$2.5M for 1,600 square feet. Despite slumping condo sales PCs speed up Mississauga’s luxury 16K-unit Lakeview Village, claiming lack of supply causing housing crisis 

For nearly two decades, elected officials, staff and Mississauga residents studied how to reclaim former industrialized waterfront lands, and give the city’s eastern shoreline back to the people. Lakeview Village, with its low, mid and high-rise homes that will cascade down to the edge of Lake Ontario was the plan that a development consortium put together to open up the site of the old Four Sisters coal fired power plant. 

It was an example of gentle density and human scale development, featuring 8,000 units on the massive brownfield site.

In a snap decision that blindsided local stakeholders, the Doug Ford PC government, at the request of Lakeview Community Partners, the collection of companies behind the project, wiped away the nearly two decades of planning between the City and the community. The Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing issued a Minister’s Zoning Order (MZOs) in May last year. It doubled the development in size from 8,050 residential units to 16,000, adding twice the projected population from approximately 20,000 residents to 40,000 — a decision met by a mix of anger and frustration by residents and members of council.

After failing to provide any details about how the provincial government will support some 40,000 new residents with infrastructure such as schools and transit expansion, and how the housing affordability crisis will be helped by the project, the PC government now wants construction plans to speed up, according to a recent letter from Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing Paul Calandra. 

Claiming Ontario “is in a housing crisis caused by a severe lack of supply” and that the Lakeview project presents “a unique and important opportunity to bring a substantial amount of new housing to the City of Mississauga,” Calandra has ordered the landowners of the site to enter into an agreement with the City of Mississauga to start work “the Minister considers necessary for the appropriate development of the Lakeview Site.” 

One of the biggest questions elected officials and staff at City Hall raised after the surprise MZO is how local infrastructure will be funded to support what will be the addition of a new small city in Mississauga. 

Last year, with the project mandated to double in size, the Province appointed a “Land Facilitator” to work with Mississauga to ensure infrastructure in the area can be expanded to handle the dramatically increased density. According to the letter, the facilitator has been working with Mississauga staff and landowners “to facilitate appropriate and timely development” of the project. 

Mississauga’s vision for revitalizing its waterfront would remediate the former home of the Four Sisters power plant into a neighborhood of mixed-density homes.

(Alexis Wright/The Pointer Files)

In an email to The Pointer, a Mississauga spokesperson said “The City has been working closely with the Office of the Provincial Land and Development Facilitator and [Lakeview Community Partners Limited] for almost a year to ensure the increased density assigned for Lakeview Village will be built in an appropriate way which includes addressing all the engineering, school accommodation, development phasing and other servicing matters associated with the Plan of Subdivision.” The spokesperson also said that while discussions have been underway for several months, formal notice, including the order from the Ministry, was only received April 10.  

“The City has been working with the Provincial Facilitator since the Enhanced MZO was issued in May of last year to address the requirements and investments needed to accommodate the increased density on the site including the schools, transportation, servicing, affordable housing, parks and cultural facilities and other infrastructure needed for the community to thrive.” 

It remains unclear where these investments will come from, and who will pay the billions of dollars needed to build infrastructure for 40,000 new residents.

Concerns about affordable housing have also been raised. Doug Ford has been criticized for frequently claiming his plan to facilitate 1.5 million new homes by 2031 will address the housing affordability crisis, while the projects he pushes in places like the Greenbelt and across the corridor where the 413 Highway will run feature expensive homes far out of reach for most Ontarians. 

Tridel, one of the partners in the Lakeview Village consortium, has been promoting its luxury Harbourwalk development in the site. A 599-square-foot unit is listed at $787,000; a 1,621-square-foot unit will cost $2,525,000, raising more questions about who the PCs are trying to speed up construction for. The Region of Peel has reported that current market pricing is too expensive for 80 percent of residents. There are currently more than 30,000 on the Region’s list for affordable housing support, with few details about how many of Lakeview Village’s 16,000 units will be considered affordable under the definition used by Peel Region: less than 30 percent of household income spent on total housing cost. 

The median 2020 individual income in Mississauga according to the Census was $39,200, before taxes. This is equivalent to a monthly income of less than $3,000 after taxes. With a $40,000 deposit, the one-bedroom mortgage cost for Tridel’s 599-square-foot unit, at a current five-year fixed rate of 5.54 percent (amortized over 25 years) is $4,577. This figure does not include all the other expenses that are used to calculate the overall cost of housing, such as utilities, property tax, insurance and maintenance/upkeep, which, on top of monthly condo fees charged by the property manager, could push the overall carrying amount to $6,500 a month. This means that someone who wants to buy a 599-square-foot unit in Tridel’s Lakeview Village development would need a $240,000 salary to keep total housing costs to about 30 percent of income. 

The claims made in the letter from the Housing Ministry, that a lack of supply is the cause of the ongoing housing crisis are not supported by data for the current condo market.

According to real estate professional David Silverberg, who cites data from industry sources, GTA condo sales in 2024 have decreased by 12.8 percent compared to this time in 2023.

