The Mimico Waterfront Park is located at the shoreline of Etobicoke, Ontario, and spans approximately 1.1 kilometers of multi-use trails that runs along the water's edge of Lake Ontario. The waterfront park encompasses multiple small green spaces, moving northwards along the shoreline: Norris Crescent Parkette, Amos Waites Park, Superior Park, and Humber Bay Promenade Park. These areas are all public open spaces that are available year-round, and are fully pet and family friendly with fields to play in and sturdy playgrounds for children. Just about all of the pathways and protruding features within the lake was man-made through the initial process of lake-filing to produce additional ground-space for the waterfront park. A number of prominent features characterize this locale, most notably: the two protruding and slightly elevated headlands, which offer great views of Lake Ontario; the three cobble beaches, all of which are quite challenging to walk along; and multiple boardwalks, with three alongside small pockets of wetland habitats that offer prime resting spots for aquatic birds such as mallards, Canadian geese, and swans who are always happy for some freebies from the locals.
The construction of the Mimico Waterfront Park was completed and open for the public to access in October, 2012, taking about 4 years from when its construction first began in 2008. Planning for this waterfront project started back in 1999, when the Canadian government was vying for and bidding on hosting the 2008 Summer Olympics in Toronto. Despite losing the bid to Beijing, the redevelopment of the waterfront was still an extremely attractive prospect that would aid in mitigating local issues involving the environment, transportation, infrastructure and housing, while also increasing tourism within the region while providing more habitats for local wildlife at the same time. Much of the non-arbor vegetation that can now be seen throughout the waterfront park (with the exception of grass) are naturally occurring successions of the plant species of which humans had very little influence upon since the end of the park's construction. The numerous flowering plants have brought back much of the pollinating insects that are vital to maintaining ecosystems, with the more common ones being the bumblebees and the Monarch butterflies during the warmer months.
Municipality: Etobicoke/Toronto
Local area name: Mimico
Latitude and longitude: 43.611597594058395, -79.48703584061195
Physical Dimensions
Length: 1.1 kilometers
Width: Varied, from 15 meters up to 125 meters
Surface Area: 3.5 hectares
Elevation: 75-77 meters from sea level
Mammal species observed:
Insect species observed:
Bird species observed since revitalization of waterfront:
How the land was formed:
The rock formations that lie below what is now Mimico were shaped and formed during the Precambrian era, which is now referred to as the vast hard rock mantle called the Canadian or Precambrian Shield. During the Paleozoic era, salt seas covered all of southern Ontario, which swarmed and was teeming with early sea lifeforms. These seas persisted until somewhere between 250-500 million years ago, in which they withdrew, and the processes of erosion began to shape the exposed soil and rocks left behind by the seas. Water and weather cut away at the Paleozoic rocks for many millions of years, with the softer and less durable rocks were worn away and cut down from the unceasing erosion, particularly the sedimentary rocks covering what is now Mimico. The center of the present basin of Lake Ontario became the valley of a huge river flowing to the southwest.
The present-day Mimico landscape was formed during a fairly recent geological time period, the Pleistocene Epoch, during the last known ice age. The great glaciers of these times moved with a kind of flowing motion, reaching southern Ontario in several arms or lobes, each one following a different route on the land. These lobes always sought the lowest path, swerving around highlands or even twisting back towards the north is a slope led that way. One lobe that covered Mimico advanced from the northeast, along the basin of Lake Ontario from the St. Lawrence valley and the northwestward. As the Lake Ontario glacier lobe melted back, its meltwaters were dammed against the Caledon hills ridge it helped form, creating a great shallow ponding between the hills and the retreating ice. Mimico's location remained covered by the waters of Lake Iroquois, a greatly-enlarged version of the present Lake Ontario. At the end of the glacial period, salt water flooded up the St. Lawrence valley to make Lake Ontario a huge inlet of the Atlantic. It was during this period that Atlantic salmon were believed to have found their way to the lake and its tributary streams.
The slow rise of the land, relieved from its ice burden, led to the St. Lawrence beginning to drain Lake Ontario, which dropped the water levels to somewhere near its present height, allowing for the emergence of the lakeshore plain. Streams began to cut through the raw clay, vegetation became established, and the forest grew to the water's edge, which set the scene for human occupation.
