Don Mills Residents Inc.

The property is located at Leslie and York Mills. It includes the buildings currently housing Windfield’s Restaurant and the Swiss Chalet/Harvey’s. It also includes the property on Leslie where Browns Veterinary clinic used to be. It does not include the property at the corner containing a strip plaza with the Big Smoke Burger restaurant, Sleep Country and a dry-cleaner.

The property is located at Leslie and York Mills. It includes the buildings currently housing Windfield’s Restaurant and the Swiss Chalet/Harvey’s. It also includes the property on Leslie where Browns Veterinary clinic used to be. It does not include the property at the corner containing a strip plaza with the Big Smoke Burger restaurant, Sleep Country and a dry-cleaner.

First Capital owns the properties dealt with in this proposal. It also owns the Longo’s Plaza (York Mills Gardens) across the street as well as the Starbuck Plaza further east on York Mills (861 York Mills Rd). It is significant that the owner of the strip plaza on the corner also plans to re-develop that site at some time in the future. The City will have to consider that in its evaluation. 

The owner has submitted a proposal to the City and it includes:

• 2 towers – 21 stories each connected with a 6-storey podium where the Winfield’s and Swiss Chalet buildings are.
• 1 mid-rise building of 9 stories where Brown’s Vet was on Leslie.
• Some retail in the podium of the ‘towers’ building.
• A small park is proposed on Scarsdale - comprising much of the parking lot currently behind the Swiss Chalet.

Opposition to the proposal is substantial. The DMRI shares many of those concerns highlighted by:

• the development is substantially too dense,
• the buildings are too tall
• the park is too small and
• there is insufficient transition between the single-family houses south of the site and the condominiums. This is particularly acute with the 9-storey building which is very close to the houses to the south. 

There are many other concerns such as privacy, property values, traffic issues, schools, …

There has been a virtual Community Consultation meeting, followed by another virtual community meeting held by our councillor Denzil Minnan-Wong. As a result of strong opposition to this application, a working group of community stakeholders has been established to examine issues in more detail and inform revisions to the development application. The applicant (Developer) has agreed to the Working Group process to facilitate community input on the application. The first meeting of the Working Group was held on February 18 and a second was held on March 16. It is anticipated that the owner will revise its application based on the feedback from the community and that revised application will be the subject of another Working Group review.

The City’s preliminary report, that describes the proposal in more detail can be found at:

https://www.toronto.ca/legdocs/mmis/2020/ny/bgrd/backgroundfile-145163.pdf

Zoning Bylaw Amendment application for the proposal of two 21 storey towers, and a 9 storey mid rise building. A total of 636 residential units, 2015 sqm of grade related retail space fronting onto York Mills Road and 670 proposed parking spaces. The details of the application are here: