Toronto’s newest nominee as a heritage property is a unique Scarborough supermarket.
The Metro store, built in 1958 with a distinctive curved roofline, sits in the Parkway Mall at Victoria Park Avenue and Ellesmere Road.
Scarborough community council voted without dissent yesterday to ask that it be added to the city’s list of heritage properties.
Some might wonder why a 1950s suburban supermarket should be considered a heritage building. Local Coun. Michael Thompson (Ward 37, Scarborough Centre) is not one of them.
“Anyone who has ever been in this area knows about that landmark that identifies this particular community,” Thompson said, adding he was asked about the building recently in British Columbia by someone who had seen it on a visit to Toronto.
City heritage staff agree, calling it a “rare example of a late 20th-century commercial building.”
The store, designed by Toronto architects Bregman and Hamman, “demonstrates a high degree of technical achievement,” a staff report says.
“The arched roof that is the most distinctive feature of the design contains what was described as the largest wood arch assembled in Canada at that time.”
It has operated under the banners of Grand Union, Steinberg’s, Miracle Food Mart, Dominion and Metro.
