PATH expansions [Archive] - SkyscraperCity

Taller, Better

September 16th, 2007, 04:24 PM

interesting article online today from the Toronto Star. Complete article:
http://www.thestar.com/News/GTA/article/257110

TheStar.com | GTA | A PATH through the maze

A PATH through the maze

map
A 3 1/2 hour journey
A 3 1/2 hour journey
I've lived in Toronto for just over a year, and never had occasion to use PATH until recently, when my editor thought it would be a good idea to set an unaccustomed reporter loose in the underground labyrinth.
Can Toronto's bewildering warren grow without creating more confusion?
Sep 16, 2007 08:09 AM
Leslie Scrivener
staff reporter

In the sunlit lobby of the Sun Life Centre tower, it's easy to get your bearings – across the way is St. Andrew's Church on King St. W., on the corner is a Sorel Etrog sculpture, and traffic roars up what is clearly University Ave. It's here, above ground, that we meet Stuart Ash, designer of the PATH system, who was once responsible for imposing order on Toronto's disjointed underground walkway.

Twenty years ago Ash and his partners began planning the signage for the pedestrian maze, which has expanded over the years to 27 kilometres, jogging hither and thither between the south building of the Metro Toronto Convention Centre, Union Station and the bus terminal north of Dundas Street. PATH is vaunted as the largest (and, some might also say, most confounding) subterranean shopping arcade in the world. Now that the system is on the cusp of a further extension – it's expected to double in size within the next decade – Ash offered to navigate the underground with the Sunday Star.

Can it double in size without becoming doubly confusing?

One of the abiding complaints about Toronto's underground warren, which links 50 downtown buildings and 20 parking garages (PATH goes right through the garage beneath City Hall) is that it's bewildering. In the depths of the shopping malls, which all seem the same as you move from building to building, it's a struggle to figure out where you are. There's no reference to landmarks at street level. And if you don't consult the PATH maps, which really do help you find your way, you can easily end up like Orpheus dragging his sad self through an unknown underworld. There are unexpected dead ends, and sometimes the only way to go north is to first go west.

Part of the problem is that each building, along with the space below it, is privately owned. From the beginning there was never a master plan to connect the buildings. The tunnels were added where it was convenient, not where it was most logical, though more recent connections have been less haphazard and better planned.

For the Star tour, Ash arrives with a map of the PATH system, taken off the City of Toronto website. It's clear from the start that when you find the signs, which are elegant and discreet, they are very helpful. But often, because they are small – they weren't supposed to compete with the retail signs – you don't notice them.

There are bright moments on our tour, such as when we arrive at First Canadian Place after studying PATH maps on walls, though it's clear there aren't enough of them. "Here's a major crossroads with lots of information," Ash says happily. "I'm amazed it's working as well as it does."

In the original plan, he and his partners Gottschalk + Ash International Design and Keith Muller + Associates planned for more signs, for compass points showing direction – it really helps to know which way is north – and for wall maps. "They were whittled down to the minimum, only 80 per cent of what we suggested," says Ash, whose internationally recognized firm has created signage for SkyDome ( now the Rogers Centre) and American Airlines Arena in Miami, and is working on the Chicago transit system.

The city of Toronto paid for developing the PATH concept, while the individual property owners paid for the manufacture and installation of the signage. Now about 35 corporations are part of the system. "It was like pulling teeth to get the property owners to introduce this," Ash recalls. The banks, for example, weren't keen to have signs that would direct customers to their competitors' buildings. In the intervening years, some companies have kept up the system and incorporated it into their own building signage while others have been lax.

There are some low points on our tour. We decide to go to BCE Place. "But how do you know where BCE Place is?" he asks. "I know it's that way (pointing east), but there's nothing directing me. Because of the lack of continuity, it's totally disorienting." From then on, it's guesswork and instinct. "It's a broken link, and that's why people are having trouble ... people don't really pay attention to way-finding, you should be there where you need it." In short, he says, "This needs work. Updating is required, and property owners need to be more consistent."

He's been told the city has no budget to add to the PATH system to help people find their way.

When the extensions are complete, there will be 45 new entry points to the system, which will expand to as many as 60 kilometres of walkways, says Al Rezoski, a senior City of Toronto planner.

Some of the new routes are already being used, such as the commodious walkway on either side of Bay St. below Front St. Others, like the underground path from Union Station to St. Andrew subway station, on a route yet to be determined, are still under environmental review.

There's pedestrian pressure to create these new walkways in the mostly underground system (which comes up for light, mole-like, in places like the SkyWalk from Union Station to the Rogers Centre).

City planners have counted pedestrians leaving Union Station during the morning rush and found 14,000 people emerging onto Front St. and another 19,000 headed toward the PATH network in one hour. With planned expansion of GO train service, those numbers are expected to nearly double in the next 15 to 20 years: 24,000 emerging onto Front St. and 36,000 heading underground.

"Now there is an ebb and flow as trains arrive," says Tim Lapsa, a transportation planning manager for the city of Toronto. "In 15 or 20 years, there will be no ebb."

If the desired expansions are approved, the PATH network will extend to College Park and include Ryerson University. Looking further to the future, the MaRS medical and biotech research district around the old Toronto General Hospital site at College and University Ave. may be linked to the underground.

Rezoski is confident the system will be easier to navigate. With the new developments, there's a chance to straighten out the network and its corridors, so the routing can be simplified, he says. For example, the redevelopment of the Richmond-Adelaide Centre, where a 48-storey building is proposed to replace a smaller building, promises a more orderly underground.

Planners are also looking at using more skylights so people walking below ground can glance up and see a familiar landmark. Another way of helping orient pedestrians is to have two-storey spaces, with escalators going up to ground level, to remind people where they are.

The city's priority for pedestrians is still sidewalks with attractive landscaping. "If we didn't have the PATH system, we'd be looking at severely congested sidewalks," says Rezoski. "This is a kind of relief valve."

To some, however, underground pedestrian networks are bastions of privatization and exclusion. Ute Lehrer, a planning professor at York University's faculty of environmental studies, notes that private security guards can move along the poor and dispossessed. "If you don't fit the normal profile of the normal user of these pathways, you are not welcome."

Privately owned undergrounds have hours of opening and closing, she points out. They are often desolate on weekends. "While on the sidewalk, you have Jane Jacobs `eyes on the street,' which you don't have in the underground. It's intriguing on Saturdays and Sundays because you feel comfortable and uncomfortable at the same time."

She links life in the underground to the condominium boom, and with that, she says, a less engaged society. "You no longer encounter the other – the homeless, people on the margins. You avoid them by using the PATH system or moving to a condo tower, where you can go down to your garage and drive off – it's a homogenized and sanitized environment."

But still, she can see comfort in the underground network, once you are familiar with it. "It gives a village experience – you know where the stores are, the access points to each building, which is the quickest way from subway to your workplace."

A lively underground, if well designed, can lead to a better city, with safer, more animated corridors, says planner Rezoski. Subterranean links to the subway attract business to the downtown, but they can also be appealing because of their access to residential buildings. He notes that PATH connects people to daycares, schools, libraries, grocery stores, community centres and theatres. "We are trying to make our downtown as family-friendly as possible. This is one component of that – it's a safe route for children, they don't have to deal with traffic, and the whole system has private security."

There's also the protection PATH affords pedestrians when winter howls through financial district wind tunnels. Though one recent, perfect summer day, when the temperature was 25C and humidity was low, the subterranean city was packed with people. Burrowing underground, it seems, has become a year-round way of life.

samsonyuen

September 16th, 2007, 05:40 PM

That's a huge enlargement!

Kappa21

September 16th, 2007, 05:49 PM

I saw the map...
I was hoping it would go maybe until bloor, but its not possible for something like that...They said something about doubling in half..

but i was impressed however with it coming to Ryerson. It takes about a few minutes for most Ryerson students to go from the class to the subway and u gotta walk outside and then inside, which is a bit of a hassle, especially when there are pedastrians and construction and other students overhead.
This is a nice way to not only link Dundas subway, but to also link the schools together underground, making it virtually easy for people to walk and get to class or back home.

reddwarf

September 16th, 2007, 10:40 PM

While the increase in size is most welcome, I was most disappointed that the PATH wasn't extended further west from Metro Hall over to the Film Festival Tower (and in my dreams further beyond to Spadina.) It would have made the winter walks to work much warmer...

Tuscani01

September 16th, 2007, 11:55 PM

Yay Ryerson!

It probably wont be around while im going to school there though:(

401_King

September 17th, 2007, 01:36 AM

LordMandeep

September 17th, 2007, 01:45 AM

true but our pedestrian traffic downtown is already very very high even with the PATH.

the Financial sector all day still has many people walking around it even after 5pm you still see people around it at 9pm. Of course i am talking about the summer.

Maybe if we did not have the PATH, we would have NY style pedestrian traffic but i found that to be rather a unpleasant experience in NY.

DrT

September 17th, 2007, 01:59 AM

the path is pretty useful in winter time. i'm all for expanding it.

what i dont like about the path
- dead after 6 and weekends
- vacuums some of the pedestrian bustle off the street

what do you guys think?

In winter/rain, I love the PATH. I'm all for expanding it.
It is also one of the things that make TO unique, understanding Montreal also has an extensive system, but, that the vast majority of cities do not.

I hope that as residential living continues to expand DT, that maybe some of the retailers along the PATH will choose to stay open longer, or some will open to cater to after hours activities and make it more like the street retail.
It's only a matter of time.

Bisonblight

September 17th, 2007, 03:18 AM

I just waiting for the Path to make under Bay-Adelaide up to the Eaton Centre. I don't use it much, so whenever I use it from Union, I get lost by Scotia Plaza. I think I'll stick to the street. Still good news ... will be larger than Montreal's I assume.

kettal

September 17th, 2007, 03:51 AM

Tuscani01

September 17th, 2007, 04:05 AM

Has anyone seen the movie waydowntown? It's an interesting study in this Canadian trend.

Also, does anyone have information on Yorkdale's underground path? How big is it? Can it feasibly be connected to the downtown one?

Yorkdale is all the way up at the 401 and doesnt have any underground path. Do you mean Yorkville?

valantino

September 17th, 2007, 04:08 AM

In Montreal, Yorkdale would be considered a part of PATH as it connects to the subway

Yorkville's PATH is pretty small basically connecting Manulife complex with the Cumberland Terrace/Holts/One Bloor West block and the HBC complex

Gil

September 17th, 2007, 04:14 AM

Since a separate thread (http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showthread.php?t=524530) has cropped up on the new PATH expansions from the Toronto Star I thought I'd just post the map from the story here to make discussion easier.

http://i18.************/4lzbtjs.jpg

Kappa21

September 17th, 2007, 04:27 AM

Yay Ryerson!

It probably wont be around while im going to school there though:(

With your abstence and lazyness ontop of those ridicoulous marks...

i say your gonna be one of the first users to use the walkway..
but this would be cool.

I hate walking outside from Kerr Hall building to the RBB..
too many people on the streets and alot of human traffic jams!!! :mad: wheres your horn when you really need it!!!!!!!!!!! :bash:

Kappa21

September 17th, 2007, 04:29 AM

the path is pretty useful in winter time. i'm all for expanding it.

what i dont like about the path
- dead after 6 and weekends
- vacuums some of the pedestrian bustle off the street

what do you guys think?

The problem is, with respect to the dowtown financial core (adelaine and king..etc) the dundas area is pretty busy after 6 and i think most stores inside the path will adjust to a more later enviornment type setting (resturants, bars...) im even thinking Ryerson will take it and use it for classes and a much needed underground store for books and goodies :D

LordMandeep

September 17th, 2007, 04:33 AM

those additions in the Bay, adelaide, Richmond area will help a lot.

kettal

September 17th, 2007, 04:58 AM

Yorkdale is all the way up at the 401 and doesnt have any underground path. Do you mean Yorkville?
yeah thats what i meant to say

Taller, Better

September 17th, 2007, 07:56 AM

Wow! I had no idea this antique thread existed, or I would not have made a new one. Maybe mine should be merged into this one....

flesh_is_weak

September 17th, 2007, 09:20 AM

i'd love to see the PATH extend all the way to Vaughan Mills :jk:

so is it really true that PATH is the world's largest underground shopping complex?

LordMandeep

September 17th, 2007, 12:32 PM

with these new inclusions it ahead of Montreal i think, thus record holder.

Filip

September 17th, 2007, 03:15 PM

yeah thats what i meant to say

I'm pretty sure he meant Yorkdale.

The thing about Montreal's RESO Network is that it's a series of disconnected tunnels and food courts. Basically, imagine PATH with a billion little disconnected parts.. Not pretty, eh?

I believe using RESO's logic, anything connected underground to a subway station is considered part of the RESO (hence Valentino's Yorkdale quip). Therefore, we could include the Clarica Centre in Etobicoke, North York City Centre, Yorkville and a million little nooks and crannies throughout the city... Inevitably making the "PATH" a gigantic network.

Gil

September 17th, 2007, 04:06 PM

Wow! I had no idea this antique thread existed, or I would not have made a new one. Maybe mine should be merged into this one....

Well it's only a few month old. There hasn't been much news lately on the PATH. Some of the discussions in the new thread have already been brought up here. Hopefully the mods can merge the two threads. I've already posted a link to the other thread a few posts back.

Gil

September 17th, 2007, 04:11 PM

I'm pretty sure he meant Yorkdale.

The thing about Montreal's RESO Network is that it's a series of disconnected tunnels and food courts. Basically, imagine PATH with a billion little disconnected parts.. Not pretty, eh?

I believe using RESO's logic, anything connected underground to a subway station is considered part of the RESO (hence Valentino's Yorkdale quip). Therefore, we could include the Clarica Centre in Etobicoke, North York City Centre, Yorkville and a million little nooks and crannies throughout the city... Inevitably making the "PATH" a gigantic network.

I usually explain it as Montréal having the longest system OVERALL, while Toronto has the longest CONTINUOUS system. Eventually connecting up to the PATH network in Yorkville should probably get us both records.

caltrane74

September 17th, 2007, 04:21 PM

Filip

September 17th, 2007, 04:36 PM

I usually explain it as Montréal having the longest system OVERALL, while Toronto has the longest CONTINUOUS system. Eventually connecting up to the PATH network in Yorkville should probably get us both records.

I'm certain if you include today's downtown core PATH and the Yorkville tunnels you'd have a system overall bigger than Montreal's RESO.

Gil

September 17th, 2007, 05:09 PM

How will Metropolis (TLS) connect to Ryerson? - Through the Chang Building??

How will the Chang Building connect to J/H or K/H?

Will there be a connection from Metropolis/ Parkcade through to K/H or J/H?

When I was at Ryerson there were discussions to have a second entrance to Dundas station at Gould with a connection to Jorgenson Hall. Maybe they can connect TLS under the parkade to Jorgenson. An additional connection to the Victoria/old Business and the Chang buildings would be nice. Jorgenson is already connected to Kerr Hall and then on to the Rogers Building. Why they didn't connect that to the Engineering building when it was built is beyond me. Any expansion into the Sam's and possibly Future Shop sites should include an additional link to Dundas.

Would it then be possible to connect to Delta Chelsea hotel? I noticed on the expanded map that it was conspicuously absent. The College Park section could easily be connected to the Delta Chelsea and then onward to MaRS.

Tuscani01

September 17th, 2007, 11:17 PM

With your abstence and lazyness ontop of those ridicoulous marks...

i say your gonna be one of the first users to use the walkway..
but this would be cool.

I hate walking outside from Kerr Hall building to the RBB..
too many people on the streets and alot of human traffic jams!!! :mad: wheres your horn when you really need it!!!!!!!!!!! :bash:

lol shut up! Im not the one in fifth year:P

doogerz

September 17th, 2007, 11:21 PM

:lol: .... all those tall new erections..... oooops..... buildings....

Hence the demographics of this site...sorry couldn't help myself.

Ok, back to the topic at hand, expansion of the path system would be an excellent idea. While I would argue the winters in Toronto are hardly...unbearable...it could draw more people into the city from the suburbs who tend to frequent the downtown during the summer yet avoid it in the winter due to the weather. Just a thought.

Kappa21

September 17th, 2007, 11:59 PM

lol shut up! Im not the one in fifth year:P

:rant: ur lucky you dont show up in the library these days......

:D Its a double major, so i cant help it!

monkeyronin

September 18th, 2007, 12:23 AM

So you could theoretically live in the Ritz, work in FCP, and never have to go outside again. Nice. :banana:

Kappa21

September 18th, 2007, 04:26 AM

I know a few who live in the Sheppard highrises who just walk in -20 temperature from their units to the subway and to work without walking outside (unless to smoke) and dont bother to bring a jacket with them.....

LordMandeep

September 18th, 2007, 04:42 AM

rbt

September 18th, 2007, 02:08 PM

Dundas station has a ton of connections in a million different ways and will have more.

It means it will likely become one of the biggest stations in the system soon.

(You have Union, Yonge/ Bloor, Finch, St. George, Kennedy, Sheppard, Kipling as the busiest, Eglinton as the big main stations i think.)

Dundas is the busiest station in the system today as a destination.

All of the other stations mentioned are busy because they are major transfer points from bus, streetcar, subway, or 3rd party (non-TTC) routes. Dundas has very little feeder activity. The area in within immediate walking distance is the source and destination of the trips.

There is a reason why Ryerson and Eaton Centre do not require very much parking compared to York U and Square One.

LordMandeep

September 19th, 2007, 02:06 AM

really how many people go to Yonge/Bloor and actually leave the station.

It seems rather minimal....

monkeyronin

September 19th, 2007, 02:40 AM

Regardless of the transfer, it still is a busy area, with high population and employment density and popular commercial areas in the vicinity. So number of people exiting the station would still be very high, just not at the ~250,000 level of total Y-B users.

Kappa21

September 19th, 2007, 05:02 AM

do you think that possibly Toronto can have a mega mall downtown similar to Eatons but all underground??? In bloor area maybe?

Like 4-5 floors, same size as Eatons, but all underground?

LordMandeep

September 19th, 2007, 12:12 PM

isn't the PATH sufficient??

I head if you include the Eaton centre retail and the path's retail, that is almost 6 million square feet total in retail.

Sixrings

September 19th, 2007, 04:58 PM

I think the sky walk should be expanded all the way over the train tracks with a HUGE mall inside of it connecting to a casino looking unto bremmer. LOL I also think a aquarium would be awesome on the same parking lot space as the new TIFF building across from hooters in the entertainment district...

samsonyuen

September 19th, 2007, 11:48 PM

The thing that sucks about the PATH is its deadness outside of office hours. The RÉSO isn't.

Taller, Better

September 20th, 2007, 06:05 AM

The thing that sucks about the PATH is its deadness outside of office hours. The RÉSO isn't.

?? It wholly depends on what part of RÉSO you are talking about, and what part of PATH you talk about. Much of RÉSO is really brutal 70's looking, too.
Even in the winter I despise these little underground warrens, as they are dreary and dark, and I get confused at what direction I am going in. I will walk indoors if the weather is ultra crappy.... otherwise I will stick to the sidewalk.

Mollywood

September 20th, 2007, 08:25 PM

I also avoid the Path tunnels at all costs, even in winter. It's so boring and void of any character at all. It's a shame because it could have been so much better. It would be so much easier to navigate if the developers actually gave each development a distinct look and feel. Higher ceilings would have helped with the claustrophobic feel of it all. The signage SUCKS!!!

LordMandeep

September 21st, 2007, 12:56 AM

i think the sections through the TD centre and Scotia bank are really nicely done....

Gil

September 21st, 2007, 05:50 AM

The section of Commerce Court North coming from Scotia Plaza is one of my favourite parts of the PATH. It just seems very European with all the plaster moulding and dark wood framing the shop windows. The renovations in Royal Bank Plaza look promising. They've increased the height of the ceilings, though they're still working on them, so I don't know what the full affect will be. Plus the renovated Food Court looks like a far cry from what used to be there.

