Terrapex environmental scientists Samantha Beatty and Nick Settecase were pleased to see a project in which they have invested many long hours win the REFOCUS award.
Terrapex was extremely pleased to accept, on behalf of the entire project team, a much‑coveted “Brownie Award” for the 150 Harrison Street Modular Housing Initiative project at the 2021 Brownfields Awards Gala in downtown Toronto on November 23rd. The award represents Terrapex’s third “Brownie”, following previous wins in 2017 and 2020.
The Brownfields Awards (brownieawards.ca) are an annual presentation by Actual Media and the Canadian Brownfields Network (CBN) to recognize and promote brownfield redevelopment projects across Canada in seven different categories. The 150 Harrison Street Modular Housing Initiative project was the winner in the brand-new REFOCUS category established to recognize projects that:
- Demonstrate alignment with broader social initiatives and mandates;
- Demonstrate significant improvements towards GHG reduction, climate resiliency, affordable housing, healthy communities, and/or diversity and inclusion;
or; - Use alternative lenses to see remediation and redevelopment from different perspectives other than economic and environmental ones.
The 150 Harrison Street project was part of the City of Toronto’s commitment to construct 1,000 new homes for people experiencing or at risk of homelessness, with a plan to employ modular construction techniques to rapidly construct 44 studio units (11 of which were built to accessibility standards) at the 150 Harrison Street site. Terrapex provided geotechnical, hydrogeological, and environmental consulting services (including two Risk Assessments completed under Ontario Regulation 153/04) for this project, all under an extremely tight timeline – the project was approved by Toronto City Council on April 30, 2020 and the modular housing facilities at 150 Harrison Street officially opened less than nine months later!
Terrapex is extremely grateful to the City of Toronto and its real estate agency CreateTO for the opportunity to be involved in a unique and very challenging brownfield project, and one that also contributes to addressing a pressing social ill in the wider community. Congratulations to all of our staff who made Terrapex’s contributions to this project a success. We’d also like to congratulate the rest of the 150 Harrison Street Modular Housing Initiative project team: Montgomery Sisan Architects, Baker Turner Landscape Architects, Design Works Engineering, Nextrans Consulting Engineers, NRB / Horizon North, and Husky General Contracting.
TORONTO OFFICE
