Paul Wilson visits the site of W.E. Sanford’s former mansion in the shadow of Television City
Wesanford is a pint-sized neighbourhood, 20 snug houses with an interesting history. Suddenly, it’s in the spotlight.
The city is considering an application from Toronto developer Brad Lamb for a two-tower condo project he’s calling Television City. One tower is to be 30 floors, the other 40 — about 15 feet higher than Hamilton’s tallest structure, Landmark Place at Main and Catharine.
But Television City would be even closer to heaven, because the site at Caroline and Hunter — CHCH headquarters for a while longer — is atop what they used to call Nob Hill. The rich lived there.
A Lamb team — minus the man himself — appeared before Hamilton’s Design Review Panel on Nov. 9. The panel was not keen on this reach for the sky.
One member declared it “too aggressive.” Another called it “a nasty precedent.” And there was some incredulity that units were already being sold for a project not yet approved.
Wife Marnie and I stopped by the Television City sales office at the tail end of the day it opened, Nov. 4.
We’d already studied the website. Just for the heck of it, we told a salesperson we’d like a Carol Burnett on the 33rd floor. (Lamb is not naming the units after TV stars anymore, not after William Shatner found out and threatened legal action.)
The salesperson looked at his clipboard and said he was sorry. The highest he could offer was the 19th floor — every Carol Burnett on the floors above had already sold. The price was about $460,000, or $600 a square foot. Hard to know how solid those sales really were.
The consensus of the Design Review Panel was that 40 storeys are not compatible with that piece of town. They were especially concerned about the tower’s impact on that pocket development right across the street — Wesanford.
Those compact brick houses — a few two-storey, the rest just one — look to be lifted right from a street in Westdale. There is nothing else quite like it in the core.
On that land — most of the block bounded by Caroline, Hunter, Bay and Jackson — there used to sit one of the city’s finest mansions. Clothing-industry baron W.E. Sanford was a man of no small ego, so named the home after himself. It had 56 rooms, 16 more than Dundurn Castle.
Sanford drowned in 1899, at his summer home on Lake Rosseau, age 60. Widow Harriet, along with the servants, stayed on at Wesanford until her death nearly 40 years later. The house and contents went up for sale fast.
There seems to have been little to no resistance to the demolition of Wesanford. The thirties had been a tough decade, war was looming, and heritage protection was not yet on the radar.
Prominent local builder W.H. Yates announced he would put an apartment block on the site. But on Aug. 11, 1939, The Spec carried a small story that said “houses in the medium-price class will be erected instead.” No explanation for the change.
The homes were built and their owners enjoy a suburbs-in-the-city setting to this day. There are highrises around it, but they’re in the 20-storey range, not twice that.
Results of a two-door survey: homeowner one in favour of the new towers, believing they could be good for property values; next-door neighbour firmly against, saying it’s too much, too close.
A 40-storey Television City would bring more traffic to that piece of town. And residents of Wesanford would lose some precious sun. A study shows that on June 21, longest day of the year, some homes there would find themselves in full shadow by four in the afternoon.
But there will be no long shadows cast this year or next. These projects take time. Sometimes they don’t happen at all.
Six weeks ago, Lamb cancelled a 37storey condo project in Edmonton after a three-year struggle for zoning changes. Sales projections, he said, started heading the wrong way.