KGB

September 22nd, 2007, 05:55 AM

Has anyone seen the movie waydowntown? It's an interesting study in this Canadian trend.

That was a funny, enjoyable quirky little movie (Fab Filippo, Don McKellar). That would have been a harder bet to win in Toronto, as never going outside would be easier to do because of how much bigger and the more stuff you can do here.

It would be a facinating fun experiment...what the hell couldn't you do? It wouldn't be that much of a burden. Hell, you can even travel out of town without cheating....you could catch a train at Union Station...travel to Montreal...spend the weekend there toolong around their system...come back. Hilarious.

Hmmm....would make an interesting reality tv show.

Also, does anyone have information on Yorkdale's underground path? How big is it? Can it feasibly be connected to the downtown one?

Well, it is already is, as you can get to both without ever going outside.

KGB

Gil

September 26th, 2007, 08:53 AM

I don't know if it's at all feasible, but here's what I'd like to see with the PATH expansions. I'm probably missing a few projects, but you get the idea. What would/should connect with St. Patrick station?

http://i20.************/10h7kf6.jpg

rbt

September 26th, 2007, 12:01 PM

I don't know if it's at all feasible, but here's what I'd like to see with the PATH expansions. I'm probably missing a few projects, but you get the idea.

MaRS will connect to Queens Park once the next phase is built.

Otherwise, none of your connections are likely to happen. Buildings like The Met, and Pinnacle haven't been designed for it. 18 Yonge does, apparently, have a knockout wall in place for a connection.

Ryerson has a skybridge crossing Church Street already for students.

I'm not convinced Ryerson will allow the general commuting public to walk through any of the current hallways. Too disruptive for classes. I had thought the intention was to cover the outdoor pedestrian walkway between Kerr Hall West and the POD. Does anybody know what specific PATH plans Ryerson has, including separation between general public and student populations?

noob(but not really)

September 26th, 2007, 02:35 PM

What would/should connect with St. Patrick station?

There are already tunnels connecting the hospitals to a few buildings. It wouldn't be that hard to build connections to the station. And of course, there are those mid-rise office buildings. But since University is for the most part dead in that area, I don't think anything should urgently be done.

I like your ideas in that map. But I like this one even more:

If someone bought the World's Biggest Bookstore location, tore it down, and built a commerical/office complex you could connect is with Atrium on Bay - to the south. From there you could run a long passage way North to Delta Chelse hotel (via the back ally) and it would be a simple link with the New expansion of College Park, and the Delta.

rbt

September 26th, 2007, 03:47 PM

There are already tunnels connecting the hospitals to a few buildings. It wouldn't be that hard to build connections to the station.

Issues of quarantine would be a major concern in the construction of tunnels directly connecting subway to hospital. Large trains do funny things with air movement, like causing substantial suction of air to the platform level from all connections.

Hermetic lockdowns for things like SARS or worse would also need to be possible.

The tunnel is probably very simple, especially once MaRS connects in.

Gil

September 26th, 2007, 07:52 PM

MaRS will connect to Queens Park once the next phase is built.

Otherwise, none of your connections are likely to happen. Buildings like The Met, and Pinnacle haven't been designed for it. 18 Yonge does, apparently, have a knockout wall in place for a connection.

Ryerson has a skybridge crossing Church Street already for students.

I'm not convinced Ryerson will allow the general commuting public to walk through any of the current hallways. Too disruptive for classes. I had thought the intention was to cover the outdoor pedestrian walkway between Kerr Hall West and the POD. Does anybody know what specific PATH plans Ryerson has, including separation between general public and student populations?

It would be nice if at least the Met could build a connection. It'd be another selling point. Connections to condo towers ideally should lead into the lobby where you'd still need to clear the security desk.

As for the Ryerson walkways, perhaps if they just did a better job of connecting the buildings on campus (Engineering, Architecture, Eric Pallin and possibly the residences. The Victoria building and the Arts building have a bridge connecting the two but isn't open for use). The existing overhead connections are shown on the map, though I've used the original map's paler shade of grey to indicate this. It's kinda hard to make out on the map.

I purposely gave the Ryerson network limited connections so as to cut down on through public traffic on that section. Ideally the network would only be used by students given the common public section is well-signed as such so that you wouldn't get lost pedestrians wandering through West Kerr Hall. The ground floor of POD/Jorgenson/LIB definitely needs a makeover as part of any connection to the PATH. The only additional connection I added other than what was originally depicted on the map was the direct access to Dundas station through the Sam's site.

Issues of quarantine would be a major concern in the construction of tunnels directly connecting subway to hospital. Large trains do funny things with air movement, like causing substantial suction of air to the platform level from all connections.

Hermetic lockdowns for things like SARS or worse would also need to be possible.

The tunnel is probably very simple, especially once MaRS connects in.

Again, like with the condo connections, access to the PATH should be through the main lobby of the hospitals. I assume that there are some sort of hermetic controls which separate the lobby from the rest of the hospital to prevent germs/contagions from getting in or out. Definitely some sort of separate ventellation system should be installed in the connector between the station and the hospitals. This is also why the PATH only connects to one subway station.

I'm not all that familiar with the existing network inside Toronto Gen, so I was intentionally vague with them. Will the MaRS connection be through the hospital or will it have a separate entrance to the subway station? I also thought that there were existing connections between the various hospitals on University to allow for patient transfers between hospitals.

In a bid to get the PATH up to Yorkville, would the U of T consider hooking up it's buildings or possibly the government offices along Bay St.? U of T would face the same issues as Ryerson but in their case there would be greater through traffic since the Ryerson network would simply be a spur branch. I'm not sure what kind of security concerns would arise by connecting the various ministerial buildings that line Bay and Wellesley. The access from Queen's Park station to Queen's Park is limited to certain parts of the day, perhaps the same could be done with the other buildings.

As for noob's comment from urban 2.0, I did put that connection in regardless of what happens with the World's Biggest Bookstore site. If something can be done with that site all the better, otherwise I just tunnelled around it. The alley between Elm and Edward though gives me some concern as I believe that underneath it lies the parking garage for the building above.

noob(but not really)

September 26th, 2007, 08:00 PM

This is also why the PATH only connects to one subway station.

PATH connects with 5 subway stations.

Gil

September 26th, 2007, 08:05 PM

PATH connects with 5 subway stations.

I meant in relation to the hospital connections AT QUEEN'S PARK. Sorry if you took that out of context with the rest of the message. :bash: Although with the additions I've posted that would add two more (College and Queens Park) plus anything that would get connected with St. Patrick and the Yorkville sections.

noob(but not really)

September 26th, 2007, 08:08 PM

^^ It wasn't out of context. Currently, PATH does not connect to any hospital stations.

Yes, I sometimes have my head stuck in the future as well. :)

Gil

September 26th, 2007, 08:26 PM

^^ It wasn't out of context. Currently, PATH does not connect to any hospital stations.

Yes, I sometimes have my head stuck in the future as well. :)

The future/proposed connections which are in the map I posted a few posts back ^^. The connection between the MaRS facility/Hospital Row and the rest of the PATH network and Queen's Park station. I've also thrown in a connection to St. Mike's through One Queen East. Again, the same conditions which would be required at Hospital Row would be in place here.

rbt

September 26th, 2007, 09:55 PM

Gil

September 26th, 2007, 11:22 PM

Not that I'm aware of. SARS was only a few years back and was not an overly contagious disease. Toronto General still didn't allow anyone within 10 feet of their entrances without being questioned first. 10 feet of outdoors between the entrance and pedestrians.

I would assume that if a very contagious air-born disease appeared that quarantine zone would be extended. A tunnel with uncontrollable airflow (trains make airflow unpredictable) would make it challenging to design, though certainly not impossible.

I was thinking the section between the hospital and the subway would act as some sort of airlock whereby you'd have to pass through a series of doors similar to how most institutions (and apartments) have a double set of doors. If they were that concerned with contagion if both sets of doors are open at the same time a third set could be built with a revolving door so that there is no direct and continuous air flow between sections.

So we'd have an entrance to the station, an entrance to the corridor connecting to the hospitals and then another entrance into the hospital itself. At any point any of the individual entrances can be sealed.

Subway ____/ \_/ \_/ \____

Corridor ----\ /--\ /--\ /---

Hospital ----(X)--(X)--(X)---

I think the door setup as I've got above means that the air gets sucked in the direction the doors open. This way there's no transference of contagion.

ONE HUMAN

September 27th, 2007, 05:50 PM

Subway ____/ \_/ \_/ \____

Corridor ----\ /--\ /--\ /---

Hospital ----(X)--(X)--(X)---

I think the door setup as I've got above means that the air gets sucked in the direction the doors open. This way there's no transference of contagion.

I'm giving you a gold star for that diagram. Keep up the good work. :)

Gil

October 27th, 2007, 09:07 AM

Rather than start a new thread I'll ask here. When was BCE Place rechristened Brookfield Place? The map the Star provided lists the building as BCE Place, though the online PATH map as well as the signs in front of the building say Brookfield. Did Bell/BCE move some or all of its operations from the building, thus they lose the naming rights or did Brookfield simply buy a larger share of the building complex?

I still refer to the building as BCE Place, not realizing the name change. When tourists ask where the Hockey Hall of Fame is, I simply point to the "pointy building with the green TD on the top" without referring to the name of the building.

[300]

Gil

November 11th, 2007, 07:50 AM

Otherwise, none of your connections are likely to happen. Buildings like The Met, and Pinnacle haven't been designed for it. 18 Yonge does, apparently, have a knockout wall in place for a connection.

I came across an article in the Homes section of the National Post today (http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/specials/posthomes/story.html?id=48a21147-d2d5-44e5-8bee-cb4f10d1a5da) on the Met regarding how so few of the new residents were signing up for parking spaces that they were actually able to scrap an entire underground parking level. The question now is what are they planning to do with that extra level? Leave it unfinished in the event they need it in the future or could they possibly develop it as an extension of the College Park PATH network?

Epi

November 11th, 2007, 08:47 PM

Again, like with the condo connections, access to the PATH should be through the main lobby of the hospitals. I assume that there are some sort of hermetic controls which separate the lobby from the rest of the hospital to prevent germs/contagions from getting in or out. Definitely some sort of separate ventellation system should be installed in the connector between the station and the hospitals. This is also why the PATH only connects to one subway station.

Connecting the hospitals is not really that great an idea. It would be a public health nightmare if anything ever got out. There's a reason why hospitals are generally sealed off to the public. Having something like this, even with 'airlocks' would still suck out and circulate a lot of air around that had no business being sucked out or circulated. As well, if this followed the general idea of what PATH really is, it would let tons of people who had no business being inside a hospital walk across the basement or lobby of the hospital. This would be disruptive for patient care, and would be disruptive in terms of a public health standpoint.

The way that this COULD work is to have a seperate underground road altogether that say ran under University Ave, with branches of tunnels to the hospitals. But that would be extremely costly, and not really what PATH is about (which basically connects basements of buildings together).

I also thought that there were existing connections between the various hospitals on University to allow for patient transfers between hospitals.

Why would you need to patient transfer between hospitals? If you need to, you use an ambulance.

In a bid to get the PATH up to Yorkville, would the U of T consider hooking up it's buildings or possibly the government offices along Bay St.? U of T would face the same issues as Ryerson but in their case there would be greater through traffic since the Ryerson network would simply be a spur branch. I'm not sure what kind of security concerns would arise by connecting the various ministerial buildings that line Bay and Wellesley. The access from Queen's Park station to Queen's Park is limited to certain parts of the day, perhaps the same could be done with the other buildings.

I don't think this would be practical. UofT does not have adequate basements in most of it's buildings. Certainly no basements that students actually go to on a regular basis aside from very few buildings (i.e. Stanford Flemming). This would require digging up the university grounds to install a completely new network of tunnels and basements to yet again make basement connectivity practical. No one is going to walk underground and back up to ground floor inbetween every building. All those stairs would make it impractical.

As well, considering UofT has a very nice leafy campus, it would certainly be against what a university is all about, which is having lots of people mingle on the grounds rather than act as commuters inbetween classes.

samsonyuen

November 12th, 2007, 06:03 AM

BCE Place changed its name in late July.

"Brookfield Properties (BPO: NYSE, TSX) today announced that BCE Place in Toronto will be renamed Brookfield Place following the expiry of a license agreement
with BCE. The renaming to Brookfield Place signifies the company’s long-term commitment to being a major commercial real estate presence in downtown Toronto."

torontobarfly

November 23rd, 2007, 01:56 AM

DrT

November 23rd, 2007, 03:00 AM

Gil

November 23rd, 2007, 03:27 AM

hi everyone

glad i stumbled across this thread as i have a couple of questions if anyone happens to know the answers

first, are there set hours as to when the path shuts down or does it vary from section to section?

also, and forgive me if this has been discussed as i haven't read all the posts, but what condos are currently connected to the downtown path and which ones are connected to the path at bloor-yorkville

thanks!!

The most notable restriction in terms of hours is the section through the Hudson's Bay store on Queen street. Since the PATH goes right through the department store that section is open around the store's hours. In the mornings I've seen it open as early as 8AM, with the store section roped off from the PATH. Closings however follow more strictly to the hours of the Bay meaning 9PM on Monday-Saturday and I think 7PM on Sunday and holidays.

Other sections or specifically connections have closing times. Most hotel connections close around midnight. I'm not sure what time the connection to City Hall closes. Probably around 11PM when the parking lot closes.

For the rest of the PATH, security does patrols so that you don't have people camping out overnight. I've been through the PATH as late as 1AM. Plus it's fully accessible on weekends and holidays (barring the restrictions at the Bay) even though most of the shops don't open.

Finally, I'm still in search of a PATH map through Yorkville. The best I could come up with is a composite from the various buildings. The only map of the Yorkville section I've ever seen came in a separate downtown map that Perly's used to do. Ever since they got bought out by Rand-McNally that particular feature has gone missing. I've been searching in used book stores to see if one turns up.

torontobarfly

November 24th, 2007, 09:41 PM

thanks for the responses

:)

DrT

April 4th, 2008, 02:55 PM

Proposed new tunnel from Union.
From The Star:

Tunnel would ease crowding on PATH
Apr 04, 2008 04:30 AM
John Spears
CITY HALL BUREAU

Toronto planners want to dig another pedestrian tunnel north from Union Station under York St. to connect with the business district, as well as widen sidewalks along York, which would reduce vehicle space to two lanes northbound.

The plan, outlined in a report to the works and infrastructure committee, points out that GO Transit expansion plans and the Union Station renovation will increase foot traffic to and from the station.

The existing PATH system – the warren of tunnels and underground malls under the downtown core – can't handle the projected increase, the report says.

Currently, 14,000 people stream north out of Union Station onto Front St. during the peak commuter hour, and 19,000 others flow into the PATH system.

By 2021, 24,000 passengers will be spilling onto Front St. during the peak hour, with 36,000 more using the PATH system.

The big question hanging over the project is financing, which is not in place.

But GO Transit staff have said they might cover one-third of the cost on behalf of the province. The report says city staff will seek federal as well as provincial funding if the project is approved.

The works committee will consider the proposal on Wednesday.

DrT

April 4th, 2008, 03:36 PM

Here is the link to the graphic:
http://www3.thestar.com/static/PDF/080404_a2-path.pdf

reddwarf

April 4th, 2008, 08:53 PM

Good plan. Now if the PATH could be expanded west from Metro Hall over to at least Festival Tower though I'd love it even further over to Charlotte. :)

Taller, Better

April 5th, 2008, 04:45 PM

Thanks for posting that one, Dr T. I had cut the article out and put it in my pocket meaning to post it.

Gil

April 10th, 2008, 04:05 PM

Here's the Post's take on the PATH expansion (http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/toronto/archive/2008/04/09/new-65m-path-tunnel-aims-to-fix-underground-congestion.aspx).

New $65M PATH tunnel aims to fix underground congestion
Posted: April 09, 2008, 6:47 PM by Rob Roberts Kuitenbrouwer

http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/toronto/PATH.jpg
Photo of the crowd heading for Union Station this afternoon by Peter J. Thompson, National Post

It’s not just up on the city streets that traffic is backed up. There’s overcrowding underground too, in the serpentine network of tunnels that link the city’s office core, known as the PATH.

The biggest bottleneck on the PATH is the point where it connects to Union Station. City counts show that 19,000 pedestrians exit the PATH during the morning peak period, crossing through the Union subway station and into Royal Bank Plaza, far more more than the 14,000 who walk out onto Front Street.

The city estimates that by 2021, the flow of people walking out of Union Station underground will almost double: “Existing PATH demand is forecast to increase to more than 36,000 hourly movements,” says a joint report from the city’s planning and transportation departments. “There is a clear need for a new northwest PATH connection to relieve current congestion.”

Today, council’s Public Works committee unanimously adopted a city plan to add a new tunnel to the PATH network. The job will be messy, intrenching and then refilling two blocks of York Street, from Front Street to Wellington Street West, with a T-section at its apex linking the new tunnel to First Canadian Place and the HSBC building at 70 York Street.

“It’s very exciting to think that, as busy and dynamic as the core is, it will get even busier,” Glen De Baeremaeker, the chair of Works, said after the meeting. “We have very limited options. We can’t say no to a report like this.”

The tunnel is also pricey, at $65-million for two blocks. Can we afford it? I asked Mr. De Baeremaeker.

“No,” he said. “GO will pay one third, we hope to get one-third from the feds, and get the rest from development charges as people build new office towers. They have a great vested financial interest in the PATH.”

This afternoon I walked from City Hall to Union Station via the shiny, glittery alternate universe that is the PATH. Retail lined almost every inch of my route: Baby Gap, Bell World, the LCBO, shoe stores, baby clothing stores. Clearly the PATH is where the money is in this town. The trickle of pedestrians became a gurgling stream as First Canadian Place empties in to Toronto-Dominion Centre, and a flood by the Royal Bank Plaza – a flood made up of the click-clacking of thousands of heels on the polished granite.

At Union Station at 5 p.m., I counted about 250 people in three minutes, opening the five sets of double doors from Royal Bank Plaza.

Then I walked back to TD Centre and climbed to the street: even on a gorgeous, sunny spring afternoon, there were twice as many people underground as above.
Those exiting TD Centre to the great outdoors J-walked, almost without exception, across the centre of Wellington Street in their rush down to Union: it’s too far to walk to the light at Bay or York. The city could put a crosswalk here to make this a safer walking route, which would be cheaper than a $65-million tunnel.

The PATH is great, especially in winter, but $65-million? I’m not sure it’s worth that much to encourage more mole-like behaviour. One problem at Union, as the report mentions, is that station design pushes passengers underground, rather than onto Front Street. Wisely, the report also suggests closing one lane of York Street in order to widen the sidewalk in front of the Royal York and on northward, to give room to those who choose air, sky and the occasional homeless person to the antiseptic realm of the great underground.

Still, people like the PATH, and it will only get busier with the completion of the Bay-Adelaide Tower, which was just a stump last time I looked but was, by yesterday, 27 storeys tall.

As Mr. De Baeremaeker notes, “We want to keep all the office towers here. We don’t want people migrating to the 905 belt. We want to do everything humanly possible to keep them here.”

sgups

April 11th, 2008, 03:37 AM

interesting aspect this. Was this expansion part of the Union renovation plans? Should they try to bundle this project with that for a better integrated design?

Gil

April 11th, 2008, 08:59 PM

interesting aspect this. Was this expansion part of the Union renovation plans? Should they try to bundle this project with that for a better integrated design?

I think it is a part of the rennovations. At least the access to the new tunnel is. There were presentation boards at Union earlier this year/late last year on options for the western access to Union Station. The option that won is the one being considered at the moment. They're just fiine tuning the details: connections to other buildings, alignment under York St., etc. Someone else will probably correct me if I've gotten the details wrong.

