Neville Park's Lost River

One of the biggest mistakes is to try to build right over a river, because this greatly interferes with nature's intended course. A whole street, with houses on both sides, was put in over what was obviously once a flourishing eco-system, on Neville Park Boulevard in the Toronto Beach area.

I once met a woman who lived in one of these houses, and she told me about the water and spongy ground in her driveway. I said I had noticed sloping front steps and repairs to the brickwork on some of the houses, where the movement of water underneath had actually shifted some of the buildings.

I also asked her about the houses on the west side of the street (north of Queen Street) which have very steep front yards and several flights of steps to get up to them. I said "Wouldn't it delay the response time of emergency personnel if they had to climb up all those steps - especially in the snow and ice in winter?" She replied that it was "no problem", because a friend of hers had been carried down to an ambulance one time. However, she added that the friend had died.

There are other places in Toronto where houses have been built right over rivers too. One is the houses on the east side of Glen Manor Drive, south of Queen Street, which were built right on top of a river which used to be big enough to have boats come up it from Lake Ontario. One of the houses has shifted so far over that it actually leans on the next house. Taddle Creek in the Toronto Annex area is another example: I have been in the house on the northwest corner of Bernard and St. George Streets, and the floors in it have shifted to an extreme slant. It looks down across the street to the Chinese Consulate, and one can only imagine how international relations are affected. The Garrison Creek regularly floods the basements on Shaw Street, and downhill from there, the playing field at the Christie Pits has water and spongy ground even on the dry summer days.

While on the subject of real estate you might want to consider not buying, the new houses on the southwest corner of Queen and Woodbine were built right on what used to be part of Ashbridges Bay, and they require sump pumps in the basements - not a good place to be if there is ever a repeat of Hurricane Hazel! And what does a street named "Fallingbrook" suggest to you? (Also, be suspicious of any house which is built with wood right down touching the edge of the lawn, as this makes wonderful termite habitat.)