Community and City Building are more than clichés in Toronto. This is nowhere more evident than in the City of Toronto’s work with the Liberty Village & Niagara Neighbourhood communities to keep Strachan an urban friendly street at the tracks south of King Street West.
When the Ontario Ministry of the Environment began an Environmental Assessment Study for the Georgetown and Airport Expansion in September 2007, I ensured that the City of Toronto undertook a Transportation study to explore designs for the at-grade-crossing at Strachan Avenue. At a public meeting in November 2008, the community discussed and endorsed a unique design that included lowering the rail tracks while keeping intersections open and Strachan Avenue at grade.
Suddenly, on April 15th, 2009, Metrolinx dropped the community endorsed design from their Open House but the community responded with passion, intelligence and focus. With the City’s Transportation design in hand, the fight-back campaign built steadily. Emails, e-petitions, postcards, letters, placards, meetings, and rallies kept the pressure up and buoyed my and the City’s negotiations. Only two short months later, on June 16th, 2009 Metrolinx presented a win-win proposal that dropped their proposed plan and instead offered a lowered rail and bridge that kept the Wellington Avenue and Douro Street intersections open.
While some details remained to be worked out, we all argued for an urban friendly solution. This latest design considers the needs of neighbours, pedestrians, cyclists, vehicles, and transit by essentially abandoning the roller coaster effect of the previous design. Metrolinx developed a solution with roots in the City and community’s insistence that Strachan remain an avenue in our neighbourhood and a pedestrian/cycling friendly path to our City’s Waterfront.
For the original study please visit toronto.ca/planning/strachanstudy/
