Toronto’s rail deck park proposal raises thorny issues around funding and inclusivity but is a “golden opportunity” for landmark downtown greenspace, international experts say.“I think this is a great opportunity that should not be overlooked,” Matt Nielson, a deputy commissioner at Chicago’s Millennium Park said in an interview after a Tuesday rail deck part discussion hosted by the Urban Land Institute.“There has to be some patience — it’s a lot of entities and infrastructure involved, it’s complicated, but I have no doubt the outcome will be embraced and become a valuable addition to the crown of Toronto.”City council voted last year to start exploring how to make real a vision, promoted by Mayor John Tory, of a grass-covered 8.5-hectare deck over the rail corridor stretching from Bathurst St. to Blue Jays Way.City staff are expected to report back this fall on issues including estimated construction costs of at least $1.05 billion and whether a developer’s claim to “air rights” over the rail tracks presents a real obstacle.Nielson said the park could link Toronto’s downtown to the waterfront the same way Millennium Park, a 10-hectare redevelopment project that hosted 13 million visitors in the first half of 2016 alone, brought downtown Chicago to Lake Michigan.Jesse Brackenbury, executive director of the non-profit conservancy that manages the Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy Greenway, which in 2008 replaced an elevated expressway and sits atop a buried interstate, said Boston has made his signature park an “incubator” for new ideas.“Have a glass of beer in a park? That hasn’t happened in other parks around Boston but this summer when our beer garden opens, the sky will not fall,” he told the panel discussion.More than 400 free events per year and draws including food trucks have helped make the Greenway, which could have become ...
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