Welcome to today's Deep Dive. I'm your host and
I'm here with our resident expert to unpack something
really fascinating. Hey everyone. Yeah, we've
got a great one today. It's a bit of a mind bender,
honestly. It really is. So to start off, I want
you to close your eyes for a second. Okay. Just
picture a very specific kind of contrast. You're
standing in the middle of a massive city. To
your left, you have a river that's been heavily
industrialized for a century. Right. And to your
right, you have heavy rail lines with commuter
trains just screaming past every few minutes.
So deep in the concrete jungle. Exactly. Deep
in the noise. But where you are standing, right
in the center of all that chaos, it is dead silent.
Wow. You're just surrounded by tall prairie grasses,
chirping birds, and the smell of wildflowers.
It sounds like a glitch in the simulation, honestly.
It really does. You are standing in a 7 .3 hectare,
that's roughly 18 acres, by the way, Oasis. It's
called Corktown Common. Right, in the West End
lands of Toronto. Yes, exactly. Toronto, Ontario.
And if you go there on a Saturday, you see families
picnicking, people jogging, dogs playing fetch.
It looks like this absolute masterpiece of landscape
architecture. Which it is. It is. But here is
the thing that stops me in my tracks every single
time I dig into the research on this place. This
isn't just a park. No, not at all. If you were
to say... peel back that layer of beautiful green
grass and dig into the soil, you'd realize you
aren't standing on a recreational space. You're
standing on a machine. A very big machine. A
massive piece of survival infrastructure that's
just disguised as a playground. That is the perfect
way to frame it. Korkown Common is a survival
machine. It was built to solve two massive competing
problems that really every modern city is facing
right now. One, we are totally desperate for
green space because urban density is going up
everywhere. And two, we are facing the increasing
threat of catastrophic natural disasters. Yeah,
climate threats. Exactly. And this park is basically
the ultimate case study. on how you solve both
of those problems at the exact same time without
anyone even realizing it. So today on the Deep
Dive, that's our mission. We are unpacking the
secret identity of Corktown Common. And we've
got some great sources for this. We do. We've
combed through all the historical records of
the industrial wasteland this site used to be.
We've looked at the government reports on the...
literal financial disasters that happened here.
Oh, the financial reports are wild. They are.
And we've also got the design breakdowns from
the landscape architects, Michael Van Valkenburg
Associates. And we really have to talk about
the money, too, because before this was a success
story, this site was a complete financial black
hole. a literal money pit we are talking hundreds
of millions of taxpayer dollars that just evaporated
on this site for absolutely nothing for decades
right until a major international sporting event
came along and changed the timeline completely
it's such a wild ride but i think um we should
probably start with that secret identity you
mentioned let's do it because if i go to quarktown
common today I definitely don't see a machine.
I just see rolling hills. Well, that's the magic
trick right there. The defining feature of the
park is its topography. It's incredibly hilly,
especially on the eastern side. Yeah. And to
the untrained eye, that just looks like aesthetic
landscaping. You walk in and you think, oh, the
designers wanted to give us a nice view of the
city. But functionally, those hills... are a
wall exactly we are looking at a flood protection
landform right a berm in engineering terms yes
a berm it acts as a shield it's roughly four
meters high in places which effectively creates
a barrier 8 .5 meters or about 28 feet above
the danger zone of the river and we need to clarify
the stakes here because you know flood protection
can sound a bit abstract until you actually look
at the hydrology reports right the source documentation
talks a lot about the 500 -year storm Which is
a term that I think people misunderstand constantly.
Oh, all the time. It doesn't mean the storm only
happens once every five centuries like clockwork.
Right. Nature doesn't have a calendar. Exactly.
It's a probability statistic. It just means that
in any given year, there is a specific very low
risk of a storm so massive that it would completely
overwhelm normal infrastructure. Right. But low
probability over a long enough timeline eventually
becomes a certainty. And if that storm hits Toronto.
Without this park. The Don River overflows. And
we aren't talking about a few puddles on a bike
path here. No, not at all. We're talking about
the river violently bursting its banks and sweeping
right into Toronto's eastern downtown. Wow. You'd
have catastrophic damage. The financial district,
residential neighborhoods, transit infrastructure.
