Two decades ago, Toronto’s Downsview Airport felt like the edge of the mental map. Yet, when nearly 500,000 visitors flooded the runway for 2003’s “SARSStock” benefit concert, a leftover site was briefly transformed into a cultural haven, hinting at enormous latent potential. In the years since, the 150-hectare airport’s long-awaited evolution has gradually come into focus, culminating in a vision for a massive new urban hub — and an ambitious international design competition to reimagine the two-kilometre runway at its heart.
Led by Northcrest Developments (a subsidiary of public sector pension fund PSP Investments), the open competition was launched last October, with five shortlisted teams now announced. Chaired by urban designer Ken Greenberg, the competition invited multi-disciplinary design teams from around the world to share their conceptual design approach, with each of the five teams led by a landscape architecture firm. Comprising a handful of the world’s leading landscape designers, the shortlist includes American firms Sasaki, Field Operations and Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates, Inc., as well as Danish designers SLA. Notably, Montreal-based CCxA, founded by late landscape visionary Claude Cormier, adds a Canadian-led group to the roster. The full design teams are listed below:
- Sasaki: Heatherwick Studio, Miasto, Buro Happold, Atelier Ten, L’Observatoire, Group Delta Consultants, Two Row Architect
- Field Operations: HR&A, Belleville Placemaking, SpruceLab Inc, Spiers Major, Pentagram, Cecilia Alemani, Debra Simon Art Consulting, Dbaajmowin
- Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates, Inc.: Henning Larsen, HR&A Advisors, eDesign Dynamics, Lord Cultural Resources, Belleville Placemaking, Bruce Mau Design
- CCxA: Belleville Placemaking, Partners for Economic Solutions, Creative Restructuring Advisors, Henriquez Partners Architects, Two Row Architect, Dougan & Associates, Ha/f Climate Design, Daily Tous Les Jours
- SLA: Gehl, PCA-STREAM, AKT II, HR&A Advisors, Trophic Design, Art+Public, AOA, Level Playing Field
The competition invites a wide range of perspectives — which are set to be refined in the coming months — though the designs will all build on the principles established by the Downsview Framework Plan. Developed by a diverse international design team, which includes shortlisted landscape architects SLA, as well as architects Henning Larsen and KPMB, the plan envisions a “15-minute city” combining the full scope of daily necessities and cultural destinations within a pedestrian-oriented setting. Encompassing the whole of Northcrest’s airport site as well as immediately surrounding industrial lots — now managed by the Canada Lands Company — the 210-hectare plan champions a mixed-use community that integrates industrial heritage within a contemporary urban setting. In total, the Downsview redevelopment will eventually comprise 85,000 homes, 1.1 million square metres of commercial space, and 40 hectares of parks and public spaces.
It’s a staggering scale — and a radical transformation. Yet, the area’s evolution is already decades in the making. In 2017, a long-awaited subway extension expanded public access to the Downsview neighbourhood. A year later, the airport, which had been used as a testing site by Bombardier Aerospace, was sold to Northcrest, setting the stage for the 150-hectare project now known as YZD (an homage to its former call sign). In the years since, a series of ongoing public consultations and events have informed the site’s fluid future. However it ultimately takes shape, the runway will be its spine.
Although 20th-century aviation infrastructure may seem like a counter-intuitive locus for a vibrant urban neighbourhood, Greenberg stresses its heritage value. “We tend to erase our histories, and yet the richest parts of our cities are multi-layered, and they have echoes of what came before,” he says. “I think that when you walk down the runway, you’ll be able to hear an echo of all those jets somewhere in the thrum of footsteps. It may not seem immediately obvious, but this is a site with deep heritage.” Northcrest’s Kristy Shortall, a member of the competition jury, echoes a similar sentiment about the signature element: “You can walk down any street and find a retail store, but where else can you walk on the runway?”
While the runway competition’s winning design is set to be unveiled in the coming months, the airport’s broader transformation remains in its relative infancy. “We’re talking about something that is going to come into existence over three or four decades, and it will be replete with feedback loops. It’s a living thing with opportunities for learning and teaching and evolution every step of the way,” says Greenberg. For now, however, the Downsview Framework Plan and the design competition set uncommonly high aspirations.
If nothing else, the competition format itself remains a relative rarity amidst otherwise conservative, precedent-driven Canadian procurement. As Greenberg notes, following the pack was never an option. “The great benefit of a competition is when you have a really wicked problem, a complex issue with a lot of variables and moving parts, and you simply don’t know what the answer is,” he says. “There’s no template here. And there are no obvious case studies to copy, regardless of whether or not you’d want to do that in the first place. We have to think it all through.”
Since the neighbourhood of tomorrow isn’t coming just yet, there’s still time to ponder — and debate — what that evolution should look like: Ahead of the redevelopment, the airport is set to become home to Rogers Stadium, a temporary 50,000-seat venue that’s slated to open this summer. For some years yet, the urban future will reside in our imagination. In the meanwhile, it’s a great time to be an Oasis fan.
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