The Ben Mulroney Show - Ontario Place renderings are out -- are they a hit or miss?

Episode Date: June 25, 2025

Guests and Topics: -Ken Greenberg - former Toronto Urban Planning If you enjoyed the podcast, tell a friend! For more of the Ben Mulroney Show, subscribe to the podcast! https://link.chtbl.com/bms Also, on youtube -- https://www.youtube.com/@BenMulroneyShow Follow Ben on Twitter/X at https://x.com/BenMulroney Enjoy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This episode is brought to you by Dazon. For the first time ever, the 32 best soccer clubs from across the world are coming together to decide who the undisputed champions of the world are in the FIFA Club World Cup. The world's best players, Messi, Holland, Kane and more are all taking part. And you can watch every match for free on Dazon, starting on June 14th and running until July 13th. Sign up now at dazone.com slash fifa that's d-a-z-n dot com slash fifa. You are listening to the Ben Mulry show on this Wednesday June 25th. Thank you so much for starting your day with us. You know, prior to the show as I drive in

I listen to my colleague Greg Brady. I get a primer on what he's talking about. Sometimes what he's gonna talk about is what aligns with us and sometimes he says something that just sends me down a rabbit hole. Earlier today, he kept referring to canned drinks as pop. And I know some people call it pop, some people call it soda. I always grew up calling them soft drinks. And I don't know if I'm the outlier, I just assumed everybody called them soft drinks.

Also, some people call the remote for the TV a clicker. For some reason, my mother used to call it a flicker. I think we're probably in the minority there. We called it a flicker. I call it the remote now. I always find it odd when people refer to groceries or the grocery store or a grocer as a grocer. I don't know where that comes from,

but it will take me out of the moment. I could be having a deep, deep conversation with somebody, especially on this show, when we talk about the rising food costs. And if I have a guest who says, grocer, I have to remind myself, I'm not here to criticize people's pronunciation, I am here to have a conversation. And I got to put myself back in that moment.

I don't know if I'm the only one who does that, but there's certain words. And the one that gets me the most has always gotten me the most. And it's an American thing. And it's not every American, but I hear it on news channels all the time. If somebody is talking about social justice,

they will say social justice. If they're talking about something about social justice, they will say social justice. If they're talking about something about social anything, social, unless the next word is security, in which case they don't say social security, they say social security. I'm not, I'm not lying. It absolutely happens. I don't know where that comes from. There are so many exceptions in the English language that there are practically no rules. And while there is no rule that says that wealthy people have to donate their money, it's always nice when a civic leader

who has made millions and built an empire gives back. And I think it's nice to start the show with some good news. You know, there's a lot of stuff out there that weighs us down from the big stuff in the Middle East to the little things like with our pools aren't open. Every now and then it's really important to highlight the good stuff. And by the way, we will endeavor to highlight good news

from people who aren't worth billions of dollars. But in this case, I think it's such a big donation that it's worthy of talking about. So Peter Gilgin is a developer and has made a massive fortune building homes across North America with Madamy Homes. He's born in Parkdale. He's born in Parkdale and he wanted to give back.

And so he and his family made a record breaking $60 million donation to St. Joseph's Hospital. And when you think about it at a time in the time that we're living in, yes, billionaires are feeling the pinch a heck of a lot less than everybody else. But everybody tightens their belt and makes choices when times are tough, including billionaires.

And to see that not only did this gentleman not tighten his belt, but literally blew the lock off of his wallet to help grow this hospital in a way that they have not seen before. The hospital says it's the single largest contribution in its history. It's gonna help St. Joseph serve over 500,000 people

in Toronto's West End, particularly through a new patient tower that's gonna be built with the $60 million. And the tower will include an expanded emergency room department, new patient and operating rooms, and two floors dedicated to a new mental health unit. And there are positive knock-on effects

beyond that initial $60 million investment. I think that gives permission to other people to donate as well. They say, oh my God, like if this guy's putting in 60, I wonder what my $200,000 investment donation could do. I could add that to the pot. Maybe in this new building, there would be room for a $200,000 investment

in a new ward for X, Y or Z. And the news of this, I believe also will inspire doctors who may be inclined to look to greener pastures and say, oh, I might go to this jurisdiction or I might move down south. I might leave the city I know and love because it just doesn't offer the satisfaction of working in a world-class facility.

Well, now that world-class facility exists and we get to keep that Canadian doctor, that Toronto doctor here at home. And so I salute Peter Gilgin. I hope to talk to him at some point. I'd love to talk to him and other hyper successful people in a city like Toronto and ask them, what do you feel your obligation is to give back?

