[URBAN NOTE] Spacing and Torontoist on Old City Hall, Toronto

[rfmcdonald]

Spacing Toronto's Chris Bateman writes in "How the Eaton Centre nearly wrecked Old City Hall" about Old City Hall's close call.

Old City Hall was completed in 1899 to plans by architect E. J. Lennox. Romanesque Revival design was popular at the time, and so Lennox included an array of arches, columns, and decorative brickwork typical of the style. He designed the grand clock tower with its 900-kilo gargoyles, the marble-lined main hallway, and even cheekily wrote his name on the upper part of the Bay St. facade.

The building served as the City of Toronto’s municipal headquarters until 1965, when New City Hall opened across the street. After the bureaucrats moved out, the Lennox structure was almost immediately threatened with destruction.

The T. Eaton Co. unveiled plans in March, 1966 that called for the demolition of almost everything in the block surrounded by Dundas, Bay, Yonge, and Queen, including most of Old City Hall. Only the clock tower, cenotaph, and Holy Trinity Church would remain.

In their place would rise three office buildings (one 32- and two 57-floors) with room for a workforce of 65,000, a cylindrical 500-room hotel and convention centre, and a 69-floor apartment and office tower, which, at 277.3 metres, would have been roughly the same height as today’s Soctia Plaza.

Eaton’s also planned to build a new store at the corner of Queen and Yonge in the concrete box style of Yorkdale Shopping Centre.

The whole thing was projected to cost $260 million ($1.8 billion in today’s money). $8 million of that was set aside for the purchase of Old City Hall.

Torontoist's Jamie Bradburn, meanwhile, used "Shaping Toronto: Reusing an Old City Hall" to examine what other cities did, and what could be done.

While our former City Hall carried on as a courthouse, other cities across North America found mixed uses for their former municipal sites, or are struggling with solutions. Boston’s 1865 Old City Hall houses tenants ranging from heritage agencies to law firms to a Ruth’s Chris Steak House. In Indianapolis, the old building housed the state historical museum for four decades, then served as a temporary home for the city’s central library. Vacant since 2007, the city recently entered a lease agreement with boutique hotel operator 21c Museum Hotels to restore the building as arts-related spaces and a museum, and provide a physical link to a new hotel being built in the neighbouring vacant parking lot.

Like Toronto, Tacoma, Washington nearly lost its Victorian-era city hall to demolition in the early 1970s. A remodelling with space for businesses and restaurants fell prey to the real estate market collapse. Falling into the disrepair, Tacoma bought the building from a private owner for $4 million earlier this year after a failure to meet repair deadlines. This week, the city is showing it off to potential investors, hoping to attract office use or a hotel.

Being a National Historic Site, it’d be a difficult, protracted process to radically overhaul the building, so anyone fearing a mini-Eaton Centre can probably relax. If such plans went ahead, public outcry would alter them (though the cleaning the soot stunt might not work a second time). What is required is a strong vision which, fingers crossed, can survive the inevitable petty political wrangling. Ideally, the building would house a long-needed city museum or other historical exhibition spaces accessible to the public. Retail tenants could integrate nods to our past a la the current occupants of Maple Leaf Gardens, and include businesses offering Toronto made or inspired products. The city report hints at possible trendy office uses such as a business or technology incubator. Given its long service to the city, whatever goes in the building should celebrate Toronto while continuing to respect Lennox’s enduring design as much as possible. It’s a site with plenty of potential that would be foolish to waste.