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In April 2014 The Friends will look back on twenty years’ involvement with Fort York. When we were organized the fort was at a low point, a tired site among former rail yards on the cusp of redevelopment. Several official plans were on the table, and many parties were anxious to stake out opportunities for investment in the surrounding area. But no one, least of all us, knew how things would turn out or how quickly they would happen. It’s been an interesting and challenging two decades. Through trial and error, we’ve come to hold the following as long-term goals that we’ve pursued and realized often, if not always: • engage in precinct planning and development issues • support the Fort York Guard • publish an electronic newsletter • maintain a good website and operate the Resource Centre at the fort • support new displays through funding and research • organize fundraising and fellowship events • co-operate with the fort’s staff on hosting Citizenship ceremonies and Parler Fort talks
Joe Gill, our esteemed and long-serving past chair, thinks our most important contributions came in pursuing the first goal. During 1994-97, as the City rezoned the lands surrounding Fort York, defining it anew, The Friends worked to see no fewer than 9.9 acres included within its bounds, or 23 per cent of its area, that might otherwise have gone for other uses. In 2000 we widened our focus to publish a landmark planning study, Fort York: Setting It Right, and to defend the Official Plan for the Fort York neighbourhood before the OMB when the City itself lost its resolve. Then in 2002-03, working with
If one of The Friends’ proudest monuments will be a new park in the crowded southwest downtown, we may also be remembered with gratitude by a generation of university students—30 to 35 each year—to whom we gave summer work and satisfaction after we revived the Fort York Guard and Drums in 2000. For a decade upwards of three-quarters of its cost was covered by revenues coming from our parking operations. But now that we no longer park cars on the lawns during the CNE and other events at Exhibition Place, we’ve created an Investment Income fund from our accumulated cash reserves that will let us continue to support the Guard in partnership with the City of Toronto and the private sponsors we hope will come forward. While our fifteenth birthday was marked by cutting a cake in the shape of a blockhouse, our twentieth will be celebrated by a guests-pay buffet supper to which both present and former directors and some of our oldest supporters are invited. website: www.fortyork.ca The Fife and Drum 5
Mail: 260 Adelaide St. E., Box 183, Toronto, M5A 1N1 e-mail: info@fortyork.ca
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