There's a map I did on the previous page adapted from the one included with the earlier Toronto Star story on PATH expansion. For those new to this thread it's worth a look to get your bearings.

Gil

April 30th, 2008, 08:10 PM

From today's Star (http://www.thestar.com/News/GTA/article/419823):

Council approves York St. tunnel
Apr 30, 2008 04:30 AM

Approved by city council:

• A $65 million pedestrian tunnel from Union Station up York St. to connect with the underground PATH system. GO Transit is prepared to kick in one-third of the cost of the tunnel, to be completed by 2012, when GO hopes to open its new terminal.

So the route labelled with the question mark is going ahead.
http://i20.************/10h7kf6.jpg

Toronto - West

April 30th, 2008, 10:30 PM

With respect to the proposed PATH expansion through the Met condos, I spoke with a sales rep prior to the Met and Encore ground breaking concerning such a possible expansion. The rep flat out stated that there was no intention to connect to College Park and Loblaws(if MLG ever gets converted). True, the cost would be relatively minimal compared to the York Street extension, but seeing as how College Park already has sufficient below grade retail, an extension to the Met condos would likely have to be funded by condo owners since attracting retail to this periphery may pose a challenge.

Jaye101

May 1st, 2008, 12:12 AM

Why would you need to patient transfer between hospitals? If you need to, you use an ambulance.

There are existing underground connections between Mount Sinai, Princess Margaret, Toronto General and Sick Kids, I believe.

Epi

May 1st, 2008, 05:36 AM

There are existing underground connections between Mount Sinai, Princess Margaret, Toronto General and Sick Kids, I believe.

You sure? Must be new... I worked in Mount Sinai for a year and I always had to go outside to get around to get my coffee at the Tim Horton's at Princess Margaret. I've also been all around the Sick Kids basement and I haven't found any tunnels, although I wasn't specifically looking for tunnels.

Tuscani01

May 1st, 2008, 05:42 AM

Based on what I have heard, Ryerson has no plans to join PATH. That map also shows a tunnel under Victoria street which doesn't even exist.

Jaye101

May 1st, 2008, 05:47 AM

You sure? Must be new... I worked in Mount Sinai for a year and I always had to go outside to get around to get my coffee at the Tim Horton's at Princess Margaret. I've also been all around the Sick Kids basement and I haven't found any tunnels, although I wasn't specifically looking for tunnels.

I believe they use them to transport dialysis machines from Toronto General, and patients since they're in such proximity. I heard a nurse refer to it when she had to bring a Dialysis Machine from Toronto General to Mount Sinai to care for one of my relatives.

Gil

May 2nd, 2008, 12:59 AM

Based on what I have heard, Ryerson has no plans to join PATH. That map also shows a tunnel under Victoria street which doesn't even exist.

The blue lines on the map were my additions. I also added the red lines through Ryerson. The other lines are what was produced by the Toronto Star graphic which I modified. It would be nice to have some sort of connection to Dundas station either through TLS or whatever they decide to do with Sam's.

I believe they use them to transport dialysis machines from Toronto General, and patients since they're in such proximity. I heard a nurse refer to it when she had to bring a Dialysis Machine from Toronto General to Mount Sinai to care for one of my relatives.

I had heard of the tunnels as well for transferring patients but couldn't confirm them so I just pencilled them in blue.

CrazyCanuck

May 2nd, 2008, 04:51 AM

There are existing underground connections between Mount Sinai, Princess Margaret, Toronto General and Sick Kids, I believe.

I've been in the depths of the TGH and I can confirm the underground connections. I don't believe they are part of PATH though.

Epi

May 2nd, 2008, 04:59 AM

I believe they use them to transport dialysis machines from Toronto General, and patients since they're in such proximity. I heard a nurse refer to it when she had to bring a Dialysis Machine from Toronto General to Mount Sinai to care for one of my relatives.

Ahhhh that's pretty cool then. I hope they closed them during SARS :)

allurban

May 2nd, 2008, 05:27 AM

A link between the Coach Terminal, Sick Kids, and St. Patrick station would be very nice to have.

One day the Coach Terminal will be replaced by an office tower, so it would make sense that the expanded PATH link would be included in that project.

Cheers, m

Gil

August 31st, 2008, 05:44 AM

I was at Front and Simcoe today and saw the progress on the connection to Lower Simcoe under the railway tracks. They've closed off all but one lane (for access to the parking lot under the Intercontinental/Convention Centre) south of Front Street. What I noticed with the work being done on the rest of Simcoe is that a structure which looks like an underground walkway is being built down the middle of Simcoe. Could this be an expansion of the PATH from Simcoe Place to the Skywalk along Station St.? It's often been mentioned as a goal of PATH to connect the Convention Centre to Simcoe Place/CBC Centre. If they couldn't get the go-ahead for an all-access connection to the Convention Centre, this could be their way of getting around it.

urban 2.0

September 1st, 2008, 08:15 AM

There should be a link between Eaton Centre and the office complex to the North of Dundas - towards the Canadian Tire section of the mall - and extend up via the ally network to College Park

Tuscani01

September 1st, 2008, 08:06 PM

There should be a link between Eaton Centre and the office complex to the North of Dundas - towards the Canadian Tire section of the mall - and extend up via the ally network to College Park

There is already a connection between the Eaton Centre and the office complex to the north of Dundas, though another connection right by the entrance to Canadian Tire would be great for CT!

Kappa21

September 3rd, 2008, 05:59 PM

I would prefer a connection underground from the Office on the north side of Dundas connecting it with the new building instead of going threw the TTC..... kinda of a hassle and would be cool if it was underground like it is in some european cities where there is no pedestrians.
That place can be a jungle sometimes....

Epi

September 3rd, 2008, 08:56 PM

You mean Atrium on Bay?

I think that entire intersection needs to be reworked a bit in the underground portion, as it is hard to navigate through a subway station, multiple stairs, and tons of people going in every direction because of the station. I guess with the scramble up top, they are going to say, why bother fixing the underground, just walk up top.

Homer J. Simpson

September 3rd, 2008, 08:58 PM

^I couldn't agree more, Yonge & Dundas underground is really confusing even if you know where you want to go.

I would like to see them re-work it because that area has so many pedestrians.

Kappa21

September 3rd, 2008, 09:31 PM

^^ If they are building an extension to Ryerson than they can fix it up.
That thing is a bitch, honestly.....

Homer J. Simpson

September 3rd, 2008, 09:44 PM

Although not exactly a part of PATH......... I have always hated the layout of Dundas Station.

I find it and the whole arrangement maddening.

rbt

September 4th, 2008, 01:02 AM

Although not exactly a part of PATH......... I have always hated the layout of Dundas Station.

I find it and the whole arrangement maddening.

Pretty sure that will change in the next few years.

TTC fire upgrades (~ $180M over 5 years) will improve ventilation and add second exits to stations. Pretty sure Dundas is considered to have a single exit and will probably get a second exit at the north end of the station.

ggaleazz

September 4th, 2008, 04:04 AM

I agree they should add a northern exit around the Gould/Edward area. I think that an entry/exit there would draw a fair number of riders (even if it were automated entrances) and thus lesson pressure on the main gates. Heck the same could be done in the south as well.

DENTROBATE54

September 4th, 2008, 05:59 AM

^^ And that'd be our seamless Ryerson U connection right there! :okay:

Kappa21

September 4th, 2008, 02:12 PM

Where would you have room to put the entry and exit in Gould and Edward?

I am thinking near the Sam the Record man?

Tuscani01

September 5th, 2008, 12:04 AM

Pretty sure that will change in the next few years.

TTC fire upgrades (~ $180M over 5 years) will improve ventilation and add second exits to stations. Pretty sure Dundas is considered to have a single exit and will probably get a second exit at the north end of the station.

Ryerson's initial plans for the Sam the Record Man site included a subway exit from Dundas Station. Work is expected to start this year on the site so we should find out soon if the exit is still in the plan.

ggaleazz

September 5th, 2008, 12:58 AM

Gil

September 5th, 2008, 02:56 AM

I'm not sure how far north of Dundas the station tunnel is, it would be a factor in where the exits are placed. I think the Edward exit would have to run along Edward. The Gould exit could be done the same way or incorporated in Ryerson's renovation of the Sam's building

I'd love for the new subway entrance to be built into the redeveloped Sam's site. I'm sure they could lock off the rest of the building from the publicly accessible subway entrance when they need to.

If the platform ends short of Gould or Edward they could add an extension mezzanine like what's done at the north end of Queen station. The depth of the subway tunnel will however dictate whether such a thing would be possible. If the line is quite shallow there also, we'd most likely see more underpass tunnels to connect both platforms.

This could be a catalyst for the PATH connection northward through the Delta Chelsea and on to College Park, especially if they could get an exit as far north as Elm.

ggaleazz

September 5th, 2008, 03:42 AM

I'd love for the new subway entrance to be built into the redeveloped Sam's site. I'm sure they could lock off the rest of the building from the publicly accessible subway entrance when they need to.

If the platform ends short of Gould or Edward they could add an extension mezzanine like what's done at the north end of Queen station. The depth of the subway tunnel will however dictate whether such a thing would be possible. If the line is quite shallow there also, we'd most likely see more underpass tunnels to connect both platforms.

This could be a catalyst for the PATH connection northward through the Delta Chelsea and on to College Park, especially if they could get an exit as far north as Elm.

I think I've seen schematics for ttc's subway stations before, maybe not dundas station though.

IIRC there is a ventilation grate thingy at the south east corner of Yonge and Gould that might indicate that the station platforms aren't to far south.

urban 2.0

September 5th, 2008, 03:56 AM

An enterence on Gould would be perfect - it's a quite street - plus it would take pressure off the sidewalk traffic on the n/e side of Yonge

Gil

January 13th, 2009, 06:56 PM

Not quite an expansion story, unless you count the view upward. It seems the Post just grabbed onto this story and ran with it. One story seems to have been canibalized by the other though!

City planners like PATH skylights proposal (http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/toronto/archive/2009/01/12/city-planners-like-path-skylights-proposal.aspx)

City planners like PATH skylights proposal
Posted: January 12, 2009, 6:57 PM
By Michael McKiernan, National Post

http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/toronto/oculusone.jpg
http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/toronto/oculustwo.jpg

An urban design team has proposed bubble-like skylights for the downtown PATH system, hoping to bring natural light underground and help pedestrians both above and below ground to orient themselves.

Serena Lee of Raw Design said the PATH, which winds its way through various downtown developments in a way that bears no relation to the street grid above, can be disorienting.

“I use it regularly and I’m always getting lost,” said Ms. Lee, who with partners Derrick Lai and Stephanie Au was a finalist in Spacing Magazine’s ThinkToronto urban design competition. (http://spacing.ca/thinktoronto/)

Their doughnut-shaped ‘‘oculus’’ design, and those of the other finalists, are on display this week in the rotunda at city hall. The exhibition, which accepted entries only from designers under 35 years of age, sought any ideas to improve Toronto’s public space.

The convex reflective surface of Oculus means pedestrians can get a 360-degree view of what is going on above them, giving them a better sense of where they are.

Ms. Lee has yet to speak with anyone at the city, but she thinks they should be interested: “Hopefully this will get some of them to notice it,” she said today.

And so it has. James Parakh, a senior urban designer with the City of Toronto, found himself drawn to the display on his way to work.

“I like the idea. It’s something that we’re already looking at,” he said. “We try to promote connections that bring natural light into the PATH and that visibility helps orient people.”

Mr. Parakh cited the Bay Adelaide Centre, still under construction, as a future site where skylights in open space would connect PATH users with the world above ground.

For Ms. Lee, her team’s design is more than just a wayfinding project. She thinks Torontonians would embrace the distinctive design.
“We think it can be a sculptural piece,” she said. “If they appear all over the city then it can become identified with the city of Toronto.”

Ms. Lee is confident that once technical issues, such as the variable depth of the ceiling in the PATH system, have been ironed out, the proposal could work in practice. The complex ownership of PATH property also needs to be addressed — each section is owned and controlled by the owner of the property it runs through — although Ms. Lee claims this could present sponsorship opportunities for individual rings.

The exhibition runs until Sunday. The winning entry, Mike Wilson’s “5 Minutes,” envisages touch-screen maps outside every subway station.

Labels would identify tourist attractions, businesses and other notable stops within a walking time of, predictably, five minutes. Street signs placed along routes would keep users on track to their destination.

Other finalists included a winding meditation path above the Don River for Sikhs to perform death rites, and adapted bus shelters where users can exchange books.

Think Toronto juror Pamela Robinson, an assistant professor in urban planning at Ryerson University, said she hopes the competition returns next year with an even bigger collection of entries.

“It’s evidence people under 35 are not disinterested or disengaged,” she said. “If you ask them to, they can come up with potent innovative ideas, which is good for our city.”

Designers see a PATH for natural light (http://www.nationalpost.com/news/story.html?id=1170034)

Designers see a PATH for natural light
Spacing Magazine; Competition exhibits displayed at city hall
Michael McKiernan, National Post
Published: Tuesday, January 13, 2009

An urban design team has proposed bubble-like skylights for the downtown PATH system, hoping to bring natural light underground and help pedestrians both above and below ground to orient themselves.

Serena Lee of Raw Design said the PATH, which winds its way through various downtown developments in a way that bears no relation to the street grid above, can be disorienting.

"I use it regularly, and I'm always getting lost," said Ms. Lee, who with partners Derrick Lai and Stephanie Au was a finalist in Spacing Magazine's ThinkToronto urban design competition.

Their doughnut-shaped ''oculus'' design, and those of the other finalists, are on display this week in the rotunda at city hall. The exhibition, which accepted entries only from designers under 35 years of age, sought any ideas to improve Toronto's public space.

The convex reflective surface of Oculus means pedestrians can get a 360-degree view of what is going on above them, giving them a better sense of where they are.

Ms. Lee has yet to speak to anyone at the city, but she thinks they should be interested: "Hopefully, this will get some of them to notice it," she said yesterday.

And so it has. James Parakh, a senior urban designer with the City of Toronto, found himself drawn to the display on his way to work.

"I like the idea. It's something that we're already looking at," he said. "We try to promote connections that bring natural light into the PATH and that visibility helps orient people."

For Ms. Lee, her team's design is more than just a way-finding project. She thinks Torontonians would embrace the distinctive design.

"We think it can be a sculptural piece," she said. "If they appear all over the city, then it can become identified with the city of Toronto."

Ms. Lee is confident that once technical issues, such as the variable depth of the ceiling in the PATH system, have been ironed out, the proposal could work in practice. The complex ownership of PATH property also needs to be addressed -- each section is owned and controlled by the owner of the property it runs through.

The exhibition runs until Sunday. The winning entry, Mike Wilson's 5 Minutes, envisages touch-screen maps outside every subway station. Labels would identify tourist attractions, businesses and other notable stops within a walking time of, predictably, five minutes. Street signs placed along routes would keep users on track to their destination.

Other finalists included a winding meditation path above the Don River for Sikhs to perform death rites, and adapted bus shelters where users can exchange books.

Think Toronto juror Pamela Robinson, an assistant professor in urban planning at Ryerson University, said she hopes the competition returns next year with an even bigger collection of entries.

"It's evidence people under 35 are not disinterested or disengaged," she said. "If you ask them to, they can come up with potent innovative ideas, which is good for our city."

Homer J. Simpson

January 13th, 2009, 07:19 PM

^Now that would be totally amazing!

ggaleazz

January 13th, 2009, 07:31 PM

sidewalks are narrow as it is in many places. This probably would only be usefull in areas where the path runs under parks and such.

Gil

January 21st, 2009, 11:59 PM

I was going through the Richmond-Adelaide Centre and noticed a lot of the shops have been closed. It looks like some sort of renovation work is going to be done rather than just the bad economy as a large section of the concourse is now devoid of shops. Any idea as to what it may be? For reference it's the section immediately south of the Sheraton Centre in what's labelled 111 Richmond St. West and the Federal Building on the PATH map. My best guess is that they're simply going to straighten out the alignment as that section makes a lot of bends with grade changes involved. This area is roughly where a connection eastward to the Bay-Adelaide Centre would end up.

Epi

January 22nd, 2009, 12:26 AM

Would be cool if they used maybe a glass floor for people to walk over then at street level. That would work quite well too without compromising sidewalk space.

sgups

January 23rd, 2009, 05:00 PM

^^^ I was at the thinkToronto exhibit organized by spacing magazine last weekend. There was a similar idea there where they had round sky lights placed wherever possible on the sidewalk. I do think the city planners liked that idea.
National post article. (http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/toronto/archive/2009/01/12/city-planners-like-path-skylights-proposal.aspx)

valantino

January 23rd, 2009, 07:11 PM

Maybe they should remove the sidewalks at street level for an extra lane of traffic ;) I'm sure that's the original thought behind the creation of the PATH system but I prefer it to remain an indoor mall.

valantino

January 23rd, 2009, 07:21 PM

For reference it's the section immediately south of the Sheraton Centre in what's labelled 111 Richmond St. West and the Federal Building on the PATH map.

A new tower and atrium are planned for the Richmond Adelaide Centre which involves the demolition of the Federal Building. I can only assume some major changes will have to be made to PATH for this to eventually proceed. (beside shutting down the links on the eastern half of the property)

Gil

January 24th, 2009, 03:13 AM

^^
Thanks for that answer. The more I passed by that section of the PATH the more I realized that that was probably what was going on. All the connections to the building lobby from the PATH were sealed off. There is now only the direct street access onto Richmond.

So with the redevelopment of this section of the PATH (with the corresponding building above it), would it be possible to create a connection to the Four Season Centre for the Performing Arts? Given the layout of the neighbouring Sheraton Hotel, I don't think they could build a connection there unless they ran it immediately beneath Queen St.

AKSR

January 28th, 2009, 08:46 AM

I wonder how they're going to shovel the snow on the street during the winter with that round thing in the way.

sgups

January 28th, 2009, 11:11 PM

I wonder how they're going to shovel the snow on the street during the winter with that round thing in the way.the same way they shovel sidewalks when there is street furniture in the way?:?

AKSR

January 28th, 2009, 11:42 PM

the same way they shovel sidewalks when there is street furniture in the way?:?

I think if there are things in the way they skip shoveling parts of it. Like when they shovel the streets. If there are cars parked there, they skip it. The streets won't be shoveled well if there are things in the middle blocking it. I hate when cars park outside on the road and block the snow shovelers, the streets can't be shoveled properly.

Gil

February 5th, 2009, 07:56 PM

An interesting "What if?" story from yesterday's 24 Hours:

We nearly buried the cars
Feb 4, 2009
Astrid Poei, 24 HOURS

In the early 1960s, when cities were growing at a rapid post-war rate, architects toyed with the idea that, in the future, cars and pedestrians would no longer be able to co-exist in urban environments.

In 1963, Toronto planners considered a downtown that would have put miles of roadway under the ground for vehicle traffic, leaving the downtown streets as pedestrian-only.

“Those ideas aren’t generally so much in favour now,” University of Toronto professor Larry Richards said. “People are more interested in more dynamic vital mixing of modes of systems and modes of circulation.”
So, instead, almost the reverse came to be in the development of the PATH in the early 1970s, where cars and people still mix above the horizon and pedestrians have an extended shopping complex below the ground— the world’s largest, employing 5,000 people in the 1,200 shops among 27 km of shopping arcades under the downtown core .

Despite the PATH’s success, Richards says more needs to be done to improve the system’s connectivity.

“It’s not really connecting in an attractive or viable way,” said Richards. “I think it’s pretty successful but it’s not fully realized as a total system.”