It would be a disaster on a massive scale. So
the design of Corktown Common is essentially
a hydraulic shunt. That is a really great way
to put it. The berm is engineered to physically
block that water. And the overall shape of the
park shunts those floodwaters south, directly
toward Lake Ontario and away from the buildings
and the people. It really changes the vibe of
walking your dog there, doesn't it? It totally
does. You realize you aren't just walking up
a nice grassy hill. You are literally walking
on the levee that keeps the entire neighborhood
dry. And here's the context that I found most
interesting in the planning documents. This berm
wasn't just an add -on. What do you mean? Well,
it wasn't like they designed a park and then
someone said, hey, let's make it flood -proof
too. This berm was the prerequisite for the entire
neighborhood. Ah, because legally, the West Don
Lands area was designated as a floodplain. Exactly.
It was completely uninsurable. You literally
could not build a single condo, coffee shop,
or road in that area until this berm was finished.
So the government's hands were tied. They had
to physically remove the land. from the regulatory
floodplain map by building this massive structure
before any development could even break ground.
So the park is the literal foundation for the
entire community that surrounds it today. It
is. The park had to come first. But the neighborhood
wasn't always there. And this is where I want
to pivot to the history because the backstory
of this land is, well, gritty is an understatement.
Yeah, it's pretty dark. If we rewind the clock,
we aren't seeing prairie grass and dog parks.
We're seeing smoke, steel, and livestock. Lots
and lots of livestock. This was the home of the
William Davies Company. Which, for those of you
who aren't up on your deep Toronto history, was
a massive pork processing operation. One of the
largest in the entire British Empire at the time.
This operation is actually a huge part of why
Toronto got the nickname Hogtown. Right. So picture
this for a second. You have massive meatpacking
plants, huge rendering facilities, and just acres
upon acres of rail yards to move the product
in and out. This was the beating industrial engine
of the city for a very long time. It's so hard
to imagine now when you're sitting on a beautiful
park bench there, but the ground you're sitting
on was soaked in the toxic byproducts of industry
for decades. Right. And like a lot of industrial
zones in North American cities, the 20th century
wasn't kind to it. As the meat industry consolidated
and logistics changed, the processing plants
moved out to the suburbs or just shut down entirely.
The trains stopped coming as frequently. Exactly.
And by the 1970s, what was left? Abandonment.
Just a scarred, completely empty landscape. And
this leads us to a chapter in the source documents
that honestly reads like a tragedy. The Adateri
Project. Oh, man. I went down such a rabbit hole
in Adateri. It is the ultimate cautionary tale.
It really is. So let's set the scene for you
listening. It's the late 1980s. The city of Toronto
and the province of Ontario look at this huge
wasteland downtown and say, we can fix this.
They needed housing. Right. There was a housing
crisis in the 80s. So they say, let's build a
massive new community. It was a very bold vision.
So in 1988. They expropriated the land in the
West End lands. And expropriated just means the
government legally seized the private land for
public use, paying out the owners. Right. The
goal was to build this mixed income community
called Adetiri to solve that housing crisis.
But they ran into two massive walls almost immediately.
Yeah. We already talked about the flood risk.
You obviously can't build houses in an active
riverbed. But the second wall was the dirt itself.
Right. Because you cannot run a massive pork
processing plant and a rail yard for a century
without severe consequences. The soil was incredibly
toxic. We're talking hydrocarbons, heavy metals,
industrial sludge. It was a total chemical cocktail.
So before they can build a single apartment building,
they have to clean the dirt. And looking at the
budget sheets from back then. It wasn't going
well. It was a complete financial disaster. By
1992, the government had spent roughly $350 million.
$350 million. In 1992 dollars. That is a staggering
amount of money. And here's the real kicker.
They hadn't laid a single brick. Not one. That
money was just for purchasing the land, evicting
the commercial tenants, and trying to start the
cleanup. And then the new projections came in.
It was going to cost another billion dollars
to actually finish the project. Another billion.
And then the final nail in the coffin hit. The
economy fell off a cliff. The real estate market
crashed hard in the early 90s. Right. So the
private money that was supposed to help fund
the housing construction just evaporated overnight.
So you have a highly toxic money pit, a massive
global recession, and a very angry public asking
where their tax dollars went. Enter the Bob Ray
government in 1993. They looked at the math,
they looked at the massive provincial deficit,
and they just pulled the plug. Just like that.
Canceled. Completely canceled. That is just heartbreaking.