Early human occupation:
There were humans living on, or near, the site that is now Mimico as early as 4,500 years ago, not long after the end of the last ice age, but there was little known of these peoples. The earliest First Nations peoples that were known to have lived in this area were the Iroquois, which encompassed many tribes and/or nations, including the Seneca, Cayuga, Onondaga, Mohawk, Oneida, and Tuscarora tribes, whom of which formed and make up a powerful federation called the Six Nations. From time to time, people of the Six Nations occupied land along the north shores of Lake Ontario (Canadian side). By 1759, when Canada became British, the Six Nations had practically wiped out three other nations and tribes, with the Six Nations themselves withdrawing to the south of Lake Ontario, of which is now in the United States.
Those of Algonquin, or Algonkian, culture tribes and nations had drifted in and taken over the land left behind by the Six Nations, of which the peoples were mostly of the Mississaugas and Ojibways. These were northern peoples who led a more roving lifestyle and practiced little in the way of agriculture. By the time real settlement of the Mimico and Toronto regions began under the British regime after the American revolution, the Mississaugas had been occupying the land for at least 100 years. They had given their names to rivers and streams, which were acknowledged by the British as the rightful owners of the land. Mimico, Etobicoke and other First Nations names that are still used in this area are Ojibway words. The name Mimico came from the aboriginal words that originally meant "place of the wild pigeon," which had undergone many different iterations over a couple of decades until it was officially assigned its current name.
The mixed hardwood and evergreen forest that bordered the Mimico Creek in the times was one of two favourite nesting places for the local birds, where wild pigeons were once one of nature's bounties when they migrated to Ontario in the spring. Unfortunately, due in part to the wild pigeon's varied and voracious diets, they were widely killed off from settler's lands and farms, while the birds' habitats were destroyed for human expansion, leading to their eventual extinction in the late 1800s.
The first white people to hew permanent homes for themselves within the area of Mimico were the discharged soldiers of Simcoe's Queen's Rangers, starting from back in the early 1790s. The heavy forest that crowded down to the edges of Lake Ontario were the settlers' largest challenge, as the land was wild and had yet to be shaped and cultivated to suit the needs and wants of the new inhabitants. Homes and shelters were made of trees and other woods available that had to be cut down, shaped, and constructed together using only the hands nearby, which was a labour-intensive process. Surrounding forest space was hacked away to produce clearings that had multiple possible uses, including farmlands, and eventually streets, subdivisions, parks, and apartment sites. The settlers regarded the forests as a mortal enemy to be destroyed and conquered by any means available.
Fast forward a few decades, practically all the arable land in Etobicoke township had been taken up and was being farmed by 1840. What is now Mimico was occupied mainly by farms and some houses. The building of the railroads had a profound and lasting effect on the future of Mimico, with the railway line being brought in through the town of Mimico in 1855. The life of the town was heavily modified by its association with the railroad. From 1870 to 1880, the community was still a farming one, with its main economic activity dependent on the prosperous beef and dairy farms. The farms, in turn, depended on a market provided for their produce in the growing city of Toronto. The railway was a convenient and dependable link with the growing city.
More modern changes:
The lakeshore road ran very close to the water's edge, which was a problem whenever there were storms that caused the waters of Lake Ontario to surge and overrun onto the road. After the spring storms in 1880s, the lakeshore road was rebuilt further back from the lake, which was in line with the current placement of the present Lakeshore Boulevard Road. Regardless, the lakeshore was seen as an excellent place to visit on nice days for trips. Families would sometimes spend a day having a picnic on the beach. Much of the beach property then was owned by farmers or other local people, but nobody seemed to object to public use of the beach and there were few fences. There were few houses along the lakeshore in the 1880's and they were widely separated. Big lakeshore estates did not come into being until much later. The lakeshore road itself was just a sandy track about 4.5 to 6 meters wide at the time.
The 1880s and 90s passed, each year bringing more people to Mimico, a few more houses and another short step in thee gradual transition from scattered farming district to suburban community. Mimico's fine lakefront, with its clear waters, long unobstructed beach and stately shade trees had begun to look attractive but became even more desirable by the 1890's with the streetcar services to a few wealthy Toronto families as a retreat from city life. So began the era of luxurious lakeshore estates. Among the most widely known were those owned by the late Col. Harry McGee, James Franceschini, the Miles, Loblaw, German and McGuiness families. These estates dominated the lakeshore for nearly 50 years. Much of which were sold to build lakefront apartments and/or condominiums. Between 1906 and 1914, Mimico had been transformed from a rural to an urban community. There were still plenty of open fields left by 1914 but they were shrinking every year before the tides of new homes for the incoming railroaders to support the rapidly growing railway industry. As the decades went on, better and more robust infrastructure was implemented into the town of Mimico, turning the once rural place into an urban town with all the comforts of the city without the congestion.