But it’s probably still better than trying to make a left turn onto Yonge St. 100 ft. below the earth’s crust.

http://i44.************/2vtpfh1.jpg
City of Toronto Archives, Series 10, Item 162 PG0021
In 1963, planners proposed a pedestrian-only downtown, with vehicle traffic below the ground.

CrazyCanuck

February 5th, 2009, 08:15 PM

Imagine how polluted the air would be down below.

Jaye101

February 5th, 2009, 08:21 PM

Woah, I had a lecture with that guy last semester.

Yeah, I don't really like that idea at all.

rbt

February 5th, 2009, 09:08 PM

Imagine how polluted the air would be down below.

My first thought was the huge number of ramps required on the side streets.

KGB

February 6th, 2009, 12:02 AM

Imagine how polluted the air would be down below.

With zero emissions vehicles close to viable on a large scale, this idea has possibilities for the future.

My first thought was the huge number of ramps required on the side streets.

Yea...obviously it couldn't realistically mimic the surface grid system, or connect with it everywhere. It would most likely be effective on some main arteries, with connections to the surface streets on a few choice ramps around the perimeter of the downtown (Bloor, Lakeshore, DVP, Bathurst/Dufferin or something to that effect).

It's a great idea for streets like King, Queen, etc, where we need a solution anyway to allow for ROW for the the streetcar system. Retrofitting all the current buildings underground for deliveres and entrances would be difficult, if not impossible. Then there's the water issue...not to mention the cost of such a thing.

But, as a concept, I think it deserves some serious thought.

KGB

Gil

February 22nd, 2009, 10:29 PM

I thought I'd post something on the thread's 2nd birthday...

A new tower and atrium are planned for the Richmond Adelaide Centre which involves the demolition of the Federal Building. I can only assume some major changes will have to be made to PATH for this to eventually proceed. (beside shutting down the links on the eastern half of the property)

I went by again, the Federal Building is next to the one I'm talking about. The 111 and 121 Richmond St. West have been sealed off from the PATH while the connection to the Federal Building still remains. I used it last week! If they were going to demolish the Federal Building, they'd only need to seal up the access from the rest of the PATH.

I've pulled up an older (and slightly more detailed) PATH map and coloured the section in question red (near the centre of the map). The Federal Building is the one east of it right above the Richmond in Richmond Adelaide Centre.

http://i40.************/4r6e1k.jpg

Any idea what's going on here. I checked out Oxford's property listing for the site and it says that there are no vacancies available in the building. Are they planning something here? Possibly a refurb since Richmond-Adelaide II been stalled?

Here's the corridor heading south out of the Sheraton Centre. All the shops have been closed up. It continues around the bend at the end of the shop where a Timothy's Coffee and (I think) George Brown College-run daycare centre once stood.

http://i39.************/34fnt5s.jpg

Just to the right of the photo is a directory, which hasn't been updated showing all the shops plus the access to the street level lobby.

Mollywood

February 23rd, 2009, 12:40 AM

With Bay/Adelaide finished it will be so much easier and faster to get to the Eaton Centre, from Front St.

Gil

March 12th, 2009, 07:10 AM

I was finally able to track down a copy of the Perly's map with the Yorkville PATH segment. It's dated 1990. Interesting to see how much downtown has changed since then!

http://i41.************/rm19bn.jpg

Here's a close-up of the Yorkville section:

http://i42.************/2wpqec2.jpg

Not much has changed in this respect. Having checked out the area while waiting for We Will Rock You to start, the only missing segment seems to be north into Cumberland Arcade from Cumberland Terrace and the exit through 80 Bloor St. West.

With the redevelopment over at 1 Bloor St. East, I'm hoping there'll be a connection to the Hudson Bay Centre through to the Xerox Centre and maybe into the building that houses Canwest Global. Right now the only thing connecting both two sides of Bloor Street is Bloor station itself.

Going through the Yorkville PATH, I'm surprised at how much later it stays open given its much smaller size. Could the residential access play a role in this as I noticed a lot of people walking their dogs underground?

So now we have it. I might take what I've learned and come up with a PATH-style map for the area. Anyone have any possible extensions that I could pencil in? There's that small mall at Yonge and Charles that could possibly be connected to the Manulife Centre and/or 1 Bloor East.

Gil

June 12th, 2009, 06:54 AM

An interesting article came up in the National Post (http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/toronto/archive/2009/06/08/65m-path-expansion-raises-hopes-of-waterfront-to-bloor-system.aspx) the other day. A lot of the details aren't anything new, but just confirmation of a couple of things.

$65M PATH expansion raises hopes of waterfront-to-Bloor system
Posted: June 08, 2009, 10:46 PM
By Emily Senger, National Post

http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/toronto/starbuckss.jpg
Commuters pass a busy Starbucks after leaving Union Station in Toronto's underground. Photo by Tyler Anderson / National Post

Commuters pour off the subways, GO trains and buses before pressing north, past the Union Station hot dog vendors wiping down their metal carts, toward the glass towers along Bay Street and University Avenue.

It’s shortly after 8 a.m. and the sidewalks aren’t wide enough to support the crush of commuters during peak hours, so when many commuters get off the subway they stay deep underground in the 27-kilometre maze of tunnels known as the PATH.

The city has plans to ease this commuter congestion by extending the PATH from Union Station under York Street to Wellington Street. The $65-million project is funded by the city and the province, and is just one of multiple expansions that will extend the PATH south toward Lakeshore Boulevard and north toward College Park in coming years.

City planners hope the York Street PATH extension will be complete by 2012, but the beginnings of the tunnel system date back to 1900 when T. Eaton Co. joined its main store on Yonge Street to its bargain annex. More than a century later, the tunnels snake for 27 km of retail-lined space underground, connecting buildings from Front Street past Dundas Square. Eventually, the PATH could expand as far south as Queens Quay and as far north as Bloor Street, according to Pam McConnell, the councillor for Toronto Centre-Rosedale.

Expanding the underground pathway comes with some growing pains. The city doesn’t get provincial or federal funding for the PATH. While the city and the province are fronting money for the York Street extension, most new PATH expansions are only possible by partnering with private developments. “We’re trying to use each and every development in this grid as an opportunity,” Ms. McConnell said.

This might mean developers are required to put a knock-out wall along potential PATH expansion zones, instead of a concrete one. The city has say over who can connect to the PATH and provides the signs and maps to help pedestrians navigate the tunnels. Once a building is connected, the walkway space is owned by the private building owner above it.

The decision to expand along with new private developments means the PATH follows the buildings above, rather than the street grid. This can be confusing to tourists and other PATH rookies.

“For first-time users it’s a little disorienting, but once you’re down here, you get the hang of it,” said Manos Sigalas who works in the Royal Bank Plaza and uses the PATH for daily coffee runs.

Although the city views each new development as a potential for PATH expansion, new sections must be able to support retail, such as coffee shops, food courts and doctors offices, said James Parakh, a senior urban designer with the city.

“We don’t want it to be just a series of tunnels,” he said.

Mr. Parakh said the PATH is unlikely to expand further west toward Spadina Avenue, where there is more residential housing. As the PATH continues its slow expansion, Larry Bourne, a University of Toronto geography professor and Cities Centre interim director, said the city needs to find a balance between future development below ground and vibrancy on downtown streets. “Visitors I take downtown to King and Bay are amazed that there is no retailing,” Prof. Bourne said. “They ask, ‘Where is it? Is it all in the suburbs?’ That’s an example of where everything is just sucked downstairs.”

Mr. Parakh said the city always prioritizes development above the PATH, to ensure the surface is pedestrian-friendly. “It provides an alternative pedestrian route,” Mr. Parakh said. “You can use it, or not use it.”

While the city beautifies the space above ground, the heated-in-winter and air-conditioned-in-summer PATH will spread south and north toward towering new developments.

Next year, a new section of the PATH will connect the Air Canada Centre to a 50-storey retail and condo building called Maple Leaf Square. Eventually, four other future high-rises near York Street and Lakeshore Boulevard will join.

Ms. McConnell said she hopes this southern development is the beginning of a push that will take the tunnels south across Lakeshore Boulevard all the way down to Queens Quay and the waterfront.

Plans for expansion north of Dundas Street are longer term, but the 75-storey Aura condo development near College Park at Gerrard Street was required to put a knock-out wall along Gerrard Street, said Raz Dhanji, vice-president of sales and marketing for Canderel Stoneridge. “It’s part of what the city wants as part of our overall approval process,” Mr. Dhanji said.

Mr. Dhanji said the Aura building will be complete in 2012, but the PATH will not connect to it until a still-unconfirmed later date.

If the PATH connects to the Aura building, it will then be connected all the way to the College Park subway station.

Ms. McConnell said there is also potential to connect the PATH to the four hospitals in the area and beyond.

“Perhaps even, in the very far future, we can get all the way up to Bloor,” Ms. McConnell said.

The PATH map I originally posted is continually getting tweaked as other projects come along. Still working on the Yorkville portion as well. It'll be a while though before both sections get connected into a single network.

Gil

July 21st, 2009, 11:46 PM

Strange source, but Fox Business News (http://www.foxbusiness.com/story/markets/industries/finance/brookfield-properties-achieves-substantial-completion-bay-adelaide-centre-west/) is reporting that the Bay-Adelaide Centre looks like it will be hooked up to the PATH just in time for the Ryerson students to make use of it when they head back to school in September. Any word on whether they've reopened the corridor through the RBC Centre between Simcoe Place and Metro Hall? Both the Telus Tower and Maple Leaf Square are coming along as well and hopefully will be ready for late this year or early next year.

Wednesday, July 01, 2009
Brookfield Properties Achieves Substantial Completion on Bay Adelaide Centre West in Toronto
Comtex TORONTO, Jul 01, 2009 (BUSINESS WIRE)

Brookfield Properties Corporation (BPO: 8.39, 0.03, 0.36%: NYSE, TSX) and its Canadian-based subsidiary, BPO Properties Ltd. (BPP: TSX) today announced that Bay Adelaide Centre West - a new, 51-storey, 1.2-million-square-foot office tower in the heart of downtown Toronto's financial core - has been certified substantially complete. The building is 73% pre-leased to major firms such as KPMG, Heenan Blaikie, Goodmans and Fasken Martineau DuMoulin. Most of these tenants have already commenced work on their new premises.

"We are proud to be the first landlord in 17 years to deliver to the Toronto market a modern, architecturally advanced office building that will provide our tenants with an environmentally friendly and technologically efficient workplace," said Tom Farley, President & CEO of Canadian Commercial Operations for Brookfield Properties.

Bay Adelaide West, built to achieve the LEED Gold standard (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design), was designed by WZMH Partners. The 11-storey historic facade of the former National Building has been integrated into the design, rebuilt and restored to its 1926 grandeur. Toronto's PATH system, 27 kilometers of public walkway and retail located one level below grade, will be completed in September with the connection through Bay Adelaide Centre into Scotia Plaza to the south and to The Bay department store to the north.

Bay Adelaide Centre West is the first significant office development project completed in the city's financial core since 1992. Bay Adelaide Centre West is the first phase of a 2.6-million-square-foot project; phases two and three of the complex will likely be a mix of office and residential.

"Bay Adelaide Centre represents a major achievement within our development portfolio," said Ric Clark, Chief Executive Officer of Brookfield Properties. "It is the fifth office building in our North American portfolio to be delivered in the past twelve months, it marks the successful completion of our final active development, and it came in ahead of schedule and under budget."

Brookfield Properties Profile

One of North America's largest commercial real estate companies, Brookfield Properties owns, develops and manages premier office properties in major U.S. and Canadian cities. The portfolio is comprised of interests in 108 properties totaling 75 million square feet in the downtown cores of New York, Boston, Washington, D.C., Los Angeles, Houston, Toronto, Calgary and Ottawa. Landmark assets include the World Financial Center in Manhattan, Brookfield Place in Toronto, Bank of America Plaza in Los Angeles and Bankers Hall in Calgary. The company's common shares trade on the NYSE and TSX under the symbol BPO. For more information, visit www.brookfieldproperties.com.

BPO Properties Profile

BPO Properties Ltd., 89% owned by Brookfield Properties Corporation, is a Canadian company that invests in real estate, focusing on the ownership and value enhancement of premier office properties. The current property portfolio is comprised of interests in 27 commercial properties totaling 18.1 million square feet and five development sites totaling 5.7 million square feet. Landmark properties include First Canadian Place in Toronto and Bankers Hall in Calgary. BPO Properties' common shares trade on the TSX under the symbol BPP. For more information, visit www.bpoproperties.com.

Toronto2008

July 23rd, 2009, 06:24 AM

Gil

October 16th, 2009, 07:52 PM

With the Bay-Adelaide Centre, Telus Tower and RBC Centre completed or nearing completion it seems the New York Times (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/14/realestate/commercial/14toronto.html?_r=1) has noticed, given the economy it's a strange bit of good news. The PATH network should start to see some substatial additions with these additions.

Square Feet
A Rare Building Boom Up North
By ALBERT WARSON
Published: October 13, 2009

TORONTO — The financial district of this city, the fifth-largest metropolitan area in North America, with a population of 5.4 million, is the scene of an exceptional flurry of development, especially in light of the recession.

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2009/10/14/business/14torontoA-nrml.jpg
Steve Payne for The New York Times
A view of the financial district of Toronto, which is experiencing pent-up demand after years of little construction.

Three green towers with a combined 3.1 million square feet of office space are opening before the end of the year in the downtown financial district. In addition, within a 20-minute walk, three high-rise condominium-hotel towers costing about 1.23 billion Canadian dollars (about $1.19 billion) will open next year.

This unusual burst of construction has rejuvenated the lower edge of the Bay Street financial district. The district has also projected to the south into a vacant 30-acre site across Front Street toward the Lake Ontario waterfront.

Despite the worldwide economic downturn, “Toronto’s real estate investment fundamentals and its place as Canada’s financial capital are more sound than most international capitals — New York included,” said Blake Hutcheson, a partner and head of global real estate investing at Mount Hallet Capital, a New York-based private equity fund.

He said the torrent of development in Toronto’s financial district was the culmination of a process that had taken 20 years “from concept to completion.” The three new downtown office towers were started before the recession.

Their developers have preleased more than two-thirds of the space, taking advantage of pent-up demand for modern office space. No significant office towers had been built in the financial district for 17 years, according to the city’s planning department.

The first of the financial district towers to be completed was the 51-story 1.2-million-square-foot Bay Adelaide Centre West, developed by a partnership of the Brookfield Properties Corporation, based in New York, and BPO Properties Ltd., based in Toronto. It opened this month and has been 73 percent preleased to the accounting giant KPMG and other tenants.

The name of the tower includes the word “West” because two more phases, encompassing another 2.6 million square feet of space, are planned. Construction of this first tower, which cost 308 million Canadian dollars, actually began almost two decades ago but was aborted after the foundation was completed in 1991, during an earlier recession, when Toronto’s office vacancy rates hit 20 percent.

Tom Farley, president and chief executive for Brookfield’s Canadian commercial operations, says the new building is the first high-rise office building in downtown Toronto to be awarded a Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design gold rating. He said that the building would have “an estimated 40 percent energy savings relative to other buildings built to the Canadian Model National Energy Code,” another voluntary standard that gives builders green bragging rights

Another new building, the RBC Centre, a 43-story tower with a 10-story podium and three underground parking levels, is the Royal Bank of Canada’s new head office. It was developed at a cost of about 420 million Canadian dollars by the Cadillac Fairview Corporation of Toronto on behalf of its parent, the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan. The new tower, which is to open later this month, is at the edge of the financial district, in a thriving entertainment district that includes a circular concert hall, an opulent 1900s-era theater, and other entertainment venues, restaurants, bars and recycled period buildings turned into offices, studios and loft condos.

The final new building, the 30-story Telus Tower, which is costing about 250 million Canadian dollars, is on a corner of the windswept 30-acre former railway lands, which have been abandoned for about three decades. It is to be completed next month. The site is near Union Station, the country’s busiest passenger transportation hub, used by about 250,000 passengers each work day.

Peter Menkes, the president of Menkes Developments of Toronto, the developer of the tower, says the building is 82 percent leased by Telus Business Solutions of Vancouver, which provides communications services across Canada.

The Hospitals of Ontario Pension Plan of Toronto and Halcyon Real Estate Partners Fund, a New York-based institutional real estate equity fund, are joint venture partners with Menkes. “Nearly filling the building space in a difficult leasing environment was an accomplishment,” Mr. Menkes said.

The new buildings will all provide access to the 16.8-mile underground PATH system, a climate-controlled retail, service and food walkway winding under most of the office towers downtown, with access to the subway. The office buildings will also be connected by the PATH to Union Station, which itself will be redeveloped in 2010 at a cost of 640 million Canadian dollars.

The three luxury hotel-condominiums that are under construction are in the downtown Bay Street financial district or within a few blocks of it. They are the 70-story Trump International Hotel and Tower, which is to cost 500 million Canadian dollars; the 53-story Ritz-Carlton and Residences at the Ritz-Carlton, with a price tag of 300 million Canadian dollars; and the 65-story Living Shangri-La Toronto, projected at 430 million Canadian dollars. They are expected to open next year or early in 2011.

All of these properties are expected to be attractive to executives doing business in the financial district, and they will have conference facilities. The upper stories will be used for residential condominiums, a booming sector in Toronto. Another building just starting to go up in the area is 18 York Street, a 26-story tower across the street from Telus Towers. It is expected to open in the fall of 2011.

GWL Realty Advisers of Toronto is developing the tower for the British Columbia Investment Management Corporation of Vancouver. PricewaterhouseCoopers is expected to be the principal tenant.

Kaid Al-Ani, an associate partner of the Mitchell Partnership of Toronto, which is designing its mechanical systems, says 18 York Street will be noteworthy for its cooling system, which will circulate cold water drawn from Lake Ontario.

Doug Webber, a planner who leads the green practice for Toronto-based Halsall Associates Ltd., an engineering consulting firm responsible for green and sustainability features at 18 York Street, says all of these new buildings “meet several city of Toronto planning objectives, including expansion of the downtown business district, employment growth, transit-oriented development and revitalization of the area surrounding Union Station.”

While it seems surprising to have all this activity during a recession, there was an acute need for new construction in the financial district, according to John O’Bryan, a vice chairman of CB Richard Ellis Ltd., a commercial real estate services company, in Toronto.

Until this year, the newest buildings there were almost 20 years old, and a number of major tenants had been pushing for more modern buildings with larger and more efficient floor plates and green qualities, he said.

Many of them also preferred to be downtown because financial employees are seen as increasingly eager to live in condos downtown.

Mr. O’Bryan noted that most of the tenants in the first two buildings came out of existing downtown buildings, leaving huge blocks of space to refill. “The older buildings that tenants left had never been retrofitted, and yet were always full,” Mr. O’Bryan said. “Owners will now retrofit those old buildings and fill them up over time.”

So here's what the PATH looks like now along with some revised connections pending approval or construction:

http://i33.************/rwsxol.jpg

I've completed the connection through the Bay-Adelaide Centre even though the PATH concourse hasn't been opened to the public. There's a trompe l'oeil sign at the connection from Scotia Plaza heralding the opening in September.

http://i35.************/1110bo5.jpg

Here's a more recent pic of the sign which has advanced a few meters into the connecting tunnel. At least it's a little harder to see the opening date!

http://i37.************/efqfq1.jpg

The tunnel is blocked off with a sign saying that the "PATH connection from Bay Adelaide Centre, The Bay and The Eaton Centre opening soon." Anyone have any ideas as to when?

Me Too

December 1st, 2009, 06:55 PM

The PATH connection between Scotia Plaza and The Bay-Eaton Centre, through Bay Adelaide Centre, opened today. A food court and several stores are outlined but none are open yet.