A lot of these people come from very meager beginnings and through a combination of hard work, dedication, sometimes it's timing or kismet, whatever you want to attribute it to, they rise to the top of their chosen field and they are under no obligation to give back and yet a great many of them do. And so that is why I want to highlight Peter Gilgin and his 60 million dollar investment in his in his community that in which he grew up in which he has a lot of for which he has a lot of respect.

Okay, this we got to talk about. I think I talked about it yesterday about how we've been in the city of Toronto, the province of Ontario, we've been kicking the can down the hall for far too long on transit investment to the point that now a lot of credit has to be given to the Ford government for doing the work that should have been done over the course of decades. The Ontario line, the finishing up the Crosstown LRT eventually, these are things that could have been done

in steps over the course of decades. And instead the Ford government is doing it all at once because we need it. The city grew and the subway didn't grow to match. Our transit routes did not grow to match the city. And one of those massive investments is the Scarborough extension. And the original price tag that was announced

was just over 10 billion. Now we're being told it is ballooned to around 27 billion. But the weird thing about it is we are being told by the head of Metrolinx that it isn't ballooning at all. In fact, it is the way things are done in Ontario that the announcement of 10 billion was exactly what was supposed to be announced. And this ballooning of the cost is no ballooning at all. It is simply the way things are. Let's listen.

It is the practice in Ontario whereby when projects are announced, only the construction costs are announced, only the construction costs are announced. Construction costs is typically half or less than half of the total project cost. Okay, that's fine, except I'm somebody who has lived here in this province for a quarter century and I didn't know that. Like, I'm a well-versed person and I didn't know that. I have reached out to the Minister of Transport because when he said it is the practice in Ontario, what I want to know is, is it the practice in Ontario of this government or has it been the practice of previous governments? Because if so, there isn't a government out there. The Liberal Party has no right to complain and the

NDP have no right to complain because they form government under Bob Wray. So I need to know where this practice came from and why, if this is true, why we don't socialize the idea, okay, it's a 10 million dollar investment now, 10 billion now, but wait for it, it is going to get bigger with the obvious investments and costs required from expropriating the land to maintenance, to repair, all that stuff. Why isn't that part of the discussion? So we're going to drill down as soon as we can on that, because I think the listeners and the viewers here at the Ben Mulroney Show deserve far more context

than what that statement gave us. Lots more to come on the show. We're gonna be talking about Ontario Place after the break. We're gonna be talking about urban design, that parking lot that costs $400 million. Is it an eyesore, is it not? All that to be discussed next on the Ben Mulroney Show. Welcome back to the Ben Mulroney Show

and we in the city of Toronto have been enduring a soap opera of, a Toronto soap opera of the highest order for the longest time and it's called Ontario Place. It's been, it's the most Toronto conversation we could possibly be having. There was the back and forth over what to do with Ontario Place. And the battle lines were clearly defined and volleys were fought and lawsuits were filed. And eventually we settled on a massive spa area, redevelopment with indigenous representation

and meditation gardens and an improved Budweiser stage and a parking lot, a massive $400 million parking lot, which is really seems to be at this point, a bone of contention. Let's listen to the premier Doug Ford on his opinion about this parking lot. Our government has been working hard to transform Ontario Place and make it a place that people from across Ontario, from around the world, including people living right here in Toronto can visit and enjoy. Now it's a 3,500 space parking lot that apparently according to the the Premier will barely be visible from the road because there will be a berm above it.

And it's got some siding on it that sort of brings it into alignment with the architecture of the space. And here to discuss sort of all of these things is Ken Greenberg, he's the former director of urban design for Toronto. Ken, welcome to the show. Good morning. Good morning.

Good morning. Now I want to give you my assessment of what we should be doing with this place before we continue. My contention forever is the province of Ontario has no business in the business of amusement parks. And so either turn it into a massive park for everybody to enjoy or monetize it.

And so I'm past the debate over what to do with it, but I, I keep getting stuck on this parking lot. Uh, so, so tell me your thoughts. So the parking lot is really parking garage is really eye popping. You'd have to go to a major world airport to find the garage as big as this with 3,500 cars. It's probably a couple of hundred meters long on the south side of Lakeshore Boulevard,

five stories high. The image shows it in this kind of gauzy wrapper. The only entrance, there are no cars on Lakeshore Boulevard in the image they show. And there's a tiny little pedestrian entrance. You don't see the vehicular entrances. so this is one and a half times the size of the garage under Nathan Phillips Square for example oh wow okay put it in perspective probably costing about two hundred and fifty thousand dollars per stall paid

for by the public so I would would describe this is like putting an oil furnace in a brand new passive house. Well, yeah. And so, so listen, I'm of two very strong minds here. One with the and play game this out with me. Let's talk about sort of the potential for this thing to actually be used quite a bit. I mean, there's an argument to be made that with the construction of the Ontario line, and you could argue that people will come from all points and will park there and then take the Ontario line and go to all points across the city using our increasingly robust transit network. So there's that. There's also the argument to be made that there is increased commercial activity

happening in that area of town. There's more development and more development than ever before on the exhibition grounds, which is just a stone's throw away. And the hope is to turn that therm spa into a year round attraction. So I can understand the need for it. What do you say to that argument?

