Councillor Robinson has posted to Leaside Community to say that she has met officials at the SmartCentres REIT about the flooded land known as Lake Leaside. She says she reiterated the urgency of ensuring this site is drained as quickly as possible. A senior executive from SmartCentres confirmed to her that it has submitted an application for a Discharge Permit and has a contractor on standby to initiate the drainage process immediately following approval. Robinson says: “I’ve met with the Acting General Manager of Toronto Water and asked him to accelerate the permit review process for this site. I will be in touch as soon as I have confirmation that the permit has been issued.” Much of this conforms with efforts made by the previous Councillor, Jon Burnside, to get the area drained in 2017 after it was reported by The Bulldog. A primary issue is the capacity of the sewer system to handle this water. Then and again in 2018 (although not as seriously) runoff filled the excavation which was dug to permit construction of new retail space. Here is what the Bulldog wrote about that on April 11, 2017.
Lake Leaside on Wicksteed Ave. no doubt holds many untold stories of plans delayed, retail development disappointments and big box entrepreneurs who are busy fixing business in the US. We can only guess. But it is now years since the SmartCentres interests began furiously digging at the site. Then everything seemed to go silent. Insiders who protested the development in the beginning called it the Walmart Plaza. Even then there was no confirmation that it was the ambitious boys from Bentonville, Arkansas who had done a deal to build there. Walmart and others have faced the Amazon challenge in recent times. The Bulldog has no desire to see purchases delivered to a nearby telephone pole by drone, but there seems no denying an altered retail style is at hand. Does it include Walmart Plaza, or more recently, Lake Leaside?