“Faced with reduced demand, developers are forced to re-evaluate their strategies. According to recent data from Urbanation, a significant number of condominium projects in the Greater Toronto Area have been put on hold due to the current economic climate… As of late 2023, sales have declined by 45% and are now 12% below the pre-pandemic decade-average level,” he writes on his website.

But the PCs are determined to push ahead with plans to force the construction of 1.5 million new units by 2031, regardless of the lack of affordability or demand for the projects currently in the pipeline. 

A previous letter from Lakeview Community Partners indicated the consortium and City staff have made “significant progress” on the development project since the MZO was issued, including: meeting weekly to advance an updated Traffic Impact Study to document the traffic solutions and road capacity for 16,000 units; approving and executing a pre-servicing agreement allowing for the installation of water, sanitary, storm and district energy infrastructure — which were upsized to accommodate the increased density; and coordinating with the Peel District School Board and Dufferin Peel Catholic District School Board on school needs resulting from increased density. An analysis from LCP on the financial benefits associated with the Lakeview Project for the City estimates it will generate $1.2 billion in municipal revenue — over $55 million is associated with the additional density, according to the development consortium.

When Calandra took over the housing ministry in the fall as the PCs scrambled to contain the Greenbelt land swap scandal he committed to a review of controversial planning decisions, including reassessing MZOs, previously forced on municipalities to get homes built, stating “there was just a little bit too much involvement from individuals within the previous minister’s office on the official plans in these areas.” MZOs are meant to be used under unusual circumstances, including emergencies, but the PCs under Premier Ford’s leadership have used the tool to override municipal planning authority, providing developers with more control over crucial land use policy in the province. The Province has repeatedly maintained the MZO approval was necessary to achieve Mississauga’s mandated housing targets under Bill 23 (120,000 new units by 2031). The City has denied these claims and maintained it will exceed its assigned target without the doubling of the Lakeview project.

Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing Paul Calandra said in the fall he would be conducting a review of previous planning decisions, including MZOs, giving hope to City councillors who requested the Minister rescind the Lakeview Village order.

(Government of Ontario) 

Seeing the announcement as an opportunity to reverse the MZO issued by the previous housing minister, City Council made a request to rescind the zoning order that doubled the size of the lakefront development.

Area Councillor Stephen Dasko put forward a motion directing the City to formally request the Minister review the MZO for the Lakeview development and consider rescinding the order, restoring the project to its originally approved plan. The letter recognized that while these types of orders “can be a useful tool in the planning process,” the City is “not supportive of the Lakeview MZO as it was granted by the previous Minister at the end of the planning process when the majority of planning work, including infrastructure planning, had already been completed.”

But the legislation, which would “wind back provincial changes to official plans and official plan amendments, except in circumstances where construction has begun or where doing so would contravene existing provincial legislation and regulation,” did nothing to reverse the changes made to the massive waterfront development.

In a February letter to the City, Calandra disregarded the City’s request to rescind the MZO, stating “Lakeview Village represents an opportunity to create a landmark waterfront community in the City of Mississauga.” He noted the MZO will expand housing options by facilitating the development of 16,000 units in a Major Transit Station Area, while creating over 9,000 jobs, while also claiming the project will generate more than $1 billion of development-related revenue for the City and Region to fund significant public infrastructure and community benefits. 

The City of Mississauga spokesperson said the development will now proceed in phases, with the first covering the development of the originally approved 8,050 units and the second phase will include the remaining units mandated by the Province.  

Calandra’s letter orders the City to immediately address matters “necessary for the appropriate development of the Lakeview Site.” This includes a $14 million community benefits contribution to be made by developers to help the City fund features that will enhance the area; submission of a transportation study and confirmation that the necessary traffic infrastructure improvements have been secured and/or constructed to adequately accommodate increased traffic volumes; and the completion of necessary upgrades to the G.E. Booth Wastewater Treatment Facility to ensure that odour will be mitigated to levels compatible with sensitive land uses.

A spokesperson for the Region said construction at the water treatment plant is currently underway and approximately half of the odour mitigation program is expected to be completed by 2026, with the bulk of the remaining work to be done by 2028. An interim odour mitigation solution, which includes a partial covering of the existing plant, has been completed. 

Noise mitigation measures need to be implemented; and a commitment from the developers to negotiate “in good faith” with the Peel District School Board for a potential new school will be followed; provisions are being made for the first 8,050 units to include at least five percent that are affordable (the criteria being followed to define affordability is not clear); and parkland must be secured for any residential units constructed on the site.

Once those requirements are met and agreed to, the City and the developers can then move forward with construction under the plan of subdivision, for up to 8,050 units (the first phase) as well as on-site engineering, servicing, paving, landscaping and amenity construction.

For Phase 2 the City and developers need to agree to a community benefits contribution that includes the Lakeview Pier Reconstruction Project and cultural amenities; a minimum of 10 percent of affordable housing units for any construction beyond the initial 8,050; and securing additional parkland.

With the sudden rush by the PCs to get shovels in the ground, concerns around affordability, oversupply and the billions of dollars needed for infrastructure are being pushed aside to get Lakeview Village built. 

Email: [email protected] 

Twitter: @mcpaigepeacock

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