Take low road on Gardiner transformation
A version of New York’s High Line park could work, but under the expressway
The Gardiner Expressway routinely makes its way into Toronto politics. Bury it? Repair it? Erase it? There are dreamers who also hold out hope for a Toronto version of the High Line: the elevated rail line on the west side of Manhattan that was transformed into a linear park. A nice dream, but it’s unlikely the Gardiner will disappear anytime soon, so let’s think about a “Low Line” park instead. It almost exists right now, as the underbelly of the Gardiner has transformed in recent years, and there’s potential for more protected linear connections.
Exhibition GO station West of Dufferin St. the Gardiner rises from a trench high into the air alongside the Canadian National Exhibition grounds. Most of the length here is used as storage by the CNE or for parking, but the covered piazza in front the Exhibition GO train station demonstrates the comfortable potential the Gardiner has to harbour humanscaled spaces underneath. It won’t win any urban beauty awards now, but a Low Line park beginning here would also connect to the 509 Harbourfront streetcar loop.
Fort York Visitor’s Centre East of Strachan Ave., the Gardiner curves around Fort York. Last year the Fort’s ambivalent relationship with the looming expressway was flipped with the opening of the Fort York visitors centre. The new building’s entrance opens into the cathedral-like space under the Gardiner, creating a kind of forecourt. Last month the visitors centre received a Toronto Urban Design Award of Excellence, and though temporarily filled with construction equipment for Gardiner repairs, it is a calm space where the soft thud of vehicles rolling over the expansion gaps above is almost meditative.
177 Fort York Blvd. The condo building at 177 Fort York Blvd. and Bathurst St. hugs the highway, giving Gardiner drivers an up-close view of granite counter tops and unmade beds, but underneath a courtyard has been created that includes a large public artwork by Adad Hannah called “Yard Stones” referencing the historical buildings at Fort York and the original Lake Ontario shoreline before it was extended south. A wide staircase connects to Bathurst, inviting people to come and go though the new space.
Mitosis Courtyard East of Bathurst an unusually beautiful space under the highway was created by artist Pierre Poussin for the condo at 38 Dan Leckie Way. Mitosis Courtyard uses a biological cell motif and includes two dozen LED light columns coupled with painted pavement patterns. It’s a tough environment under the Gardiner and some of columns have already rusted and paint is peeling on the asphalt. Proper maintenance on the Low Line will be critical to keeping it in good condition, but the artwork has completely trans- formed the once-forbidding space.
The great potential East of Dan Leckie Way, Lake Shore Blvd. begins to take up much of the space under the Gardiner, but there’s still potential for Low Line connections in the covered spaces that could be home to passages, skateboard parks, or more. For now it remains the most untamed space underneath but along the south side of Lake Shore a secondary bike trail exists, used as a temporary detour during Queens Quay construction, but one that could be turned into an alternative “fast route” for speed-demon cyclists who find the new shared path too slow.
York St. off ramp At York St., the circular off ramp has been a park for some time and the slow traffic constantly circling it seems like an auto show display where cars are on perpetually spinning platforms. This year a temporary installation of blue windsocks was added. Created by the artist collective VSVSVS for Waterfront Toronto, they’re made from material used to create the giant blue ribbon that was cut during the opening of the new Queens Quay waterfront in the spring.
10 Yonge East of York St. the Gardiner un- derbelly is consumed entirely by the westbound lanes of Lake Shore, but a long off-ramp covers the sidewalk along the eastbound lanes. That sidewalk leads to “The Residences of the World Trade Centre” at 10 Yonge St. A late 1980s condo project, its diagonal plaza hasn’t been maintained as well as it should, but a big waterfall here still works and “Between the Eyes,” the monumental “egg beaters” artwork by Richard Deacon still dominates the corner of Yonge and Queens Quay. With a little more love, this space could connect the Low Line with the new waterfront parkland being created in the East Bayfront.