UrbanPrincess

January 15th, 2010, 06:10 PM

Gil

January 16th, 2010, 05:49 AM

the BAC connection is heaven sent. Shaves a good 5 minutes off walking to Yonge/Dundas. Now its just a matter of time before they get their food court up and running. Tim Horton's can only hold the fort for so long

I found out about the opening the first day it became available back in December and love it. A Thai Island has opened up at the other end of the food court. A Richtree will be moving in too just past the food court. At the entrance from Scotia Plaza there's a Second Cup. I think the lower level of the Bay is opening for business earlier due to the BAC access. Then again, it could have been due to the Christmas rush, I haven't been by in the morning since December.

ssiguy2

January 18th, 2010, 05:38 AM

UrbanPrincess

January 18th, 2010, 04:06 PM

Grill it up has also opened beside Timmies. and Shoppers Drug Mart will be coming soon. It's not as busy, probably for a variety of reasons like more people work along university or they are unaware of it being opened. It will be busy once the businesses open up. I'm sure many people will use the services and food outlets once opened. It will take the load of people going to Dundee Place for Timmies or to the Eaton Centre for lunch

Gil

January 19th, 2010, 12:32 AM

As far as I'm concerned NO Path extentions should be allowed unless they provide an underground corridor ROW because if not then trying to build under Queen will be hoeeibly expensive and the stations incredibly deep.

The one crossing of Queen St. which does not occur at a subway station is the entrance to City Hall. Given its proximity to the subway lines, if the roughed in station(s) were even used the PATH crossing wouldn't be a problem as it'd be one level above.

Considerations for a DRL on the other hand are a little trickier. Since no one knows for sure where it would cross through downtown nothing can be set aside with any certainty. Development would be left entirely to speculation. As it stands right now, for the most part, PATH expansions are forced to cross the subway line at a station only.

kettal

January 20th, 2010, 12:11 AM

I don't like using PATH when I'm dressed for winter. It so hot down there it makes me sweat.

ssiguy2

January 20th, 2010, 12:45 AM

Gil

January 20th, 2010, 06:27 AM

Gil
If that is the case then no PATH extentions should be allowed..........period.
It will be great for those who are afraid to get wet having to cross a street but it will be all Torontonians who will pay the price of a significantly more expensive DRL having to tunnel even further under PATH. It will have to be extremely deep resulting in slower construction time and a hell of a lot more money. That is extremly short-sighted but then its only money and what's a couple of hundred million betwween frriends?

Running a DRL under Queen is still a possibility with very few PATH crossings. The only other corridor which is PATH free would be through Union Station. Freezing development due to speculating on if, where and what form the DRL wil take is a bit extreme too. There are also other underground infrastructure such as the EnWave Deep Lake Water Cooling network, several hydro vaults and parking structures which would affect the routing and depth of any additional subway line.

It's been 60 years since the Yonge Line opened and 50 since the University Line opened. A good deal of downtown Toronto has changed since then. While provisions were made for a possible Queen Line the lack of any reasonable development on that front has left the growth of downtown in the hands of business.

kettal

January 20th, 2010, 06:44 PM

As far as I'm concerned NO Path extentions should be allowed unless they provide an underground corridor ROW because if not then trying to build under Queen will be hoeeibly expensive and the stations incredibly deep.

It will have to be deep anyways. How do you expect it to intersect with the two subway lines that are already there??

The Mad Navigator

January 20th, 2010, 06:50 PM

So here's what the PATH looks like now along with some revised connections pending approval or construction:

http://i33.************/rwsxol.jpg

Shows how professional Toronto City Planning Division really is.... no freakin' legend with the map!

chrystoja0024

January 20th, 2010, 07:01 PM

delete.

camel_trainer

January 20th, 2010, 10:03 PM

What's the difference between the PATH and a walkway?

jjippidy

January 20th, 2010, 11:20 PM

What's the difference between the PATH and a walkway?

It's not connected to the PATH.

They're all underground walkways, most of which with retail and other services, at least the ones on the map above, all the same level below grade.

PATH is just the name given to the largest connected network of underground tunnels and services in the CBD. Unlike some cities, in Toronto if it's not a part of continuous connection to the rest of the PATH system, it's not considered, labelled or promoted as part of the PATH.

Nozumi 300

January 21st, 2010, 04:00 AM

I'm suprised about the walkway between Queens Park station and Queens Park. I've never seen the connection, where is the entrance to this walkway from the station?

Gil

January 21st, 2010, 05:13 AM

Shows how professional Toronto City Planning Division really is.... no freakin' legend with the map!

The map that's posted has been cropped from the original that the Toronto Star published which kinda spawned this whole thread. Here it is (from a few pages back) in its original form:

http://i18.************/4lzbtjs.jpg

The subsequent maps are an updated version (the one you copied) and "fantasy" version (the oe with blue lines that chrystoja0024 copied).

I'm suprised about the walkway between Queens Park station and Queens Park. I've never seen the connection, where is the entrance to this walkway from the station?

The connection is there from the Queens Park subway station. It's only open during "business hours" for the Legislature.

http://www3.ttc.ca/images/Stations/Accessible_Alternatives/queenspark_con_st.jpg
It's the corridor leading to the northeast from the fare concourse by the red dot.

The Mad Navigator

January 22nd, 2010, 03:08 AM

I stand corrected!

Gil

February 13th, 2010, 07:30 AM

Two small updates:

• The access tunnel between the Union Station concourse and the Telus Tower, officially christened the Union Tower opened this week.
• Rennovations at the Richmond-Adelaide Complex have re-routed the PATH around the Federal Building. The only way to access the building is through the temporary construction accesses. Using the map from the last page, the re-routing continues on the west branch of the building labelled Richmond-Adelaide Complex straight through to the connection to the Sheraton Centre.

The following came from the Friday Metro (http://www.metronews.ca/toronto/local/article/449722--bored-at-lunch-walk-toronto-s-downtown-path-for-treasure). While it's not on PATH expansions per se, it could spur some additional linkages with more people using it for other reasons than working.

Bored at lunch? Walk Toronto's downtown PATH for treasure

http://media.metronews.topscms.com/images/c8/fd/f6ead0524281a19d8479a17a722d.jpeg
If you want to participate in the PATH treasure hunt, you can register at leisurerules.ca.

JOHN KEILLOR
METRO TORONTO
February 12, 2010 5:00 a.m.

Treasure hunters are a likable breed: Surly pirates combing tropical beaches for buried chests, or eccentric historians scanning British fields with metal detectors.

Now Toronto has a modern means to satisfy the hunter’s itch, right downtown. And you can do it during your work break.

“The idea is to run a number of public treasure hunts in the Toronto area, all free to the public,” explains Jim Cloughley, co-founder of Leisurerules Inc. “The business model is fueled by sponsors who are trying to drive foot traffic or web traffic to a specific location.

“Our new hunt is called PATH, and the winner gets $100,” adds Cloughley.

PATH is named after downtown’s indoor path system. That’s where the clues are, though the final object is somewhere outside. The first clue will be announced on the leisurerules website Monday at 7 a.m., online and on Twitter.

When you find all the clues, you’ve got a puzzle to unscramble. The answer is a public object. Be the first treasure hunter to take a picture of the object and post it on the site to win. The last hunt was for different letters to be unscrambled on a puzzle board.

The answer was the address, 115 King St. W. where there were ice sculptures of bears. Taking a picture of those bears was the way to win. For this kind of hunting, digital cameras are a must.
Interest has been rising steadily since the company started six months ago.

“Less than a hundred people took part in our first hunt,” says Cloughley, “but now there are over 800 people signed up. At first we were appealing to individuals who wanted something different to do on their lunch hours. But now there are people teaming up, making treasure-hunting groups. And families who are looking for something to do on the weekend are making their presence felt.”

These hunts will continue to mesh further with technology, introducing GPS systems. But Cloughley says he’s careful to not let the tech element get too overwhelming. However, some people are just too enthusiastic to deter.

“At noon exactly on Monday through Friday, we release clues,” says Cloughley. “The hardcore treasure hunters are there every time. They sometimes try to wrangle additional clues. Our last contest had 40 correct answers. Some people just guessed, I’m sure.”

• To get your hunt on, go to leisurerules.ca (http://leisurerules.ca/) to register.

ssiguy2

February 13th, 2010, 06:15 PM

I can't think of anything more boring than running around like a mouse in a maze only to find myself going from one mall to the other that have exactly the same stores/restuarants. It can be convient when its raining or snowing like hell but after that I actually see them as a bit of an urban disaster.............it creates an enviornment that is not pedestrian friendly.

Kappa21

February 13th, 2010, 08:27 PM

Gil

May 5th, 2010, 04:13 AM

It seems I've been neglecting to keep this up-to-date. The National Post has been running a series about the PATH (http://network.nationalpost.com/NP/blogs/toronto/archive/tags/The+Walk+Under+Toronto/default.aspx) and I was waiting for it to wrap up before posting them here. I'll post them as separate entries, along with a few other stories.

At rush hour, follow your own PATH
Posted: March 26, 2010, 7:00 AM by Rob Roberts
http://network.nationalpost.com/NP/blogs/toronto/PATHmural.jpg
Victor Lee, a technician for Telus, moved in November from the company's former offices at 299 Yonge St., near the Eaton Centre, to the new Telus headquarters at 25 York St., next to the Air Canada Centre. He has a few complaints.

"I have to take the subway at lunch time if I want to go shopping downtown," he says. A more serious challenge is reaching the subway after work, to go home.

From here, Mr. Lee must walk on the PATH, that famous pedestrian network of tunnels, through the ACC and then north through the GO Train concourse of Union Station to the subway. The trouble is, he is swimming against a torrent of commuters headed south, out of the financial district to catch the GO trains. Pedestrian gridlock ensues.

"I was trying to leave at five," Mr. Lee says. "But I cannot. It gets really bad at around 4:30. When people are going home, they are rushing like crazy. They don't want to be late for home. Holy cow! Nothing can stop them. It's like Niagara Falls. They're bumping shoulders. From here, getting to the subway is kind of stressful."

To solve the problem, he decided to come to work later, after 10 a.m., and leave after 6 p.m. when the crowds subside.

I met Mr. Lee, who was clutching a muffin and coffee, as I began yesterday to explore what the Guinness Book of World Records has codified as the world's largest underground city, the labyrinth called the PATH (which uses all capital letters but is not, in fact, an acronym for anything).

At the southernmost extremity of the PATH, at the Telus building, I discovered something remarkable, which challenges my premise of a Walk Under Toronto. It is this: south of Union Station, the PATH is not underground.

I'm not kidding. The PATH here is at grade. Windows, natural light, doors straight to the sidewalk, everything. Sensibly, they put the cars downstairs in the parking garage and let the people walk right through the building lobby.

Don't worry, it has the usual trappings, so you PATH people won't feel out of place: Starbucks, Booster Juice, "sushi shop opening soon," Fit for Life (a sandwich place) and, also opening soon, a dentist's office.

Plus this stretch has more, including two remarkable artworks by Toronto photographer Michael Awad. One is a colour photograph, about twice the length of a city bus, that satirizes the commuting hordes; distortions of the photo stretch or shrink the legs and feet of women and men in business attire who hurry along a highway. Cars zoom by in the background.

From the ceiling Mr. Awad has hung a chandelier of thousands of strands of plastic, each perhaps five metres long; on each strand are dozens of tiny lights which change colour, rippling from blue to yellow to red to purple in a continuous hypnotic pulsation.

The effect is triumphant. Finally, here is a grand lobby through which the builders invite the public to stream.

"We love it," said Nancy Thakkar at Booster Juice, when I stopped for a pomegranate passion. "I don't like underground."

Roy Budgell, general manager of the Telus building for the owner, Menkes, said the PATH will continue above-ground on its way west; a future escalator at the west end of this building will lift commuters to a walkway crossing over York Street to the Price-WaterhouseCoopers tower, which is under construction at 18 York St.

"It will be actually quite nice when you're going up York Street to see this nice glass walkway full of people, screening what is now a quite ugly concrete abutment [of the train tracks]," says James Parakh, who works on the PATH in the urban design division at the City of Toronto.

And on a lovely day, who knows? The PATH people might even venture out of doors for a breath of fresh air.

Read more: http://network.nationalpost.com/NP/blogs/toronto/archive/2010/03/26/at-rush-hour-follow-your-own-path.aspx#ixzz0n17D346H

Gil

May 5th, 2010, 04:56 AM

This one isn't a PATH story per se, but it was part of the series.

TTC man collects tolls, and fans
Posted: March 27, 2010, 7:00 AM by Rob Roberts
http://network.nationalpost.com/NP/blogs/toronto/TTCtokencollector.jpg
At 8:30 a.m. the commotion in Union subway station reaches its crescendo. "Chocolate today!" yell three women in bunny ears, handing out Allan's Easter eggs. Two violinists strike up. A bit further, three young actors dressed in newsboy hats and suspenders hold up mock newspapers, "The Jackpot Times," and shout, "Have you heard the news? Lotto Max is $15-million!"

Joining the din: the tribal drumming of thousands of heels on the cracked yellow terrazzo, as workers cascade off the GO trains and into the catacombs of Toronto.

In the eye of this storm stands a solitary, smiling Clarke Smith. A TTC employee since 1981, from 6:30 to 10 a.m. and 1:30 to 6 p.m. Mr. Smith mans the "crash gate," the rush hour entrance to the subway at Union, inspecting passes and collecting tokens, tickets and cash.

But Mr. Smith is more. He dispenses smiles, and more crucially, directions. This is the busiest spot on the TTC, everyone is lost, and in Mr. Smith's words, "the signage sucks." One sign shows the way to "the SkyDome" ( "How long since it's been called that?" he asks. "I've complained."). No sign indicates the Metro Toronto Convention Centre, the most common destination to which people ask directions.

"There's a job fair going on down there this week," explains Mr. Smith, who learned that from lost souls. The ticket-taker is a hefty man with green sparkling eyes, dressed in a wine-red TTC winter jacket, who helps to smooth out hard edges of the big, scary city. In one 10-minute stretch he directs passengers to Warden Station, to the GO bus, to Kennedy Station, to the Lakeshore streetcar, to Front Street East, to Bay and Bloor, to Yonge and Queen. The TTC has faced copious bad press about sleeping fare collectors; here is one worker who is wide awake and helping out his fellow citizens -- even if, sometimes, he can't help having a little fun.

"What do you need, guys?" Mr. Smith asks two lost young men. "I'll help you," he says to one, "but I won't help anyone that's got a Montreal Canadiens sweater." He points to the Habs crest: "Cover that up."

Two girls from Barrie confess, "We're lost. We're trying to get to Bloor and Dundas."

He gives them directions. Then a woman walks up. "How do I go south?" she asks.

"You can't go south," Mr. Smith replies with a smile. "You'd be in the lake. You'd be all wet."

A minute later another woman approaches, equally lost, and says, "This is my first time on the subway."

"Why start now?" he asks. Mr. Smith is a single parent whose five children, aged 13 through 23, live with him at his Scarborough home, along with three dogs. He joined the TTC at age 21. "I love my job. I love working with people."

He brightens what is otherwise an unattractive subway station. The ceiling is made of slats of tin -- bent, rusted and filthy.

Paint peels from beams. A project to reconfigure this station and add a second platform has been stalled for years. Mr. Smith leads me to a filthy alcove with blistered, stained plaster, rust and slime.

"Look at this piece of s---," he says, pointing to the "Lift for Persons With Physical Disabilities."

A tin box says, "push and hold for chair lift." Mr. Smith pushes and holds, but the door will not open. Finally he buzzes another fare collector, who resets the mechanism, and finally the door opens.

"I ain't goin' in there because I might never come out," he says.

Fixing this lift is at the top of Mr. Smith's list. He also wants a plasma screen on the pillar where the bad signage lurks, that would offer good directions plus a list of the day's events, such as, "Blue Jays Game, 7:30 p.m."

Until then, we will have to make do with Mr. Smith. A woman approaches, with a pleading look on her face and a handful of change. "I have almost $2," she says.

"OK," says Mr. Smith, waving her into the subway. "But you owe me big for next time."

Read more: http://network.nationalpost.com/NP/blogs/toronto/archive/2010/03/27/ttc-man-collects-tolls-and-fans.aspx#ixzz0n18N3XVc

The Star had a related piece from The Fixer column about having PATH maps installed inside subway stations. Can't seem to find it online. Suffice to say there apparently is no restriction on having them there, it's just a matter of getting them installed.

Gil

May 5th, 2010, 05:00 AM

Continuing where the last post left off:

The Walk Under Toronto: A difficult PATH to follow
Posted: March 30, 2010, 6:00 AM by Rob Roberts
http://network.nationalpost.com/NP/blogs/toronto/PATHgeneric.jpg
John Reed is a retired truck driver who lives in Hamilton. Yesterday he took the GO bus into Union Station and prepared to plunge into Toronto’s famous PATH system, an underground network of 28 kilometres of pedestrian walkways that connect much of downtown. But before sallying forth, he walked up to a TTC fare collector and asked a reasonable question.

“Tell me something. Is there a map for this PATH that they got down here?”

But the TTC employee shook his head.

“You’d think they’d have a map,” said Mr. Reed. “There used to be a restaurant down here that had the best corned beef. But could I find it again? No way. No map is a definite pain in the ass.”

Thousands of people charge resolutely through the bowels of Toronto on a daily basis, but it does not take long for a novice to get lost in the gleaming underground. Royal Bank Plaza is the first building most people enter when heading north from Union Station. But no map of the PATH graces its wall. A sign indicates “North to Toronto Dominion Centre,” but what if your destination is First Canadian Place, one building north of the TD Centre? You’d have to get to TD Centre first, to find that sign.

After getting thoroughly lost myself yesterday, walking east into Brookfield Place and then somehow stumbling into the high-gloss subterranean world of Commerce Court, I called Michael Saunders, of economic development at the City of Toronto, who crafts agreements with developers on how they use PATH signage. Thankfully cell phone reception is great underground.

The city owns the trademark to “PATH,” Mr. Saunders explained, and thus can control how people display the symbol. However, he has no power to require anyone to put up any sign at all.

“The PATH is a private-public partnership,” he said. “Different property management firms look after and upgrade the maps. We suggest tht PATH maps be put up and kept up to date. Some are really good at it and others don’t do a thing.”

And do not look for maps to the PATH in the TTC, even though six of our busiest subway stations connect to the PATH at 16 locations. “In the TTC itself they have refused to allow a PATH map to go up,” he said. The TTC passed my message to its marketing person, who did not call back.

Mr. Saunders said he recalled maps of the PATH previously on the walls of Royal Bank Plaza, but suggested that perhaps the plaza removed them during recent renovations. Oxford Properties, which manages the towers, did not return several calls. Mr. Saunders suggested I ask at the Royal Bank Plaza concierge desk.

I followed the signs up the escalator to the North Lobby. The concierge had run out of PATH maps; he directed me to the South Lobby where, lo and behold, on the concierge desk are stacked PATH maps, produced by the City of Toronto, which boast, “Follow the PATH and you’ll reach your downtown destination easily in weatherproof comfort.” For copies, call (416) 392-1005.

Yes, you have to surface here to get a map of the tunnels; I’ll bet that most visitors, once they glimpse sweet daylight, will brave the weather rather than trying to find their way in the “weatherproof” underground.

To sum up: The wayfinding system does not work. But Mr. Saunders has no stomach to change it, given the warring commercial duchies that the PATH seeks to link.

“It took a long while for anyone to agree on signs,” he said. “If we wanted to modernize the signage it would probably take years.”

Pat probably has the best technique for getting around. She is an older woman whom I met underneath Royal Bank Plaza, drinking coffee in the swank food court and reading the morning newspapers.

Pat was walking through the plaza and saw people getting off an up escalator clutching coffee in paper cups.

“I asked somebody, ‘Where did you get the Tim Hortons?’ and they directed me here.”

