Case Study: 405 Sherbourne
Boost Building Capacity While Shortening Prospecting Time and Reducing Costs
About
Toronto is the largest city in Canada with 2.6 million residents. The City of Toronto launched the HousingNow initiative in 2019 to propose viable development plans for the housing supply target set forth by their mandate.
Need
The goal of HousingNow team is to create as many affordable housing units as possible and find an appropriate ratio of creating affordable and market rate housing. They needed to determine development feasibility and present proposals in six days. In order to do so they required access to zoning, land constraint, and construction cost data that the HousingNow team could not afford.
Solutions
HousingNow used UrbanSim’s rapid site feasibility tool to quickly test out different development forms within their short timeline. The team knew that considering a rezoning scenario was imperative due to the zoning for one of their sites only allowing for a three story building, which is not sufficient to achieve the housing targets set forth by the City of Toronto. The eventual proposed development stands 25 stories high, with 266 units included into the housing stock. This proposal has passed through approvals, and its first occupancy is expected in 2025.
