Tower Renewal Partnership’s Graeme Stewart speaks at ULI Panel event and report release
On December 3, the Tower Renewal Partnership’s Graeme Stewart joined a virtual expert panel to discuss a new Urban Land Institute (ULI) report on Tower Renewal called “Affordability and Resilience: The Challenge of Tower Renewal in Private Rental Apartment Buildings“. The report and panel sought to provide fresh recommendation around increasing Tower Renewal retrofit activity, particularly to private tower owners.
The expert panel’s top recommendations include:
- Reorganize the Tower Renewal Program within city government
- Expand the scope of the city’s housing plan to at least 2050
- Address structural biases favouring condo over rental
- Promote density in the appropriate locations
- Create a mandatory inclusionary housing program
- Identify open space ownership
- Create tower enhancement districts (TEDs)
- Target and animate currently disused and disjointed spaces
- Identify city funding for projects that create public benefits
- Create a new set of policies to move toward the city’s goals
- Use TCHC building retrofits as a spring board
- Create a city pilot program for private-sector retrofits.
This is the culmination of a ULI initiative that the TRP supported early in 2020. In February, The TRP and the City of Toronto partnered with ULI to bring experts to Toronto for a weeklong visit to explore the policy challenges involved in retrofitting our aging apartment towers. Experts from across North America formed an Advisory Panel and visited Toronto to learn more about the city’s challenges, meet with leaders on this topic, and make recommendations. As part of the providing context and information, TRP shared several key documents including: