Rental apartments may be coming to Toronto's Yorkdale Mall

A major change is in the works for Toronto’s largest mall as the owners of Yorkdale Shopping Centre plan to add rental apartments to the site.

A spokesperson Oxford Properties Group, Yorkdale’s owner, confirmed to Daily Hive that the addition of a residential development is in the works, noting that plans are still in an early stage with not many specifics to confirm. For now, the Yorkdale mall apartments will be “primarily rental.”

This isn’t Oxford Properties’ only recent push to add residential components to a Toronto mall. Over at Scarborough Town Centre, the developer is planning to build three residential towers, with the tallest reaching up to 50 storeys in height. Collectively, they’ll add 1,342 rental units to the area.

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And just last year, Oxford Properties announced plans to transform 130 acres around Mississauga’s Square One Shopping Centre into an 18 million sq ft mixed-use neighbourhood with 18,000 residential units.

The reason for these developments on the mall sites, the Oxford Properties spokesperson explained, is “the critical need for additional housing supply.”

“We don’t believe extensive surface parking lots are the most efficient use of transit-oriented real estate,” they said. “Adapting some of this space for much needed residential stands to provide significant benefit to the broader community.”