Think about the waste there. $350 million gone,
and the land just sat there anyway. For 15 years,
it became this fenced -off scar in the middle
of the city. A literal do not enter zone. Yeah.
It's a classic example of urban paralysis. The
problem is too big. The cost to fix it is too
high. So nobody touches it. It just sits there
rotting. But obviously we're talking about a
thriving park today, so something eventually
broke the deadlock. Waterfront Toronto. Right.
This was the new entity formed in the 2000s.
It was a joint venture between the city, the
province, and the federal government. Their mandate
was basically fix the waterfront finally, stop
talking about it, and just do it. And they identified
the West Don Lands as one of their first four
priority projects. So they came up with a new
plan in 2004. Let me guess. economic trouble
again history is a funny way of rhyming the 2008
financial crisis hit oh right just as they were
gearing up to finally tackle this toxic site
the global markets melted down again it looked
like the project might stall out for a second
time But this time, they had an ace in the hole.
Or maybe a ticking clock is a better description.
The Pan American Games. It is amazing how a hard
deadline changes things in government. It changes
absolutely everything. Toronto won the bid to
host the 2015 Pan Am Games. Right. And to do
that, they needed an athlete's village. They
needed to house thousands of athletes and officials
from all over the world. And they decided the
West Don Lands was the perfect place to do it.
And unlike a generic housing target where a politician
can say, oh, we'll delay it a year, you cannot
move the date of an international sporting event.
Exactly. The opening ceremony is happening on
that date, whether you are ready or not. So it
forced the funding to finally unlock. To host
the athletes, the buildings had to be legally
insurable. to be insurable the flood barrier
had to be built and to build the barrier the
soil had to be remediated the dominoes had to
fall it completely broke the paralysis the park
had to be ready for the games first it actually
served as the front lawn for the athletes during
the event and then was turned over to the public
afterward So let's talk about that construction
process, because building a high -end park on
top of a toxic industrial graveyard isn't exactly
simple gardening. No, this is extreme engineering.
Yeah. The final price tag for the park was around
$135 million Canadian dollars. Wow. And the design
was led by Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates,
who are absolute giants in the landscape architecture
world. And they had to deal with that toxic soil.
You can't just plant a nice oak tree in industrial
sludge. Right. And this is the really... clever
part. We mentioned the berm is a flood barrier,
but it actually serves a second function. It's
also a cap. They brought in massive amounts of
clean, fresh, clean soil from offsite to build
the topography. So they effectively sealed the
remediated industrial lands underneath a thick
layer of fresh, clean earth. So it's a lid. They
built a new world on top of the old one. Precisely.
And they were incredibly specific about what
they planted in that new world. I was reading
through the planting lists in the design docs,
and it's not just generic grass. No, it's a full
-on ecological restoration project. It really
is. They planted over 700 trees and thousands
of native shrubs. But the goal was specifically
to recreate the southern Ontario Carolinian forest.
Which is the native ecosystem for this region,
right? From before the factories arrived. Right.
It's a very biodiverse, rich ecosystem. They
also included an urban prairie on the riverside
of the park. Right. I read about that. That's
about 3 .2 hectares, nearly 8 acres of tall native
grasses and wildflowers. It's designed to precisely
mimic what this land looked like centuries ago.
And there's a major water component inside the
park too, right? The urban marsh. Which ties
the whole water theme back together. The marsh
isn't just there to look pretty. It's a functional
wetland that helps manage stormwater within the
park itself. How does it work? It captures the
rain, filters it naturally through the aquatic
plants, and then reuses it for irrigation. It's
a closed loop. So they aren't just blocking the
river water with the berm. They are actively
respecting the water cycle inside the park boundaries.
It's fascinating because it creates this constructed
ecology. It's totally artificial in the sense
that they built it from scratch with bulldozers,
but it functions exactly like a real ecosystem.
And that really is the future of urban design.
We can't just go out and find pristine nature
in the city anymore. We have to build it. So
let's take the listener inside. We've covered
the heavy history and the engineering. If you
walk into Corktown Common today, what is the
actual experience? Because despite all this intense
engineering, it doesn't feel like a science experiment
when you're there. No, not at all. It feels like
a true community hub. The layout is this really
interesting mix of the wild and the civilized.
You've got the recreational stuff on one side.
The athletic fields, the open lawns where people
are playing frisbee. And the splash pad, which
is absolutely huge for families in the summer.