Photo by Tim Fraser for National Post

Read more: http://network.nationalpost.com/NP/blogs/toronto/archive/2010/03/30/the-walk-under-toronto-a-difficult-path-to-follow.aspx#ixzz0n1J958Sv

Along with a little addendum:

Find your way in Toronto's catacombs
Posted: March 30, 2010, 10:48 AM by Peter Kuitenbrouwer

I wrote today about the hopeless lack of good signage and maps in the PATH system. I did receive today this helpful note from a reader, Aland Brown, who writes, in part, "After reading today's instalment about PATH maps, I thought I'd tell you what I did to get a map when your series started so I could follow along. I did a Google search and
found http://www.toronto.ca/path/. There's a link there to a PDF copy of a map ready for printing (which may be the same as the map you picked up at the concierge desk).

Thank you very much for this, Alan. I should point out, however, that a visitor arriving in Toronto at Union Station will not be able to download and print a map on the spot. Let's face it, nothing really beats a map on the wall and proper signage helping visitors to find their way.

Read more: http://network.nationalpost.com/NP/blogs/toronto/archive/2010/03/30/find-your-way-in-toronto-s-catacombs.aspx#ixzz0n1K8gBl9

Gil

May 5th, 2010, 05:26 AM

This one is a little more personal, as I know the guy through the fiancée he never married.

The Walk Under Toronto: Work, live, play — and no overcoat
Posted: March 31, 2010, 6:59 AM by Daniel Kaszor
http://network.nationalpost.com/NP/blogs/toronto/donaldblair.jpg
Columnist Peter Kuitenbrouwer, who has previously walked across Toronto, down Yonge Street and through Mississauga, continues his latest sojourn: The PATH, Toronto’s famous underground city.

Donald Blair, an IT professional who looks at home in a crisp suit, is at the vanguard of a new class of Toronto commuters, set to grow quickly over the next few years: Those who do not need a car, train, the TTC, a bicycle or even a jacket to get home from work. He walks underground.

From his office at the Cambridge Club in the Sheraton Centre, Mr. Blair heads south under the Richmond Adelaide Complex, which is a construction zone. The drop ceiling is gone, revealing a tangle of pipes, hoses, ducts, cables and wires; the floor is bare concrete. He continues south, past Booster Juice and International News, Sweet Temptations, Bell World and Couture Parfums.

At the Exchange Tower, the floor changes to white marble. He hangs a hard left, passes Nine West and Necessities, and reaches the elevator banks at First Canadian Place. This is a lovely bit; lilies and birds of paradise bloom beside the Waterfall Stage, scene of a lunchtime concert yesterday by singer Tara MacLean.

Mr. Blair passes BMO Investorline and Harry Rosen and crosses into Scotia Plaza, where the floor changes to red granite. Then he walks by the Shoe Company and Teaopia, which yesterday offered free samples of green tea. Past the Scotiabank Investor Update Centre he turns south at Second Cup and enters Commerce Court; the floor now is creamy marble and the walls are chocolate-coloured stone.

Finally, he turns left at the CIBC Instant Teller, past the Tropical Energy Juice Bar and the Sweet Exchange (a candy store) and, just to the left of the entrance to the King subway station, enters a small brass door whose plaque announces his new home: One King West Hotel & Residence. The walk takes eight minutes.

“I never have to see daylight again!” he announces triumphantly in the Shops of the Sheraton Centre, tucking into a Big Xtra burger from McDonald’s. “It’s its own entertainment district in a way. You’ve got access to restaurants and bars and clubs, all without having to set foot outside.”

Toronto’s underground city, inspired by the shopping mecca that opened in 1962 beneath Montreal’s Place Ville Marie, began during Matthew Lawson’s tenure as city planning commissioner from 1954 to 1967, Post columnist Robert Fulford notes in his book, Accidental City. The network known as the PATH now links dozens of office towers but only recently connected to its first residential building: One King West.

More underground pedestrian commuters are coming soon. The Trump Tower, about half-built on Bay Street and the Ritz-Carlton, under construction on Wellington Street West, will connect hundreds of new condo units to the PATH. In addition, the PATH will link (at ground level and through overhead walkways) to a whole neighbourhood rising south of the rail corridor, including the two condo towers of Maple Leaf Square by the Air Canada Centre and the Ice Condos, whose first 55-storey building is set to open on York Street in 2012.

Mr. Blair grew up in North York, Scarborough and Mississauga. He got his first job with Bank of Nova Scotia, in Scotia Plaza. He is moving to One King from Brooklin, in north Whitby, after his engagement to be married fell apart. These days, he seems to crave the frenzy of the underground city. He wrote “PATH people” as the subject line in his first email to me, and signed off as a “Soon-to-be downtown snob.”

After we ate lunch, Mr. Blair showed me his workplace, the bustling men-only Cambridge Club in the Sheraton Centre.

Clive Caldwell, president of the Cambridge Group of Clubs, was lunching with Armin Schroecker, a consultant. Mr. Schroecker used to run the Toronto Hilton and recalls becoming lost in the PATH on his second day. He does not like the underground lifestyle.

“You become a mole,” he says.

“Oh, come on,” says Mr. Caldwell. “Buy a sun lamp.”

Mr. Blair will get some sun, though, forced into the outside air to satisfy one craving: a cigarette. Other than that, he will use the PATH, even to service the other two clubs his company owns, the Adelaide Club and the Toronto Athletic Club. Both are on the PATH. “It’s really convenient for getting from place to place, because on a nice day the crowds will be a lot above ground.

“I like the hustle and the bustle,” he adds. “I’m a single guy. It’s perfect for me. I like the eye candy.”

National Post

Read more: http://network.nationalpost.com/NP/blogs/toronto/archive/2010/03/31/the-walk-under-toronto-work-live-play-and-no-overcoat.aspx#ixzz0n1LUSUHs

Gil

May 5th, 2010, 05:30 AM

I've always like this part of the PATH for the décor. It feels very European, almost like a Moscow subway station without the chandeliers.

Underground, this is what they're wearing underneath
Posted: April 01, 2010, 11:30 AM by Rob Roberts
http://network.nationalpost.com/NP/blogs/toronto/PATHbrastore.jpg
It has the intimacy of a vintage tobacconist’s shop, with decorated bay windows, dark wood paneling throughout, a glass countertop and, behind this, rows and rows of wooden drawers with glass fronts, reminiscent of humidors. But rather than cigars, the drawers here at Brava Boutique hold brassieres: European lace and fine workmanship, to fit every size.

After 13 years of selling undergarments in the underground city, Brava Boutique, whose slogan is, “Serving you 9 to 5 ... supporting you 24/7,” has become a destination for working women, tempting them with European lace and a friendly, straightforward sales pitch.

“It’s made in France with proper technology,” Stephanie Kampf, a manager here, says of her product line. “It’s realy going to lift you, it’s going to support you. You can buy a bra wherever but you’re going to be saggy after a little while.”

For the past week I have been walking through the PATH system, to find the stories of those who work, shop, and commute through the 28-kilometre network of tunnels that connect downtown Toronto. If you have ever wondered why the corner of Bay and King looks so quiet, even on a workday, it is because everybody is downstairs.

This week I stumbled on Brava Boutique while walking through the old Commerce Court, perhaps the most elegant part of the PATH. Underneath the historic Canadian Bank of Commerce building (1929), this stretch boasts brown stone walls, opaque white lamps, white marble floors, a richly patterned plaster ceiling, and benches of stainless steel and chocolate marble.

Men never feel very comfortable walking into lingerie places, but the women at Brava made me feel right at home.

“We have some guys who come in and say, ‘I’d like to buy something for my wife and something for my girlfriend,’ without the bat of an eyelash,” reports Ms. Kampf. The store can fit any body; its sizes range from 28 to 54, and A to K-cup. Bras start at $100. They also do a lot of business with maternity and sports bras.

Another specialty is helping women who have lost a breast to cancer by fitting them with prosthetics.

“We want our clients to feel comfortable,” says Christine Lackan, the owner. “It’s quite common nowadays [for women to go through a masectomy]. It’s a bump in the road. We want them to feel they can move on and we have some really nice bras for them.”

Ms. Lackan and Ms. Kampf just returned from Austria and Paris, to select their fall lineup, and get on famously; they cannot, however, agree on directions to this spot. “I heard her give directions the other day, saying we are at Yonge and King,” says Ms. Kampf. “We are not at Yonge and King! You’re crazy! We’re at Bay and King.”

“It’s easier to come by subway,” says Ms. Lackan, who takes the subway here herself.

Exit King subway station at the north end and turn left, following the sign to Commerce Court/Melinda Street. Go up the stairs and head west past a row of shops, and turn right at the Second Cup.

If you can handle crowds and disorientation, navigating the PATH can be an adventure. Sarah Paner, another Brava staffer, had suggested I check out Rocky Mountain Chocolate in First Canadian Place. I got quite lost; finally I found a sign announcing that the chocolate store is closed for renovations.

Fighting my way to a food court, I ordered pad thai from Thai Island; a server took my money and told me to wait on the side. An Asian woman appeared with a bowl heaped with bean sprouts and shouted something several times, which sounded to me like Chinese.

“What is she shouting?” I asked the customer next to me.

“402,” the woman replied.

I looked at my ticket. It read “402.”

Read more: http://network.nationalpost.com/NP/blogs/toronto/archive/2010/04/01/underground-this-is-what-they-re-wearing-underneath.aspx#ixzz0n1QPitDw

Gil

May 5th, 2010, 05:37 AM

Originally posted by The National Post

Like Vatican City, Toronto's PATH has its own pulse. Also, lots of money
Posted: April 06, 2010, 7:00 AM by Rob Roberts
http://network.nationalpost.com/NP/blogs/toronto/DonGivelos.jpg
One thing is clear to anyone who takes a stroll through the underground tunnels of the city’s core: there is a lot of money down here. Plywood hoarding covers much of the “Marketplace” at First Canadian Place, whose owner, Brookfield Properties, is investing in a major renovation, and, further north, Oxford Properties has put hoarding around much of the retail in the Richmond-Adelaide Centre, painted with stripes in blue, green, peach and tangerine, and huge photos of succulent croissant and pizza, with the proclamation, “Coming soon -- a fresh shopping experience.”

You do not find stores for rent under here; one source suggests rents of $80 to $100 per square foot in the underground city are about double the rents on the surface.

Probably owing to the steep rents, you do not find shops in the PATH that sell funky hats or tie-dyed T-shirts; the shops run more to Harry Rosen and, on the lower end, Tip Top Tailors. While it is impossible to get a shoe shine on the sidewalk in Toronto, there are any number of shoeshine stalls in the PATH, and I discovered on the first day of my walk that I could not wear jeans in the PATH, at peril of being mistaken for a courier or a cleaner.

Even so, armed with patience, one can reach noteworty shops via the PATH. Shopping the other day for Easter treats, I arose from the tunnel into the ground floor of First Canadian Place to find Eitelbach Baumkuchen Pastries, a German baker and chocolatier whose specialty is “treecake,” which looks a bit like a chocolate-covered donut; the glaze in fact hides a cake baked layer by layer on a rotisserie.

Then I needed an Easter card. Beneath the TD Bank Tower, just west of the main north/south PATH route through the TD Centre, I found Essence du Papier, one of two Toronto branches of the Montreal-based fine stationer. The store offers a whole wall of colours of cards and envelopes by the German paper-maker Gmund & Rössler, candles, lovely address books and agendas, and even equipment to affix wax seals to envelopes.

Don Givelos wants to make it easier for people to find the shops and services they seek in the PATH. Mr. Givelos, whose experience runs to creating insuranceworks.ca, a recruitment search engine for the insurance industry, has been using the PATH for 30 years.

Now, in a unit he owns at One King West Hotel & Residence, Mr. Givelos has set up an office for Torontopath.com, the five-year-old web site he purchased in December. Mr. Givelos is busy hiring writers and programmers.

“We’re creating a one stop shop: everything you want to know about the PATH,” he promised last week when he met me in a cozy subterranean nook of a Second Cup that just opened in a new piece of the PATH, under the Bay-Adelaide Centre.

We sat beside an artificial fireplace and he told me of his plans.

“We all take the PATH for granted,” he says. “For me it’s a business, but it’s a business that I’m passionate about. Think of how cool this is. We’re sitting here in front of a fake fire, we could get to the Eaton Centre, we could get to the CN Tower, we could get to 30 kilometres of services and never put our coat on. It’s very safe: there are security cameras everywhere.”

Those who don’t commute through the PATH don’t know it, he says. “It’s almost like Vatican City. It has its own pulse.”

Torontopath.com plans to launch its revamped site next Monday, with the semi-spiritual slogan, “Know Your Path.” The site may not help you find Nirvana, but it will probably help you locate that German gourmet bakery.

Photo: Don Givelos poses in front of One King West's old bank vault, which is now part of the PATH system and looks cool in photographs. By Peter J. Thompson, National Post

Read more: http://network.nationalpost.com/NP/blogs/toronto/archive/2010/04/06/like-vatican-city-toronto-s-path-has-its-own-pulse-also-lots-of-money.aspx#ixzz0n1S9nkoY

Gil

May 5th, 2010, 05:40 AM

Originally posted by The National Post

Below Simcoe Place, an underground hit
Posted: April 07, 2010, 6:30 AM by Rob Roberts
http://network.nationalpost.com/NP/blogs/toronto/greencurryPATH.jpg
At 11:55 a.m. yesterday, 23 people waited in line for lunch at Green Curry, “Viet Thai Cuisine,” in the Simcoe Place food court beneath 200 Front Street West. Russian-speakers, Blacks, Whites, Asians -- even the guy from Brinks with a pistol in a holster -- stood patiently, corralled by blue line-control strapping, to get to the smiling women in pumpkin t-shirts and black ball caps who took their orders.

McDonald’s next door looked sleepy by comparison, with just eight customers at that hour.

A long line is the best ad of all: “I’ve seen the lineup and I figured it was a good place,” said Adrian Van Vroenhoven, a chartered accountant, who frequently makes the 10-minute walk underground from First Canadian Place to lunch on vermicelli and chicken from Green Curry.

“It’s a good way to get exercise,” Mr. Van Vroenhoven explained. It is also a good way to get noodles.

The owner, May, directed me to B6, the special: BBQ chicken and fried shrimp. I nodded.

She began by dropping a large quantity of thick rice noodles into a deep round plastic bowl. On this she placed a generous slab of glistening chicken that still held its skin, a bit like Peking duck, which she sliced with flashing scissors. On top came a pork spring roll, which she also sliced, and four jumbo shrimp, battered and deep-fried.

Then came shredded raw carrots, lettuce, sauce, a sprig of fresh basil, fried, crumbled peanuts and fried onions.

Here’s the amazing part: with a can of pop and all the taxes, the total came to $8.23. Enjoy this feast in the remodeled food court, with its fake-wood paneled chairs (fake wood is making a wicked comeback, eh?) white tiled floors, communal tables and mood lighting: you have an underground winner.

How Mr. Van Vroenhoven found the place beats me, however. Yesterday I walked east from First Canadian Place, underground through the Sun Life Centre, St. Andrew subway station and Roy Thomson Hall (where the PATH mercifully rises, offering a strip with a wall of glass, and daylight). I got lost at MetroCentre (home to another food court) and had to surface, cross Wellington Street and then re-enter the underworld at the CBC Building. If you want to stay underground, follow signs for the new RBC Centre and on to Simcoe Place.

Having savoured the special, I watched the Green Curry women at work, behind a counter displaying 40 foodstuffs in a rainbow of hues, and in front of a second counter holding seven rice cookers, containing steamed, brown, fried, coconut and sticky rice, along with noodles.

To make an “assorted meat and vegetables soup,” the server first placed fish balls, shrimp, chicken and crab meat in a wire basket and submerged it in a vat of boiling water; in another basket she put broccoli, and vermicelli in a third, submerging them all. She then drained each basket and united the foods in a bowl, adding broth (vegetable, chicken or seafood) and garnishes.

“The proportions are huge,” said Hank Yu, a banker at Royal Bank. “It’s ridiculous.”

May declined to give me her last name; she revealed only that she is from Cambodia; her husband, the chef, is from Vietnam. They have operated this shop nine years.

Ray Libidi, who works in IT support at the CBC, stopped by at 2 p.m for noodles with sesame and spicy chicken ($7.45) and explained the appeal simply: “It’s homemade food.” But he noted, “sometimes it’s a big lineup so if I’m in a hurry I have to get something else.” Even at 2 p.m., when Tabouli, Manchu Wok and Fresh West Grill (a burrito place) were sucking wind, seven people waited at Green Curry.

I have a strategy, though, for beating the line: I’m going to come for breakfast. Macaroni soup with ham is just $3.10. Or how about spicy wontons (5) for $3.80? What a way to start the work day.

Read more: http://network.nationalpost.com/NP/blogs/toronto/archive/2010/04/07/below-simcoe-place-an-underground-hit.aspx#ixzz0n1SvZxGc

Gil

May 5th, 2010, 05:45 AM

I wonder if they'll finally get the connection between New and Bell-Trinity Centre/Old City Hall when they get around to redoing Nathan Phillips Square?

Originally posted by The National Post

City hall renovates its basement
Posted: April 08, 2010, 10:04 AM by Rob Roberts
http://network.nationalpost.com/NP/blogs/toronto/PATHgarage.jpg
It is a crowning irony of our underground city that although the 28-kilometre system of tunnels began as the brainchild of city planners, at present the PATH connection to City Hall is the ugliest and scariest piece of the network.

The PATH from the Sheraton Centre to City Hall is a long, serpentine route through an underground parking garage, delineated by diagonal yellow lines. No one has repainted these lines in years. Those using the walkway must stroll alongside cars going in and out of parking spots. At one time, workers installed a row of 42 orange lights on the ceiling to mark the route. Since then, 32 of these lights have burnt out.

This is a good news story, however. Tomorrow, Mayor David Miller will announce a plan to remove at least 30 parking spaces from the garage under Nathan Phillips Square, to make way for a gleaming new subterranean walkway connecting City Hall to Toronto's underground city.

The details will come as Mr. Miller officially launches construction on a $42.7-million overhaul of the square, courtesy of Toronto's Plant Architect Inc. and Shore Tilbe Irwin. The plan includes a new permanent stage, eateries, information kiosks, bike rental stations, fountains and a green roof surrounding the council chamber. The work is set for completion in 2012.

Yesterday, Chris Pommer, a partner with Plant Architect, met me under the square and, brandishing drawings of the new PATH walkway, showed me how his firm plans to straighten the existing jogs in the route.

"Our strategy is to clarify the place where pedestrians are walking," Mr. Pommer said. "We will make a clear route right the way through with its own lighting."

The architects plan to run the PATH straight north from the Sheraton Centre, crossing first through the half of the parking garage owned by the Toronto Parking Authority. To do so, they will move 12 disabled parking spots (each of which takes up about the space of two standard car slots) to a different part of the garage. They will then knock a hole in a garage wall to continue the PATH straight north to City Hall. This will eliminate 18 parking spots currently allocated to city staff.

"Yes, there is a net decrease in parking spots, which is good for the world," said Mr. Pommer, who personally prefers to walk or ride a bicycle. His plan calls for encouraging bicycle use, with new bicycle parking in this garage, complete with underground showers for cyclists.

There was also good news yesterday for those lost in the PATH, shockingly lacking in maps or signs. Last week, after getting lost in the PATH, I wrote a story quoting Michael Saunders, who handles PATH signage in the economic development department at the City of Toronto, as follows: "In the TTC itself they have refused to allow a PATH map to go up."

Danny Nicholson, a TTC spokesman, spent several days trying to find who at the TTC might have decreed such a ban.

Yesterday he figured it out, and told me: "I spoke with Michael Saunders from the City of Toronto. He said he spoke with the former director of TTC public affairs three or four years ago, who at the time, mentioned that the TTC would not allow the PATH maps to go inside our stations. The TTC employee has been retired for two years. The installation of PATH signs inside TTC stations is something the commission will look into."

