Heritage: More on 7 Austin Terrace

BELLEVUE, WASHINGTON - Long-time readers of this blog may remember a piece done back in September on 7 Austin Terrace in Toronto, Ontario near Casa Loma. The 1922 building, built for John B. Maclean, the founder of what has become Maclean's magazine, was in limbo, with an unknown developer proposing to remove it in favor of much taller condos using apparently-sneaky tactics, and the community having difficulty figuring out what to do about the situation.

I was contacted yesterday in reference to that old blog post, as it seems that the situation around 7 Austin Terrace is changing. No less than Maclean's has run an article accusing the developer of trying to vandalize the building. As described in the article, many of the heritage features have been removed in an attempt to prevent the city from designating it as a heritage structure. Maclean's identifies the developer in question as John Todd.

Further details revealed by an article in the Toronto Star seem consistent with this interpretation. Thanks to the authority of the Ontario Municipal Board, there appears to be nothing that the city of Toronto can do; Todd has won.

For those who wish to boycott Todd's other developments, there appears to be a partial list on one of his other companies' web sites.

Further developments will likely be tracked at the Heritage Toronto and Toll Keeper's Cottage web sites.

Heritage: 7 Austin Terrace

The building at 7 Austin Terrace in Toronto, Ontario, originally built in 1922, faced an unknown future on 13-September-2009

TORONTO, ONTARIO - On Sunday afternoon, I attended the Heritage Toronto walk "Atop the Davenport Hill in the 1920's." As with many of these activities, the walk stopped at a variety of interesting buildings in a neighbourhood, in this case the area north of Davenport Road and south of St. Clair Avenue between Spadina Road and Wells Hill Avenue.

One of those structures on the route was a 7 Austin Terrace. Built in 1922 by Lieutenant-Colonel John B. Maclean, who had published a magazine called "The Business Man's" which morphed into what we know today as "Maclean's," the building had clearly been rebuilt over the years and had become a multi-unit complex. While plenty was known about Maclean and the building's early history, its contemporary status was not known, and in fact a demolition notice was found on the door. Our tour guide, Doug Fife of the Spadina Museum, did not know what was happening with the building.

Just minutes later as the walk started down Wells Hill Avenue, local residents who were out working in their yards filled in some details. It seems that a proposed land use action to build a large condominium complex on the site had been posted while most of them were on vacation in late August, requiring comment by 31-August. When those who were in town called the telephone number listed to protest the proposed action, no human being ever answered.

Meanwhile, the doors to the building were being left open, apparently to encourage vandalism. The owners of the building--and nobody knows who they are--seem to be hoping that the building will fall into such a state of disrepair that the building cannot be saved.

7 Austin Terrace does not have a historical designation just like many homes in the neighbourhood built in the 1920's, which is retrospect may have been a major oversight by the city. Whether the home built by an iconic Canadian media figure survives in something like its present form or not, it is clear that a building with significantly more units than the existing structure would not fit its surroundings, which are mostly single-family homes with some two-story apartments.

This kind of additional information, beyond what even the researcher of the walk had been able to come up with, is one of the joys of Heritage Toronto walks.

Those concerned about what has happened with this building are encouraged to contact Toronto city councilperson Joe Mihevc, who represents the St. Paul's Ward.