Oh, yeah. But look at the social infrastructure
they included. They put in large communal tables,
a barbecue area, and this is actually my favorite
detail in the whole park. A fireplace. A fireplace
in a public park. That is such a specific, unusual
choice. It is. But think about what a fireplace
signifies to us culturally. Warmth. Warmth, yes,
but also the home. It signifies gathering. By
putting a fireplace in a public park, the designers
are basically saying, this is your living room.
Oh, I love that. It invites total strangers to
gather around a hearth. It turns a large, anonymous
public space into an intimate domestic space.
And for the more active crowd... You have the
bike paths that seamlessly connect to the wider
city trails. You have the boardwalks running
right through the marsh and a great off -leash
dog area. And we definitely can't forget the
art. If you've been there, you can't miss the
large sculpture by Marc de Severo. Oh, right.
The one called No Shoes. No Shoes. Yeah. It's
this large abstract steel structure. And I think
the name just fits the space perfectly. Because
you take your shoes off. Exactly. No Shoes suggests
grounding, taking your shoes off, feeling the
actual grass. connecting physically with the
earth. Which is deeply ironic given that the
earth you're connecting with is imported soil
sitting on top of an industrial cap. True. But
it works. And the location itself really adds
to that sharp contrast. We are east of Bayview
Avenue, south of King Street, but just look at
the borders. You are completely sandwiched. You
have the Don River on one side, which represents
nature, or at least the city's attempt to manage
nature. Right. But on the exact opposite side,
you have the Jugo train commuter line. It gets
really loud sometimes. It does. But honestly,
that's the point. You're standing in a restored
Carolinian forest watching a butterfly land on
a native wildflower. And 50 yards away, a massive
commuter train is tearing past, carrying thousands
of people. It's nature, but it's nature that
has been forcefully squeezed back into the city.
It's a very Toronto experience. It's not... pretending
the city doesn't exist around it. It's actively
integrating with it. It acknowledges the context.
It's reclaimed land, not virgin land. It's a
scar that has finally healed. So when we step
back and look at the whole picture, from the
massive pork plants to the failed Etatiri project
to the Pan Am rescue to this flood -protecting
berm, what do you think is the big takeaway here?
I mean, for me, I think Corktown Common is the
ultimate proof of concept for the multitasking
landscape. Meaning a park can't just be a park
anymore. Exactly. In a dense, modern city where
land is incredibly expensive and climate risks
are rising every year, you just can't afford
a single -use space. Right. You can't just build
an ugly concrete flood wall. That's a total waste
of valuable downtown real estate. And on the
flip side, you can't just have a pretty park
that gets completely washed away in the first
big 500 -year storm. That's just bad planning.
Corky Uncommon does it all. It does. It heals
the scar of pollution through the remediation
cap. It protects the financial security of the
city against the flood risk. And it creates a
beautiful backyard for thousands of residents.
It solves three massive problems. Pollution,
climate risk, and livability with one single
project. And, you know, for me, the lesson is
also about persistence. Or maybe just timing.
How so? Well, the Atatiri failure in the 90s
made it seem like... This land was totally cursed.
People looked at it and thought, this is a dead
zone. Right. We threw $350 million at it and
got nothing. Right. Untouchable. But it wasn't
dead. It just hadn't found the right urgency
yet. It needed the deadline. It needed the deadline.
It proves that even the biggest, messiest, most
toxic failures in urban planning can be turned
around if you have the engineering smarts and
the political will, which usually comes in the
form of an international sporting event, to force
it through. It gives you hope for other wastelands
and other cities, honestly. It really does. Every
major city has that one spot, the old rail yard,
the abandoned factory by the river that everyone
says is just hopeless. Corktown Common proves
it's never hopeless. It's just waiting for the
right design. Absolutely. So here is a thought
for you to take with you today. Next time you
are out jogging through a city park or walking
your dog and you find yourself walking up a surprisingly
steep... Beautifully landscaped hill. Don't just
complain about the cardio. Exactly. Ask yourself,
is this just pretty scenery? Or is this hill
secretly saving my basement from a catastrophic
flood? Because you really never know what kind
of machine is buried under the grass. It's always
worth asking what lies beneath. It really is.
Thanks for listening to this deep dive into Corktown
Common. We'll catch you on the next one.