The Canadian

A final meeting of the Distillery District working group on Sept. 10 had ended in frustration over the fate of the Clear Spirits condominium project looming large in the heritage community. According to Lester Brown and other area representatives of the working group, compromise has not resulted from eight long meetings over six months. They met and discussed a number of options for residential housing with the city planning department and CityScape/Dundee, the owners and developers of the Distillery District, accompanied by their architects. Brown characterized the final meeting of the group by saying, “They are building exactly what they wanted,” referring to the plans for two massive condominium towers of 40 to 48 storeys that are proposed for construction on the site of what is now called Rackhouse M. At the previous meeting of the working group on Aug. 23, the area representatives had presented an alternative plan which would place one of the proposed residential towers closer to Cherry St. and would move one of the historic buildings to a new position such that the proposed buildings would be further from the centre of the Distillery District and provide “more open space, allowing it to breathe.”