Well, let me turn it the other way around. You have three major high order transit lines, the Ontario line, which you mentioned the new subway line with 15 stations across the city. You have all day go service, 15-minute intervals in both directions, and you have the waterfront LRT, which is being extended all the way along Queens Quay, all converging on that destination a short distance away. So why on earth, with all that investment in transit, to get you there, why would you then go backwards?

And I was chief planner in Boston for a couple of years. The Seaport in Boston is doing everything to remove all the automobile barriers, to break down the investment that had been made in this gigantic auto oriented infrastructure. Look at, look at pretty much every major waterfront around the world trying to get away from this kind of solution. And so it's creating this giant wall on the water, probably a couple of hundred meters

long. And it's really operating across purposes. And so, you know, the other thing is they just published images of the public realm. And not one of those images, they're very subjective, seductive, beautiful renderings of all the aspects of the public realm. You never see the spa. You never see the spa. You never see the garage, you never see these gigantic structures. So it's just incomprehensible. It's so contradictory to the idea of everything is trying to be conveyed about the public realm to then turn around at this point in time in bringing in really what I was described

as a 1970s solution to mobility into this site that's trying to be environmentally sensitive, that's trying to be part of the opening up of the Toronto Waterfront, providing all these great amenities. And the logic of the 95-year lease for for Thurm, which is essentially a sale for this gigantic facility, which as I say, appears nowhere in the renderings is quite mind blowing. Let's ask the question I'm sure is on a lot of people's minds. Why wouldn't we build this underground? If we're already down there building the Ontario line, why wouldn't we build this underground if we're already if we're already on a very down there building the Ontario line why wouldn't we take advantage to build in some form of underground parking is it because that that area of

town is is sort of as low as it is and it's so much of it is reclaimed land that there's a worry of flooding that's obviously an issue however the city had offered I was trying to negotiate with the province to build on the other side of Lakeshore Boulevard on the exhibition site where there are already thousands of surface parking spaces. And there the ground is higher. Yeah. And I agree.

Like I think having more parking and I'm somebody who believes that you got to allow people to get to wherever they want to go in any way that they want to get there. But if you're compromising the view, if you have a chance to rebuild something, take it down to the studs and start again. Why would you put something like that right on the waterfront when everything we've been doing for the past couple of decades has been about removing those sorts of things? We built a gigantic gigantic not nearly as big as this, by the way, a fraction of this size, a gigantic parking garage in Harvard front way back decades ago now being removed, of course. And all those big above great parking garages we did in the early phases of the waterfront development are now tremendous eyesores that we're trying to get rid of. So here we go after all this time

has passed, a generation later repeating the same mistake. There's also the fear, and you said it in the renderings, there's no traffic on Lake Shore. I remember watching a CFL game about five, six years ago when they were unveiling a new stadium out West. And it was the first game being played at the stadium. And the stands were empty and nobody could understand why until they realized that in developing this stadium, they didn't change how broad the roads were as access points for cars to park.

And so you had gridlock just just trying to get into the parking lots. And my fear is if they build this and you got 3500 cars all showing up at the same time trying to get onto Lakeshore Boulevard, trying to get on at times where Lakeshore is a parking lot, it is going to be it is going to be far more trouble than it's worth. I don't know what goes into deciding where you put a parking lot, but to me, this is, unless they get all their ducks in a row, this could just be a recipe for disaster. So picture all the entrances to get into the huge parking garage at terminal one at Pearson, the enormous amount of roadway, all the ways in which you have to enter. None of that appears in that

rendering. You just see this tiny little pedestrian entrance and one car. Yeah. So it is misleading to say the least. Well, listen, I think I think they've done some good things with, I think the idea of this spa from what I've seen and what the choices they've made, I have been on board with more or less. I'm still on the fence with this parking lot. My hope, Ken, is that this, even though the premier says he's happy with it, that this is not the final decision. Well, I certainly hope so.

I really appreciate you adding to the conversation today, sir. I hope to have you back on, because I know that this soap opera will continue here in the city of Toronto. So thank you very much, and have a great day. You too. Thanks. to celebrate the days of our lives 60th anniversary W network and stack TV invite you to enter for a chance to win the ultimate fan experience by watching new episodes of days of our lives

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