to the height of the CN Tower’s observation deck.

The video was initially uploaded with several glaring errors, presenting inaccurate figures from earlier in The One’s development process and referencing both in print and on video the previously approved 306-metre, 85-storey height from before the building’s added storeys were approved.

Several commenters also seemed annoyed by the video producers’ apparent lack of familiarity with Toronto’s road network, showing aerial footage of Yonge and Dundas when describing Yonge and Bloor.

The initial upload glazed over the turmoil The One is experiencing and opted to just show off the shiny new skyscraper to international audiences.

After some heavy edits, it now explains protracted legal challenges, construction delays and all of the other roadblocks that have thrust the project’s behind-the-scenes turmoil into the public eye.

Others have noted that, despite the errors and choice of stock footage, the video and corresponding article on The B1M’s website have brought new attention to what sure feels like the climactic peak of Toronto’s 21st-century skyscraper boom.