Extending PUBLIC WORK’s innovative design thinking from The Bentway eastward, Under Concord leverages a unique private development opportunity beneath the elevated Gardiner Expressway to create a new kind of vibrant public terrain. This strategic vision introduces a place-specific typology of micro-retail and cultural units that weave new physical connections and frame gathering spaces in and around the expressway structure—creating a hybrid public realm and community amenity for the City Place neighbourhood.
Drawing on our extensive experience working under and with transportation infrastructure, PUBLIC WORK developed a micro-density concept that integrates novel forms of programmable public space with expanded trail connections. Created in collaboration with Concord Adex and The Bentway Conservancy, the proposal is structured around a series of spatial interventions tailored to the unique constraints of the expressway itself.
A distinct built form emerges not from any architectural style but from the required offsets of the existing infrastructure, creating a dialogue between the Gardiner’s 20th-century engineering and new 21st-century urban interventions. The resulting series of stacked bar buildings nestled beneath the expressway are as pragmatic and essential as the infrastructure above. From this starting point, a series of sunken “voids” are carved out that showcase the Gardiner’s support columns and create dramatic central courtyards. Multiple levels of retail frontages are animated with the addition of bridge connections and fully accessible spiralling ramps, enabling seamless retail access—even on upper levels Fundamentally, the public realm is conceived as a surprising sequence of dynamic — almost cinematic — public connections and excavated spaces that exist in sharp contrast to the more predictable parks and streets of the surrounding district. Finally, The Bentway’s multi-use trail is extended from the future bridge landing at Fort York Boulevard and along Housey Street, linking to the existing trail network east of Dan Leckie Way.
