The demolition of several heritage buildings in the West Don Lands is continuing today despite widespread community opposition.

Crews began tearing down the old Dominion Wheel and Foundries Company buildings located at 153-185 Eastern Ave on Monday, months after the Ford Government issued a ministerial zoning order that allowed it to sidestep the local planning process and go ahead with the development of high-rise residential towers on three provincially owned sites, including 153-185 Eastern Avenue.

City officials have pled with the province to reconsider the demolition of the Dominion Wheel and Foundries Company buildings, which are listed on Toronto’s heritage inventory.

More than 8,000 people have also signed a petition calling on the province to halt the demolition to allow for community input.

“What you see here is an act of vandalism,” Toronto Centre Coun. Kristyn Wong-Tam told CP24 on Monday night. “These are assets that belong to the people of Ontario. Doug Ford doesn’t own these buildings, they (the province) hold them in trust and this isn’t what we want them to do.”

Dozens of protesters showed up to the West Don Lands site on Monday when news that demolition had begun first began circulating.

The protesters were then back at the site early Tuesday morning.

“Right now we don’t have any information from the Ford government. They stealthily brought in demolition equipment over the weekend with no notice and no consultation with the community and there is no guarantee about what the future of the site will hold,” NDP MPP Suze Morrison told CP24 during an interview on Tuesday afternoon. “Folks are looking for clarity, accountability and transparency from the government and they are not getting that

Province defends demolition

There is currently no formal development proposal on the books for the land that the buildings stand on but the Ford government used its Ministerial Zoning Order to permit the construction of high-rise up to 43 storeys tall.

Over the weekend, the city’s chief planner Greg Lintern wrote a letter to the Ford government noting that conservation of the heritage value of the site should be “fully considered” before demolition takes place.

But in a statement provided to CP24 earlier on Tuesday a spokesperson for Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing Steve Clark said that a heritage impact assessment was conducted on the site and that it determined that it is “not of provincial significance.”

The spokesperson said that alternatives to demolition were considered but it was ultimately determined that those would not be feasible “due in part to the contamination of the property, requiring full remediation.”

“The Foundry site has been in a state of bad repair and largely abandoned for over 40 years,” the statement reads. “The government has determined that the site would be best used to provide affordable housing and new community space.”

While the Ford government has suggested that there will be affordable housing built as part of the redevelopment of the sites, the Ministerial Zoning Order issued in October does not specifically mention mention that.

As demolition continues, the city’s planning and housing committee met today to consider a motion from Wong Tam to immediately halt all work at the site for a minimum of 30 days and provide the city with several documents to review, including the heritage impact assessment and a cultural heritage evaluation.

Wong Tam has also said that area residents will be at the site to “document & protest against this unlawful demolition” each morning at 6:30 a.m.

“The action the province is taking is more than just the potential loss of four buildings in the West Don Lands. The MZOs that were sprung on the city last year - part of more than an unprecedented three dozen MZOs that were issued by the province in 2020 - are part of a pattern. That pattern shows a disinterest by the province in engaging with local planning, local decision-makers, and critically, local residents,” the downtown councillor said in a letter to the planning and housing committee. “The MZOs are not just threatening heritage buildings, they are also threatening the provincially significant wetlands in the GTA, in many cases without any consultation with local residents and stakeholders.”

The Dominion Wheel and Foundries Company buildings were all constructed between 1917 and 1929 and were added to the city’s heritage inventory in 2004. At the time the city noted that they were “historically and architecturally significant as a good example of an industrial enclave in the area adjoining the lower Don River.”