Thursday, August 28th, 2008 ::: Screw-Ups

We’ve taken a look at 193/195 Spadina Ave before. In Audit: 193 Spadina, we looked at the enforcement against the illegal billboard on the north wall of this building. Today we look at the south wall.

Notice that Pattison’s fascia sign is located directly above Pattison’s third party ground sign.

Sid Catalano, Pattison’s Director of Legislation and a former City of Toronto signs planner who can’t stop giving north-east Spain a bad name, and his leasing man, Just Cole, applied for a permit (98-419636) to build this third party sign in 1998.

City of Toronto zoning examiner Harris Ramrup noticed that there were Pattison billboards on the northerly and southerly elevations of this building. The northerly facing sign is the same sign that was the subject of a this February 21, 2006 Notice of Violation. The southerly facing sign is the one Sid applied to legalize in permit application 98-419636. Ramrup asked Catalano to remove the signs before proceeding with the permit application and Sid Catalano had the signs removed and submitted this letter to Ramrup:

“This letter is to inform you that the existing signs located on the second floor of the above noted building have been removed, both from the north and south elevations. You have received photos which I delivered to you on April 14, 1999, which further substantiate this.”

The photograph he submitted indicates that sign was removed from the north elevation.

(The south elevation photo is not legible in the file we obtained.) So that’s what the north elevation looked like in April 1999 after Pattison removed the billboard. The billboard was, of course, re-erected on the northerly elevation and looked like this in March 2006:

That’s the same building. Still there today.

Back to the south elevation. In order to obtain the permit for the fascia sign, Pattison’s Just Cole submitted this declaration that there were no third party ground signs within 60 metres:

That’s a problem for Pattison. As you can see from the photo above, there is a Pattison sign directly below the south elevation fascia. Both can’t be legal at the same time. There is also another Pattison ground sign on the parking lot next door (which is apparently the same lot). You can make out both Pattison ground signs in this photo:

Neither of those two signs can be legal if the fascia is to be legal. We suspect that both the Pattison ground signs are illegal because we couldn’t find any permits for them.

Of course, the parking lot kiosk sign is also illegal. That kiosk is an IMA Outdoor sign, and it is blocking the visibility of the Pattison ground sign, which is on the same lot as the kiosk, not the abutting lot. That’s just bad form on the part of Danny Starnino’s upstart IMA Outdoor. Pattison was there first. It’s one thing to block the visibility of a sign on another lot, but here the complete lack of respect from Starnino is unbelievable. So many illegal signs, you can’t see the illegal signs anymore.

Conclusion: There are 5 third party signs on this building and its adjacent parking lot. Two Pattison ground sign are illegal. One IMA Outdoor kiosk is illegal. As for the Pattison fascias, the north-facing one is illegal and the south facing one is legal so long as both ground signs are illegal. The illegality of the ground signs make the fascia comply with 60 Metre separation requirements.

There is also an illegal Strategic Media fascia on 185 Spadina, the listed historic building next door.