City hall is being asked to consider a refresh of the podium-style building at 2 and 90 Bloor St. E that would include a self-storage warehouse. If self-storage can work on a remote highway on the outskirts of town, why not try it at one of Toronto's premier intersections?
Application Details
Brookfield Properties and Larco Investments have applied for a zoning amendment that would allow the home of the former Bay department store at Yonge and Bloor Sts. to be converted into a multi-storey self-storage warehouse. Consulting firm Urban Strategies Inc. submitted the documents to the City of Toronto this month on behalf of Brookfield and Larco.
In an email, Benjamin Hoff, the partner at Urban Strategies who is listed as the applicant on forms submitted to city hall, said he would be unable to comment. The office for Councillor Dianne Saxe, who represents the ward, did not respond to a request for a comment from the Toronto Sun.
Area Known for Luxury Retail
In a cover letter signed by Hoff and addressed to a city bureaucrat, Urban Strategies said the plan is to convert the upper floors into self-storage warehouse space, while re-animating the ground floor retail spaces on Bloor. While that part of the city, nicknamed Mink Mile, is synonymous with luxury retail, Hoff's cover letter says the floors being eyed for self-storage have minimal access to natural light and no direct interface with the public realm.
The addition of a self-storage warehouse adds a complementary commercial use to a mixed-use area of the downtown within a portion of the site that is currently vacant and challenging to feasibly utilize for other commercial uses, the letter adds.
Former Bay Building Constructed in 1973
The podium-style building at 2 and 90 Bloor St. E was built in 1973 to serve as a flagship Bay department store, according to an Urban Strategies document submitted as part of the zoning application. The property has sat empty since the Bay left in 2022.
Since the Bay's departure, Brookfield and Larco have explored a variety of ways to repurpose the space, but due to challenging market conditions, the decline of large-format retail space and unique site constraints, the building continues to sit vacant, the document adds. Opportunities to lease the space for retail uses have been challenged due to the large size of the space and the existing above-grade floor conditions.
Urban Strategies said that in addition to the interior renovation and investments in the ground-floor retail space, the exterior would also get a refresh. Modern cladding would be mounted onto the steep, stony facade above Bloor to make the existing building more compatible within the surrounding context, the cover letter says.