Who would have thunk it: the city and the TTC actually catching up to the rest of our citizens, and improving their connections to the thriving underground.

Photo: Chris Pommer walks the PATH. Photo by Aaron Lynett, National Post

Read more: http://network.nationalpost.com/NP/blogs/toronto/archive/2010/04/08/city-hall-renovates-its-basement.aspx#ixzz0n1UIjw1L

Gil

May 5th, 2010, 05:49 AM

Originally posted by The National Post

Bay Street's salad dominatrix
Posted: April 09, 2010, 6:00 AM by Rob Roberts
http://network.nationalpost.com/NP/blogs/toronto/oasisPATH.jpg
Suzy Sung blames the traders of Bay Street, who work in the banking towers above her restaurant, for transforming a sweet girl from China into the salad dominatrix of the underground city.

“Let’s be honest,” says Ms. Sung, dressed, like the other staff at Oasis Café, in a black pillbox cap and black apron. “This is Bay Street. The people are very aggressive. You can feel the stress. You can feel the tension. Sometimes they negotiate with you. They say, ‘Come on, give me an extra tomato.’

“I say, ‘You think this is the Salvation Army?’ ’’

Oasis patrons say that, on the contrary, they are the ones who tiptoe around the diminutive manager of this lunch place, not daring to modify an order for fear that Ms. Sung will blow her stack.

“She’ll yell at you,” warns Rob Bloom, a leasing manager with GE Real Estate. “She’s a little bit like the soup Nazi.”

Every soup or salad here comes with a marbled, poppy, sesame or “all-dressed” bagel, but please do not refer to that last choice as a “New York bagel.”

“Why do they call it a New York bagel?” asks Ms. Sung. “We are not New York. Somebody calls it a New York bagel, they can’t have one. It’s a Toronto bagel.”

Oasis, owned by Toronto restaurateur Sam Esses, opened 11 years ago in The Food Exchange under The Exchange Tower, at 130 King Street West. For Orthodox Jews in downtown Toronto, this is indeed an oasis -- it is the only restaurant south of Eglinton Avenue that keeps Kosher. Every morning a mashgiach (a person who inspects and supervises the kosher status of a kosher establishment) turns on the ovens, checks the lettuce for bugs, and inspects the eggs for blood. (Any lettuce head harbouring a bug goes in the compost; bugs are not kosher.)

Last year Oasis expanded, adding a meat counter (where a smoked turkey breast sandwich costs $9.95) in a separate alcove from the “dairy” side, where a tuna melt costs $8.95.

“When you’re stuck because you didn’t bring your lunch, this place provides real food,” says lawyer Steve Shoshan, who walks here underground from his office tower nearby. The restaurant, open for breakfast and lunch, offers a sink where kosher customers can wash their hands before eating, and laminated cards in Hebrew for the grace the Orthodox must recite after meals, which begins:

“Blessed are you lord our God, king of the world, who sustains the entire world with goodness, graciousness, kindness and mercy.”

The lord may give mercy, but not Ms. Sung, who commutes in every day by GO train from Oshawa and has worked here 10 years.

“Your boss is the biggest fussy guy,” she upbraids one secretary, who came to get a sandwich for her superior, then returned, demanding olives. “I don’t have olives. My supplier didn’t deliver them. What do you want?”

“I used to be very friendly and nice,” she explains. “But I have to learn to change the way I behave.”

Even so, her gruff demeanour hides a warm heart. “Very friendly,” says Michael Sosedov, a patron. Stan, another customer, once tasted Ms. Sung’s wrath when he asked for an extra slice of cheese, but notes, “She has a sense of humour once you get to know her.”

Just don’t try to get a deal, says Ms. Sung, shaking her head.

“You see all these people wearing ties, and fancy bags on the women, and they negotiate with you for a dollar.”

Photo: Suzy Sung, left, and food worker Nella Pianta laugh while preparing food yesterday. By Peter J. Thompson, National Post

Read more: http://network.nationalpost.com/NP/blogs/toronto/archive/2010/04/09/bay-street-s-salad-dominatrix.aspx#ixzz0n1VfE6uF[/quote]

Gil

May 5th, 2010, 05:53 AM

I've used this guy's service several times before. There's never a line-up which is surprising given what he charges.

Originally posted by The National Post

The Walk Under Toronto: Subterranean sojourn comes to shiny stop
Posted: April 10, 2010, 11:59 AM by Daniel Kaszor

In the underground city, where it never rains, there is no excuse for a scuffed or dirty pair of shoes.

And so business is steady for Carmen Liscio, the shoe shiner under the Sheraton Centre. Mr. Liscio, who comes from the Naples area of Italy, moved to Canada in 1960. “I cannot find any job; my English was poor,” he explains.

In 1972, three months before the Sheraton officially opened, he began shining shoes in the tunnel that links the parking garage under City Hall to the towers of the financial district.

Mr. Liscio, now 70, still works 10 hours a day, 8 a.m. to 6 p.m.; he has shined the shoes of many mayors, including David Crombie, Barbara Hall, Mel Lastman and David Miller.

“I love Mel Lastman,” he says, breaking into a big grin. “He was a really nice guy. And David Miller is OK, too.”
Sometimes, in summer, the lack of daylight gets to him; he makes up for it with a sunny disposition and a ready joke.

The booth has three comfy leather chairs; as I got a shine, two other men sat waiting. A fourth man, who said his French two-tone shoes set him back $240, asked,

“How much for a shine?”

Mr. Liscio pointed to the sign on the booth: “Shoeshine $5, tax included.” But the gentleman hesitated, and stood scrutinizing the shoe shiner’s technique. Mr. Liscio took out a small bottle and sprayed it on my shoes. He turned to the two-tone guy. “It’s dog pee,” he said.

A judge, whose cufflinks were two tiny fountain pens, arrived for a shine; he’s come here 25 years. Then Dr. Larry Salberg sat down. Dr. Salberg, a neurologist, had just disembarked a plane from Chicago. He is here for the American Academy of Neurology’s 62nd annual meeting, which starts tomorrow, and explained the importance of a good buff.

“My father and grandfather were tailors in the clothing business,” Dr. Salberg says. “So I’ve always kept trim. You get a reputation for the company you keep, and it’s the same for the shoes. It’s not hard to keep your shoes shined. It’s a symbol of being presentable in an unpresentable world.”

The good doctor turns out to be a shoe aficionado; when he is in the U.K., he says, he has shoes made by John Lobb, shoemaker to the Royal Family, confiding, “Just the shoe trees cost $1,000.” I started feeling inadequate in my Roots loafers, but hey, at least they’re made in Canada, and they looked better after Mr. Liscio got done with them.

With this column, I wrap up my three-week exploration of the underground city. I grew up on farm, the son of a Dutch woman who likes daylight so much that our house had no curtains; so I approached this assignment with a great deal of trepidation. But I’ve gained a grudging respect for the underground city.

Yesterday, to test the efficiency of the PATH and my knowledge of it, I walked from its northern end, at the Toronto Coach Terminal, to its southwest end, the Metro

Toronto Convention Centre. The trip took me half an hour. I walked back on the street, which took 24 minutes.

I preferred the walk underground. For one thing, it was snowing out; for another, the underground felt like the centre of the action.

Our network of tunnels — the world’s largest — is wonderful in that it encourages people to walk. I have walked across Toronto, twice, down Yonge Street from Lake Simcoe to Lake Ontario, and across Mississauga, but on no other walk have I had the company of so many other walkers. The PATH lacks daylight and signage, and the level of noise and pall of grease hanging over the food courts at lunch hour can be oppressive, but it certainly helps our citizenry to stay fit.

As Mr. Liscio puts it, “Down here there is still good people.”

National Post
pkuitenbrouwer@nationalpost.com

Read more: http://network.nationalpost.com/NP/blogs/toronto/archive/2010/04/10/the-walk-under-toronto-subterranean-sojourn-comes-to-shiny-stop.aspx#ixzz0n1WJBfKx

Gil

May 5th, 2010, 06:21 AM

This one comes from the Toronto Star. I was hoping that the revamped website (http://www.torontopath.com/view/Home.aspx) that the story focuses on would have a new version of the PATH map.

A guide to the ‘city under a city’Torontopath.com will offer details on PATH’s stores and services
Published On Thu Apr 8 2010
Patty Winsa
Urban Affairs Reporter

http://media.thestar.topscms.com/images/e0/ff/b9d8f2f34865a75756e1a976f51d.jpeg
Don Givelos is the owner of Torontopath.com, which will offer a guide to stores in the PATH system, the world's largest subterranean mall. The site launches Monday. DAVID COOPER/TORONTO STAR

Toronto’s PATH system is one of the city’s hidden gems, a collection of tunnels lined with retail outlets that connect commuters underground from Union Station to downtown office buildings and malls.

But the route is poorly signed, hard to navigate and lacks a posted guide to the location or names of the stores that make it the world’s largest subterranean mall.

A new website to be launched Monday should change that.

Torontopath.com will be the online guide to PATH retailers, and by the end of the year will also offer a downloadable mobile application allowing users to search and map stores and services throughout the system.

It will be the preeminent source for the “city under the city,” says website owner Don Givelos, who sold a recruiting Internet site he’d operated for more than a decade before setting up this one.

The PATH is a 30-kilometre maze with signage that points downtown workers in the direction of the next building but doesn’t provide much navigation help to newcomers who don’t know the names and locations of the office towers the system links together. And the PATH maps available don’t list the stores or services.

“If you were a tourist, you would find it a challenge,” says Al Rezoski, of the city’s planning department. “It’s a very generalized graphic ... a very rudimentary wayfinding system,” he says.

The city manages the pathways, but connections from buildings are made voluntarily by private developers, who pay for construction and maintenance. The cost to build a tunnel can run as high as $3 million, especially if the passageway goes under a road, where it must meet the same specifications for bearing heavy traffic as a city bridge.

Over the next decade, several residential towers, such as the Aura at College Park and the Ritz-Carlton, a hotel-condo on Wellington St. near Simcoe St., are expected to join the PATH. Rezoski expects the additions to change the retail mix in the PATH complex, attracting grocery stores and bars that cater to residents, and perhaps prompting an extension to the current opening hours — generally 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. — that are meant to meet the needs of office workers.

Developers of two condo-hotels — the 57-storey Trump Towers at Adelaide and Bay Sts. and the 65-storey Shangri-la on University Ave. below Richmond St. — have said no to connecting with the system.

The website should bolster traffic to the underground stores that now largely subsist on passersby.

Rezoski says two new pharmacies have opened recently, one under Brookfield Place at Yonge and Front Sts., and the other below the Bay-Adelaide Centre, with neither ground-level exterior signage or advertising.

“You wouldn’t know that (they) were underneath,” says Rezoski. “It’s kind of interesting that retail can survive just on the foot traffic in the PATH system.”

The Toronto Star http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/article/792548--a-guide-to-the-city-under-a-city

With no connection to the Trump and Shangri-la, perhaps they should focus on connecting up to Aura and the College Park complex. Either through the Delta Chelsea or up Bay St. to connect with the Sick Kids Hospital expansion.

Gil

May 5th, 2010, 06:36 AM

And finally, two pieces on making getting around the PATH a little easier.

Engineers try to make sense of the PATH
After getting lost themselves, students propose info terminals and colour-coding
Published On Wed Apr 14 2010
Patty Winsa
Urban Affairs Reporter

http://media.thestar.topscms.com/images/dc/34/7f00f2a24044bd7484dd69b68152.jpeg
The engineering student team's conception of what the PATH information stand might look like. The team's proposal would place these terminals around the 30-km PATH system, allowing users to find their way and even get a printout of the route.

How many University of Toronto engineering students does it take to decipher a map in Toronto’s underground PATH system?

Three. But after reading the map, the first-year students who were in the tunnels researching a major project on how to improve the signage were still lost.

The group was eventually helped out by a homeless man who had taken shelter from the rain in the passageways and noticed their confused faces, says Adam Fontana, 17, one of the students.

It may read like a bad joke, but lately, the PATH maps are more likely to be the butt of bad press.

The directional signage in the tunnels that connect downtown office buildings to malls and subway stations is so dense that only the most familiar users, who can navigate from building to building, can find their way around.

On Monday, at a day-long symposium in U of T’s engineering-science building, Fontana and team mates Andrei Vouk, 18, and Michael De Paolis, 18, presented their solution: 22 searchable computerized terminals, one at every major entry point into the PATH.

In response to a query, a computer program written by the team calculates the shortest distance between two points along the PATH and creates a map and a Google-like list of turn-by-turn directions. The results are displayed on screen, but for 10 cents, the user can get a print-out.

Paper in the terminals would be restocked twice a week, when the money was collected, says Fontana. And when the machines weren’t in use, advertisements would cycle through on-screen, producing revenue for the city that would justify the $88,000 price tag for installation and the $36,000 in annual maintenance fees.

“It promotes the economy of the PATH and it promotes the downtown core,” said Fontana.

Fontana’s group was one of more than 80 that presented hypothetical solutions to real-life problems identified by students earlier in the year. Teachers Jason Foster and Alan Chong narrowed a list of 84 topics down to eight, which included the PATH map, along with topics such as how to harness the power of urban wind tunnels and improve pedestrian and cyclist safety. Teams set up displays and defended their design proposals to lecturers and teaching assistants in 90-minute increments on Monday before tearing their displays down to make way for new teams.

The searchable computer program is “a great idea,” said Michael Saunders, a PATH manager with the city’s economic development, culture and tourism division, who attended the event. Saunders said after some of the PATH teams consulted with him, he became interested in what would emerge in their proposals.

But Saunders worried that the outdoor terminals proposed by Fontana’s team would seize up in cold weather, much like the computerized information kiosks installed downtown by the city’s parks and recreation department a few years ago.

At the other end of the spectrum was a simple, cost-effective PATH proposal by students Tom Ye, 18, Kai Hsiang Yang, 18 and Sheng-Chang Tsai, 19.

The students used the existing PATH map, but colour-coded it according to districts named for the area’s most prominent landmark, such as the Eaton Centre or City Hall. Retail stores and services in each district were colour-coded to match, and coordinating lines on floors served as visual guides.

Saunders says there are no plans to replace the PATH maps, despite the recent criticism. Although the city oversees the underground passageways, the tunnels are owned and managed by the private developers who pay to build them. Saunders says it took years just to reach agreement on the design of the current signs.

The Star will feature other challenges and solutions in Greater Toronto throughout this week.

The Toronto Star http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/article/795445--engineers-try-to-make-sense-of-the-path

Finally, there's an App (http://mapthepath.com/) for that!

Lost underground? App helps find your Path
By DON PEAT, Toronto Sun
Last Updated: April 21, 2010 9:53am
http://storage.canoe.ca/v1/dynamic_resize/?src=http://www.torontosun.com/news/torontoandgta/2010/04/20/pathW.jpg&size=248x186
Roxana Vasquez — posing in the Path on Thursday — holds an iphone with the Map the Path app she has designed for the device. (ERNEST DOROSZUK/Toronto Sun)

A Toronto woman has developed an application to turn your iPhone into an iPATHfinder through Toronto’s underground labyrinth of shops.

Roxana Vasquez, founder of BonceWorks, said she got the idea for Map the Path after noticing a common trend among people wandering through the city’s PATH system.

“A lot of people walking around the PATH area seemed to be lost,” she said Tuesday.

The app gives users an overview of the 28 km of walkways connecting the 50 buildings within the PATH system and helps people find the businesses they are looking for underground.

Originally from Lima, Peru, Vasquez, 33, said she has worked in online marketing and she knows “mobile is the future.”

The free application launched Monday has been downloaded by about 150 people so far but could be used by a huge audience considering the PATH system accommodates about 100,000 commuters a day along with thousands of tourists and residents.

She hopes that as Torontonians download it and use it, they’ll be able to give her feedback on how to improve the program.

To get your copy of Map the Path, go to mapthepath.com.

The Toronto Sun http://www.torontosun.com/news/torontoandgta/2010/04/20/13658296.html

Here's a screencap from the app website:
http://mapthepath.com/httpdocs/MTP/site/images/mapa.png

allurban

May 5th, 2010, 08:46 AM

Continuing where the last post left off:

Along with a little addendum:

Originally Posted by The National Post
Find your way in Toronto's catacombs
Posted: March 30, 2010, 10:48 AM by Peter Kuitenbrouwer

I wrote today about the hopeless lack of good signage and maps in the PATH system. I did receive today this helpful note from a reader, Aland Brown, who writes, in part, "After reading today's instalment about PATH maps, I thought I'd tell you what I did to get a map when your series started so I could follow along. I did a Google search and
found http://www.toronto.ca/path/. There's a link there to a PDF copy of a map ready for printing (which may be the same as the map you picked up at the concierge desk).

Thank you very much for this, Alan. I should point out, however, that a visitor arriving in Toronto at Union Station will not be able to download and print a map on the spot. Let's face it, nothing really beats a map on the wall and proper signage helping visitors to find their way.

Read more: http://network.nationalpost.com/NP/b...#ixzz0n1K8gBl9

Not so dumb question - is there an app for that?... and by the time I got to the end of the series, I find that wow, there is an app.

I thought this series was great - it takes me to a part of Toronto that I have never really become familiar with - and I remember getting lost alot when I would jump into the PATH on my way down from U of T to Union station!

The thing that impresses me about the feature is how the stories have shaped, and have been shaped by, the fast changes - get people thinking and talking and suddenly, solutions start to appear.

The one thing that does worry me tho - what is happening to the streetfront stores with the PATH expansion? Consider what the streets of the city look like south of Queen - lots of nice wide sidewalks and lovely bank towers, but nothing at street level to draw crowds outside of office hours.

Walk down Yonge and south of Queen it gets really depressing...until you get to Front and the Hockey Hall of Fame and Marche suddenly kick it back into life.

Cheers, m

Gil

May 5th, 2010, 11:25 PM

The one thing that does worry me tho - what is happening to the streetfront stores with the PATH expansion? Consider what the streets of the city look like south of Queen - lots of nice wide sidewalks and lovely bank towers, but nothing at street level to draw crowds outside of office hours.

Walk down Yonge and south of Queen it gets really depressing...until you get to Front and the Hockey Hall of Fame and Marche suddenly kick it back into life.

Cheers, m

There is a lot of redevelopment going on along that stretch Yonge St. It's still pretty well used by pedestrians since the PATH network doesn't really exist east of Yonge. There are shops, restaurants and banks which are apparently well patronized. Over on Bay St. there are people who choose to walk at street-level for the more direct routing (traffic lights aside) or those just seeking to get outside after being cooped up indoors all day. There are also a few buildings with services not accessible by the PATH which require a quick trip outdoors.

urban 2.0

May 8th, 2010, 05:47 AM

Someone found Google.

Kappa21

May 9th, 2010, 01:49 AM

I'm glad there is some help going on for the Path. When I went from school to the GO, i used to get lost...wish it was available before hand.

Its difficult to know where u going, especially since you dont know if you are going North, East, West or South.......

I usually rely on streets and buildings to see where im going or if im lost sometimes...

Gil

June 17th, 2010, 07:10 PM

With the Telus Tower and Maple Leaf Square now open to the public it's interesting to see their connections to the PATH system from the Air Canada Centre and westward to other developments.

Telus Tower is connected at the ground level to the ACC/Union Station and will have an above-ground connection to the 18 York St. tower across the street.

Meanwhile, from the ACC you travel above ground to get to Maple Leaf Square and then will travel under York Street to get to the Ice condo development on the other side of York.

Seems like both developments are trying to expose as much of their respective buildings as possible to people using the PATH network. The connection through Maple Leaf Square seems the most convoluted having to go up level to enter from the ACC and then go down two levels to the Conourse level to continue westward. The aerial connection though does allow for potential southern connections on the other side of Lake Shore Blvd.

