The $22 billion plan to turn a defunct airport into a small city

That is because the C$30 billion, equivalent to about $22 billion, development will be located at the Canadian city’s former Downsview Airport.

Airports have been repurposed as communities and parks before, but developers typically raze the original infrastructure and start from scratch. In this case, Northcrest Developments is betting that by preserving the airport’s main features it can enhance the community’s allure.

“It’s hard to make a planned community seem authentic when everything is brand new," said Derek Goring, chief executive of the Toronto-based developer. “So we really decided to lean into the aerospace legacy."

Those old hangars, for instance, will anchor the project’s first neighborhood: a 50-acre residential district with 2,850 homes, mainly in mid-rise apartment buildings. The runway will be preserved as a pedestrian thoroughfare lined with stores, restaurants, public patios, schools and a library.

Overall, Northcrest and its partners are creating more than 28 million square feet of residential space, 7 million square feet of commercial property and 74 acres of parks and open spaces. The development is expected to take 30 years to complete and is being built in phases across seven distinct neighborhoods, making it one of Canada’s largest real-estate projects.

Northcrest cites high-profile developments that repurpose aging industrial infrastructure, such as the High Line park in New York City, as a model for Downsview.

“The fact that it’s an old rail line is something that makes it interesting to people," said Goring.

In this case, he hopes, the hangars and runway will lend the development its appeal.

“It’s the thing that will make this place unlike anything else, and from a developer’s perspective, that’s like marketing 101," said Goring. “This is something no one else can really offer."

The strategy isn’t without risk. Repurposing old infrastructure typically costs more than building from scratch, and the extra cost doesn’t always make sense, said David Dixon, an Urban Places Fellow at Stantec, a consulting firm.

“It depends whether we can proclaim a value premium because it’s unique and has a special character," he said.

With the advent of self-driving cars, for example, there has been a lot of talk about converting parking garages into housing. “In fact, these conversions will be more expensive and less competitive in the marketplace than purpose-built housing," Dixon said.

Downsview Airport opened in 1929 and was used as an air base for the Royal Canadian Air Force in World War II. It later served as a testing facility for aircraft maker Bombardier. Bombardier sold the site in 2018 for about $635 million to a Canadian pension manager, which created Northcrest to oversee the development.

Northcrest briefly considered razing the entire site. “But we quickly came to the conclusion that that was not a good idea," Goring said. Research on developments around the world has shown the reuse of historic buildings could contribute to a project’s success.

Locals also said they wanted the land maintained as a hub for jobs and economic activity, and didn’t want to erase the site’s history, which included making planes for the war effort.

The hangars, built between the 1950s and 1990s, still have some practical use today. They are typically between 600 and 750 feet long and 150 feet wide, with 40-foot ceilings and no internal support columns. This makes them ideal for film production, light manufacturing and clean tech, according to Goring. Such spaces are difficult to find in Toronto.

“So there’s an opportunity to attract companies that actually want to be here but can’t because they can’t find these types of locations," he said.

Developers have long transformed 19th-century warehouses into trendy residential and commercial loft spaces, but until recently, midcentury industrial infrastructure had little appeal. As time marches on, a 1960s airplane hangar now looks dated enough to be regarded as a piece of history to be treasured.

Downsview isn’t the only development making use of 20th-century airport buildings. A new 5,000-home community planned for the site of the former Berlin Tegel Airport will use the existing terminal buildings to house startups, laboratories and university facilities.

Northcrest has already opened the Downsview site to the public for events, including “Play on the Runway," which saw crowds dancing and skating on the empty tarmac. Next year, it plans to build temporary sports fields and performance venues on open spaces slated for later development.

“It makes me wonder what we’re going to save 30 to 40 years from now," Dixon said. “Don’t knock down all the big box stores!"