The Toronto waterfront is going to get a new lakeside pool, floating wharf with restaurants, park space, amphitheatre, kayak and canoe launches, and a place to moor your boat.
On Monday, Waterfront Toronto announced plans to develop the Parliament slip, the water inlet that rests alongside the upcoming Bayside condo community, making it a destination for city residents.
“Parliament Slip is our chance to create an exciting experience on the water for all types of marine activity,” says Waterfront Toronto CEO George Zegarac, in a statement.
The announcement comes almost a year after Google’s Sidewalk Labs walked away for their own plans to develop a “smart city” in the nearby port lands area, citing “changing economic circumstances” during the pandemic as the reason.
Nevertheless, Waterfront Toronto is moving ahead with plans to change the area from industrial to a community space in accordance with an update to Waterfront Toronto’s 2020 Marine Use Strategy. You can get to the new Toronto waterfront destination by foot, streetcar, water taxi or park your boat; and bring your swimsuit.
“Toronto was born on the waterfront but industry forced it to turn its back from the lake,” Zegarac said in his statement. “With today’s announcement we are fulfilling our promise to reorient the city back to the water.”
Artists renderings includes green space, tree canopy, both an adult and a kiddie pool, and a wharf with a fish shack and jerk chicken spot. The design also incorporates the WaveDecks from the more developed westside of Toronto’s harbourfront.
“The concepts for the Parliament Slip are among the first to emerge from the Marine Use Strategy,” says Chris Sawicki, PortsToronto’s planning and environmental service VP of infrastructure.
The plan for Toronto’s waterfront is to make user-friendly destinations all along the harbour, the port lands and the Toronto Islands. Potential transportation routes, whether by ferry or water taxi, can connect people to new stops between Trillium Park, Gibraltar Point, Sugar Beach, Parliament Slip and more destinations in the waterfront “loop.”
The Marine Use Strategy map out goals to create ambitious channels for social and recreational movement all along the water, while still accommodating industrial shipping, which has been seeing growth in the transport of construction materials.
The next steps for Waterfront Toronto is establishing a Marine Coordination Committee to put the Marine Strategy Report’s recommendations into action.