The restoration and formation of the waterfront park:
The project of restoring the Mimico waterfront was part of a greater project to provide an ecosystem-based framework to ensure that shoreline management activities result in a clean, green, accessible, diverse, connected, open, affordable, attractive and useable waterfront space. This undertaking was seen as preserving the foundation of the last remaining beach along the Mimico waterfront as well as restoring a more natural land-water interface within the landscape. The increased habitat diversity and cover was planned out to attract more diverse wildlife and to minimize the opportunities for any single species to dominate the area.
To form the added landmass needed for making the connected waterfront park, an enormous amount of lake filling was required, which came out be approximately 115,000 tonnes of stone, rocks, sand, and soil.
[Read Hough (Chapter 6): Climate (pp.189-218)
Human activities can have a profound influence on local climate and microclimate. With specific references to the readings above and other resources you have found on your own, describe the human-induced changes that have occurred to your local landscape that may have altered its microclimate and contributed to changes in the climate of the region.]
Ownership, jurisdiction, access, and management
[Read Alberti (Chapter 4): Landscape Signatures (Sections 4.1-4.3, pp. 93-112)
Currell, H. (1967). The Mimico Story (2nd ed.). Town of Mimico and Library Board.
eBird (2021) eBird: An online database of bird distribution and abundance [web application]. eBird, Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, New York. Available: https://ebird.org/hotspot/L1817793. Accessed: November 3, 2021.
Halstead, J. Commissioner of Economic Development, Culture and Tourism. (2004). Comments on the Environmental Assessment, Mimico Waterfront Linear Park Project, City of Toronto - Humber Bay Park West to Norris Crescent Parkette Ward 6 - Etobicoke-Lakeshore. Toronto STAFF REPORT.
Lade H (n.d.) Shoreline restoration at Mimico Waterfront Park. Aquatic Habitat Canada. Retrieved September 21, 2021, from https://aquatichabitat.ca/shoreline-restoration-at...
Toronto and Region Conservation Authority (TRCA) (2014). Mimico Waterfront Linear Park Terrestrial Biological Inventory and Assessment. Retrieved November 5, 2021, from https://trca.ca/app/uploads/2016/02/MimicoWaterfro...
Toronto and Region Conservation Authority (TRCA) (n.d.) Watershed features – Lake Ontario Waterfront. Retrieved September 19, 2021, from https://trca.ca/conservation/watershed-management/...
Map of the township of Etobicoke, in the county of York, compiled by Charles Unwin, Provincial Land Surveyor, Provincial Chambers, Toronto.
Waterfront Toronto (n. d.) Mimico Waterfront Park. Retrieved September 17, 2021, from https://www.waterfrontoronto.ca/nbe/portal/waterfr...!ut/p/a1/jY9fC4IwFMW_in6A2HWJfx6Xk7TUiIxsLzEibZSbDCno07eipyDzPN0Dv3MuBzFUISb5TTS8F0ry68sz71A4NHacFSyhzEMgURh4PllPIQID7A0QzUni-hkAuAGGlM4S6oc5QOqNy8MPEfiXX4x4gHUe5Q1iHe_PEyFrhapWtOKorDvvT7rWSvZWx_UF7RD76ospNn1ZMCvS0lz4AwwNfgMDi7p2Wz2yepM2tv0EYB_rFg!!/dl5/d5/L2dBISEvZ0FBIS9nQSEh/pw/Z7_N1DE11O0KG7OD0AC5HINJ930G4/ren/p=CTX=QCPwaterfront_content_libraryQCPWaterfrontQCAHomeQCPprojectsQCPmimicoQCAwaterfrontQCApark/p=ns_Z7_N1DE11O0KG7OD0AC5HINJ930G4_WCM_Page.4658872e-46c2-4a90-aac1-107654e08032=2/p=WCM_PI=1/=/#Z7_N1DE11O0KG7OD0AC5HINJ930G4
This Local Landscape Report was prepared by Aimi Abe-Lafond for the Brock University course TMGT 2P94: Human Dominated Ecosystems on November 7, 2021.
All copyrights for cited material rest with the original copyright owners.
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