Now, with the supposed underground station for a Bremner LRT from Union Sation will both towers have connections to the York St. station/stop, thus providing an indoor connection between the two buildings without going through the ACC? I would expect that the buildings on the west side of York St. would also have a connection. That would make the station the crossroad for all four developments.

allurban

June 21st, 2010, 09:28 AM

Gil

June 21st, 2010, 11:52 PM

it would be nice to have a connection from the bus terminal to HSC - maybe they will build something if the bus terminal lands ever get redeveloped.

The other big gap is along University Ave. between Queen & Dundas - it would be nice to have some walkways there (not to mention, some desirable buildings to walk past/through).

Osgoode Hall seems so isolated and then there is the issue with the US Consulate so Im not even sure what they could do.

Cheers, m

Unfortunately the biggest development along that section of University, the Shangri-La won't get a connection to the PATH (see my earlier post (http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showpost.php?p=56363343&postcount=215) from the Star. That leaves the north-south potential connections west of University along Simcoe or John. I'd love to see the Lightbox get a connection through Metro Hall and eventually head north.

This all leave the First Century Tower at the southwest corner of Dundas and University completely cut off from the rest of the PATH network. So much so that it's usually left off the map.

allurban

June 23rd, 2010, 07:39 AM

Unfortunately the biggest development along that section of University, the Shangri-La won't get a connection to the PATH (see my earlier post (http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showpost.php?p=56363343&postcount=215) from the Star. That leaves the north-south potential connections west of University along Simcoe or John. I'd love to see the Lightbox get a connection through Metro Hall and eventually head north.

This all leave the First Century Tower at the southwest corner of Dundas and University completely cut off from the rest of the PATH network. So much so that it's usually left off the map.I guess the best possibility would be to extend the PATH west from the bus terminal to the corner of University and Dundas, then beyond to Simcoe to provide that north-south link.

I hope that one day, Toronto decides to open up the Osgoode lands for more people to enjoy. Perhaps some development under the open spaces, which could be connected to the PATH system from City Hall and the Four Seasons Centre.

I hope they also find a way to open up the grounds to encourage people to use the space.

In the winter, perhaps a skate path like Gage Park in Brampton - linked to the skating rink at City Hall

Cheers, m

Skybean

June 29th, 2010, 07:05 PM

Toronto shines a light on underground PATH

http://img341.imageshack.us/img341/9160/path734245gma.jpg
In the PATH in downtown Toronto.

City begins work on a master plan for labyrinthine pedestrian corridor where retail is king but no one is really in charge

Angela Kryhul

Globe and Mail Update Published on Tuesday, Jun. 29, 2010 11:14AM EDT Last updated on Tuesday, Jun. 29, 2010 11:20AM EDT

City planners and private developers from all over the world come to Toronto to study PATH, the system of pedestrian tunnels snaking underneath the downtown core. Usually, planners want to know how they can duplicate Toronto’s vision for the 28-kilometre subterranean city, which connects more than 50 buildings and office towers, 20 parking garages, five subway stations, six major hotels and City Hall.

Except that there is no master plan.

For decades, PATH has grown in piecemeal fashion. About 35 private corporations own sections of PATH: They constructed the pedestrian tunnels running through the basements of their buildings, and they cover the ongoing costs of security and maintenance. The city of Toronto owns only the small spaces connecting one private owner to another, and the PATH sections running under city streets.

That explains why PATH resembles the work of a demented spider. Following no discernible pattern, PATH weaves as far north as the Toronto Coach Terminal at Dundas and Bay streets, and the Metro Toronto Convention Centre to the south. The Telus, RBC Dexia and Bay-Adelaide Centre office towers are among the latest additions to PATH.

Heated in the winter and air-conditioned in summer, PATH plays an important role in relieving pedestrian crowding at street level. About 100,000 people walk the PATH every day. “Although we have fairly wide sidewalks, they literally could not handle the flow of pedestrians coming in and out of the huge buildings if the PATH system wasn’t there to back it up,” says Rod McPhail, director of transportation planning for the City of Toronto.

Toronto, in fact, is building its very own piece of the PATH, connecting the northwest corner of Union Station to an existing artery at Wellington Street. This $65-million, 300-metre tunnel is the first time a substantial section of PATH will have been built, paid for, maintained and owned by the city.

It’s still early days, but Toronto city planners want to create a master plan for PATH to help guide negotiations with downtown property developers. The city has begun work on a study of the master plan idea, according to Mr. McPhail. In the absence of a grand vision, the city negotiates one-on-one with developers.

“During the site-plan application process, if we saw a project where PATH comes up to the location but there’s no way for it to continue on to another development, we would work with the developer to suggest how the PATH system can continue through their development,” says James Parakh, senior urban designer with the city of Toronto.

The city would likely insist that the basement be designed so that a connection might be added in the future. Some basements even have knockout panels where the property might one day connect to PATH, Mr. McPhail adds.

Since 1995 the city has had design guidelines for PATH that ensure consistency in tunnel dimensions, materials used and signage. Toronto has legal agreements with private landowners to ensure PATH is maintained, secure and accessible to the public. “There’s actually quite a good working relationship between the public sector and the private sector,” Mr. McPhail says.

So why, after all these years, does the city now want to create a master plan for the PATH network’s future development?

Mr. McPhail says that both private developers and city planners are calling for it. “The reason why we really want to do this is we’re missing out on opportunities to make connections that are logical,” he says.

The need for a master plan became obvious a few years ago when city planners saw that the proposed Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts – located close to the Osgoode subway station – did not include a PATH connection in the initial design, Mr. McPhail says.

The city negotiated to get the connection, but it “was done sort of after the fact, almost at the tail end of the negotiations, and that’s what we want to avoid,” Mr. McPhail explains.

“When somebody comes in to develop block A on the corner of such and such street, our planner should be able to look at a master plan that says there’s a desire to have PATH go through that site. Then we can negotiate with the private developer early on in the process because they’re going to have to decide how to design their basement to accommodate a PATH system,” he says.

The last thing you want to do is try to persuade a developer to add a PATH connection at the end of the process, Mr. McPhail says. “You want to discuss the mutual benefits to the city, the private sector and to the public at large who will be using it.”

At least one downtown business group is saying how far it wants PATH to grow in its area.

The Toronto Entertainment District Business Improvement Area – representing businesses bounded by Spadina Avenue to the west, Queen Street to the north, Harbourfront to the south and venues as far east as the Air Canada Centre – last year created a long-term vision for overall area development. The document discourages any westward extension of the PATH network.

As PATH continued west, it has diverted business away from street-level restaurants and stores and affected the vibrant street life, explains Harold Madi, a partner with the Planning Partnership, which prepared the BIA Master Plan document.

“This is an important time for the city to really think very carefully about what it intends to do with the PATH network – what its true purpose is, and what principles ought to be considered when expanding it,” Mr. Madi says. “A PATH master plan would deal with, hopefully, not just physical expansion but rather conditions under which to expand.”

A retail hot spot

With 1,200 shops and services covering 4 million square feet, Toronto’s PATH is recognized by Guinness World Records as the world’s largest underground shopping complex.

But if you’re a retailer looking to lease space in this labyrinth of pedestrian tunnels, be prepared for stiff competition. “PATH is a competitive scene, and landlords all want the latest new tenant,” says Stuart A. Smith, vice-president, urban retail group, for CB Richard Ellis in Toronto. “There’s very little vacancy down in the PATH system. It’s probably less than 1 per cent.”

PATH has its roots in retail. Back in 1900, the T Eaton Co. built the first tunnel from its Yonge Street store to an adjacent bargain annex. PATH really got going in the 1970s when the Richmond-Adelaide and Sheraton centres were connected.

Location matters, even underground. What makes PATH so desirable is that most of its users are professionals working in one of the many bank towers, Mr. Smith explains.

People are rushing to and from work, so retailers are catering to a crowd that’s thinking “give it to me now,” Mr. Smith says. At lunchtime, they’re doing chores like going to the pharmacy, having their shoes repaired or buying gifts. “It’s generally a compact presentation of things that people want to buy while they’re downtown at work. It’s not really about browsing around and comparison shopping in three or four different fashion stores.”

The average store size in PATH is 1,000 to 1,200 square feet, and net rents for non-food-court spaces are $50 to $100 per square foot, he says. Retailers can expect to pay the highest rents in the main arteries that lead to Union Station.

It’s difficult to compare what a PATH retailer pays in net rent compared with stores on the street above, Mr. Smith says. There are few comparable retail opportunities at-grade, he adds, because the financial institutions leasing space usually dominate the building lobbies where they offer banking services to the public.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/toronto-shines-a-light-on-underground-path/article1622826/

Ramako

June 29th, 2010, 08:01 PM

I'm still a little disappointed that the PATH wasn't extended to the TIFF Lightbox.

skyscraper03

June 30th, 2010, 12:12 AM

I'm still a little disappointed that the PATH wasn't extended to the TIFF Lightbox.

I always wonder why Toronto doesn't have sufficient underground path when it's the coldest city among top 10 largest cities in North America.

They should first extend the downtown underground path to UofT area and Ryerson University.

Taller, Better

June 30th, 2010, 12:23 AM

I always wonder why Toronto doesn't have sufficient underground path when it's the coldest city among top 10 largest cities in North America.

.

Uhmm... Toronto has more PATH than any of the other 10 largest cities in North America, and in fact probably more than any city in the world, so what is it you are always wondering about? Why would you consider it insufficient? Montreal's figures for RÉSO include interrupted stretches that you can only access by jumping on the Metro and getting off at another station. Our figures do not include such stretches at, say, Eglinton or North York. I've never heard anyone, ever complain there are insufficient underground tunnels here.

What part of the GTA do you live in?

Elkhanan1

June 30th, 2010, 01:29 AM

Great article. I think the long-term vision should be for PATH to go all the way up to Manulife via College Park and the provincial gov't buildings. Hopefully, Aura's taking care of the connection to CP with a spur to Ryerson's new student centre on Yonge. Along Bloor, the tunnels should be extended westward toward the ROM.

koolio

June 30th, 2010, 03:35 AM

Gil

June 30th, 2010, 05:20 AM

I'm still a little disappointed that the PATH wasn't extended to the TIFF Lightbox.

The article mentioned that the Entertainment District is trying to prevent the PATH from extending further into the area, hence the lack of a connection to the Lightbox and theatres. Perhaps if they had some official/grandiose structures to mark the end of the PATH and the beginning of the Entertainment District, something like a gateway between the two areas.

To the mods, there is a PATH thread in the Transportation subforum, could this get merged with that so that things don't get repeated?

Taller, Better

June 30th, 2010, 05:38 AM

You are correct. I will move it.

I use PATH only when it is VERY cold, as I hate scurrying around underground.

Gil

March 12th, 2011, 05:16 AM

It's been relatively quiet on the PATH front lately with the Ritz-Carlton coming on stream and confirmation that the Trump Tower will again have a connection after backing out of the original idea. My question there is where would the connection be? I'm thinking under Adelaide off the connection between Scotia and Bay-Adelaide just past the Ninki Japanese restaurant seeing as Scotia Plaza's parking garage access lies just behind the restaurant. The Shangri-La Hotel/Condo at this point looks like it won't get a connection.

I've made some updates to my PATH map including the developments along Bremner, some discussions (http://enconsulting.ca/?p=51) about connections southeastward to St. Lawrence Market and I've included the legend from the original map. Perhaps at some point I'll extend the map back to the original coverage area up to College once more details about connections to the existing network are revealed.

http://i55.************/209qeyt.jpg

AndrewJM3D

March 12th, 2011, 04:54 PM

I think the knockout wall is on north side connectiong to BA. I'm sure it will be nothing more then a door for hotel patrons to gain access to the path network. Much like 1 King West.

Gil

June 11th, 2011, 04:15 AM

I think the knockout wall is on north side connectiong to BA. I'm sure it will be nothing more then a door for hotel patrons to gain access to the path network. Much like 1 King West.

The City hosted a PIC at Union Station a few weeks back on a Master Plan for the PATH network. On one of the panels they had the existing network including the "satellite" networks at College, Hospital Row and Bloor displayed. It's available online: http://www.toronto.ca/planning/pdf/path_dropin_panels.pdf the map is on page 6.

On that map they listed buildings with knock-out panels for potential connections to the PATH. The connection to Trump is shown as undeground on the south side of Adelaide. I suppose you could build a parallel corridor to BA from Trump as both have underground connectors. Another curious connection is the knock-out panel at Maple Leaf Square being underground while the knock-out panel for the ICE Condos across the street is shown as being above ground. That'd make for an interesting connector. The Shangri-La has two underground knock-out panels potentially for an eastern connection to the DBRS Tower and a southern connection to Sun Life and St. Andrew station.

The map itself is pretty impressive despite some missing/incorrect details as it shows where the City is looking to expand immediately, in the short- to medium-term and in the long-term with cooperation from property owners along the way.

Gil

September 28th, 2011, 08:30 PM

Manager not sold on PATH to Toronto’s Trump hotel
Peter Kuitenbrouwer Sep 27, 2011 – 12:34 PM ET | Last Updated: Sep 27, 2011 1:51 PM ET

The Trump International Hotel & Tower, nearing completion on the corner of Bay and Adelaide streets, rests in the heart of Toronto’s PATH network of underground tunnels: across Adelaide stands the Bay-Adelaide Centre, which linked the PATH from the Bank of Nova Scotia up to the Hudson’s Bay Company, two years ago; across Bay sits First Canadian Place, possibly the busiest hub of the PATH.

The Trump tower did rough in a connection to the PATH, Mickael Damelincourt, general manager of the Trump Hotel Toronto, told me Monday. But today a wall blocks PATH users from entering the Trump. Mr. Damelincourt said he is not sure whether he will open the PATH connection to the Trump.
...
http://news.nationalpost.com/2011/09/27/manager-not-sold-on-path-to-torontos-trump-hotel/

The article goes on to say the hotel didn't want people bypassing the lobby where they would be personally greeted by staff before heading up to their rooms. They also underestimated the connectivity and usage of the PATH network.

The Ritz-Carlton probably faces the same issues, but instead of blocking the connection they simply had the elevators access the Lobby, PATH and parking levels only. That way people would still have to pass through the lobby.

As some of the comments from the article have stated come winter or inclement weather the lack of a direct connection to the PATH will be seen as a deterrant to the hotel.

Now the question, where is this roughed-in connection? With Scotia Plaza or with the Bay-Adelaide Centre? The floor plans for the BAC don't indicate a connection with Trump unless they plan on losing one of their retail leases for it.

Scotia Plaza makes sense but the layout makes for an awkward connection. The access to the parking garage prevents a direct connection along Adelaide unless a tunnel was built beneath the street to make the connection, something I see as doubtful. There's an unexcavated area south of the parking ramp which leads to the raised area south of Ninki next to the National Club's back door. It's a little hidden if you don't know what you're looking for, but perhaps knocking down the wall will open it up a bit. The grade change somewhat forces most of the pedestrian flow around the elevators to the crossroad by Winners and Ninki.

eltodesukane

September 29th, 2011, 08:24 PM

I always wonder why Toronto doesn't have sufficient underground path when it's the coldest city among top 10 largest cities in North America.

They should first extend the downtown underground path to UofT area and Ryerson University.

Elevated pedestrian bridges and walkways should also be an option, as between The Eaton Center and The Bay on Queen St.

Attached image from Algonquin College in Ottawa.

(how can I attach an image from my computer ?)

http://i56.************/14shblt.png

Paul29

September 29th, 2011, 08:55 PM

Attached image from Algonquin College in Ottawa.

(how can I attach an image from my computer ?)

I think you have to upload to an site like tinypic and use the link provided to post to a message board.

http://************/

Gil

September 30th, 2011, 04:56 AM

Elevated pedestrian bridges and walkways should also be an option, as between The Eaton Center and The Bay on Queen St. ...

It looks like the PATH network south of Front St. will either be at ground level or above ground. The connection from Maple Leaf Square to the ACC is above ground, as will be the connection between the Telus Tower and 18 York St. and then along the rest of the developments along Bremner connecting with the Skywalk.

What strikes me in terms of connections at least within Ryerson's network (if it ever gets conncted to the rest of the PATH) was the lack of some sort of connection between the Rogers Communications building and the Engineering building when it was being built.

yin_yang

October 1st, 2011, 10:54 AM

It looks like the PATH network south of Front St. will either be at ground level or above ground. The connection from Maple Leaf Square to the ACC is above ground, as will be the connection between the Telus Tower and 18 York St. and then along the rest of the developments along Bremner connecting with the Skywalk.

What strikes me in terms of connections at least within Ryerson's network (if it ever gets conncted to the rest of the PATH) was the lack of some sort of connection between the Rogers Communications building and the Engineering building when it was being built.

aw, come on, as a former ryerson student, that connection is short compared to the bridged one.

Gil

October 15th, 2011, 02:41 AM

It seems like the Post likes breaking PATH expansions (http://business.financialpost.com/2011/10/14/rbc-trades-bay-street-for-bay-view/).

RBC: On the waterfront
Barbara Shecter Oct 14, 2011 – 9:29 AM ET

http://financialpostbusiness.files.wordpress.com/2011/10/1014rbc.jpg?w=620
Architectural renderings of the RBC WaterPark building.

TORONTO — Toronto’s financial hub is expanding and gravitating towards the city’s waterfront.

Royal Bank of Canada, the country’s biggest bank, said Friday it is moving the headquarters of its domestic operations from a smattering of locations across the city to a sparkling new home on the north side of Queens Quay — outside the traditional Bay Street corridor bounded by Queen Street to the north and Front Street to the south.
...

The article goes on to mention that the building will be connected to the PATH by pedestrian bridge from the Air Canada Centre. That connection will rely on a connection through whatever is being built at 90 Harbour St. Based on the rendering and the address it looks like the building will go where the parking lot between York, Bay, Harbour and Queens Quay.

I know the Waterfront BIA was trying to get a connection down to the Ferry Terminal. A connection through the Harbour Square condos (perhaps through the parking levels) or into the Westin's Conference Centre.

gan4volta

October 16th, 2011, 05:18 PM

Girl at front looks not so happy from this render)

Gil

November 6th, 2011, 03:14 AM

Over at UT (http://urbantoronto.ca/news/2011/11/mars-phase-ii-integrating-queens-park-station) with word that MaRS II will connect to Queen's Park station, they've gone and mapped out the connections between the Government buildings and the hospitals:

http://www.urbantoronto.ca/sites/default/files/imagecache/display-slideshow/images/articles/2011/10/3685/urbantoronto-3685-11346.jpg
Pedestrian tunnel network around Queen's Park Station - by Isidoros Kyrlangitses

Meanwhile the City is working on a pedestrian PATH network master plan. You can see the draft report here (http://www.toronto.ca/planning/pdf/path_draftmasterplan.pdf) with loads of interesting maps. (See their Map 1 on page 31)Strangely it seems as though they're using different levels of the PATH for the various buildings when they show the entire network. There are also a few missing connections that I have mapped but they don't. The draft Design Guidelines are here (http://www.toronto.ca/planning/pdf/path_draftdesignguideline.pdf) which look at among other things wayfinding and portals.

There was an PIC at Metro Hall last week regarding the master plan. It was interesting listening to the various conversations going on. One key subject that ties in with the UT posting is that the University Health Network should get on board to try and upgrade their internal network so that it can be connected to the PATH at some point.

Another was the connection to Ryerson via the Learning Centre which will get underway soon. Unfortunately its location is apparently too far north to connect with Dundas station. It's hoped that whatever develops on the south side of Gould where the Salad King once stood will get the connection and allow Ryerson to connect with it.

As soon as I get the chance I'll incorporate these into the running PATH map we've got here. It looks like I might have to go back to the original format which ran all the way to College St.