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Toronto Parks Atlas
Brimley Yard, site photograph
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ParketteType:Underperforming / Leftover Space (waterfront-leaning)Eglinton East

Brimley Yard

Parkette, near the bottom of the city overall (score 17, rank ~1th percentile). Strongest: edge activation; weakest: natural comfort.

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Aerial, City of Toronto orthophoto, ~8 cm/px source · cached 5/9/2026

Data updated

Brimley Yard scores 16.7 / 100. Strongest dimensions: enclosure / eyes on park and natural comfort. Weakest: amenity diversity (0). Border-vacuum risk is elevated (100). This score is a transparent reading of Jane Jacobs-style vitality factors, not a definitive judgment.

Best fora quiet siteveryday neighbourhood use

Area · 0.78 ha

Getting around

Paths

No walking paths mapped in OpenStreetMap.

Seating

No seating mapped in OpenStreetMap.

Arrival

Nearest parking 188 m away. None of the 1 nearby lot records whether it has accessible spaces.

Path, seating and parking data comes from OpenStreetMap and reflects what volunteers have mapped, not a survey. Absence here means nobody has recorded it. This section does not assess wheelchair access: the relevant OpenStreetMap tag is present on well under 1% of Toronto paths.

Vitality Score
17/100

Weighted across six dimensions · confidence 59%

Data Confidence
16.7 / 100

Data confidence: moderate

Citywide
1st
of all 3,753 parks
Among Parkette
0th
same primary typology
Expected for similar parks
37
median in small Parkette (n=222)
Performance gap
-21
raw − expected · context confidence high
strong underperformer

Scores are not bell-curved. Percentiles and expected scores provide context without changing the underlying model.

Loading map…

The parks map is loading.
Street context. Park polygon highlighted on the citywide map.

Grounds of a City building, not a designated park. It is left out of park rankings.

Explain this score

Where did the 17 come from? Each weighted contribution against a neutral 50 baseline. Green = pushed up; red = pulled down.

Download JSON
What pushed this score up or down vs a neutral 50weight × score
Edge Activation0 · p62
-12.5
Amenity Diversity0 · p51
-10.0
Border Vacuum Risk100 (risk)
-5.0
Connectivity32 · p29
-3.7
Natural Comfort34 · p19
-2.4
Enclosure / Eyes on Park53 · p25
+0.3

Sum of contributions = the headline score. A negative bar means that dimension dragged the park below the city-wide neutral baseline.

Why this park works

Brimley Yard works because its edge activation score (0) is middle of the pack.

What limits this park

Brimley Yard is held back by natural comfort (34, bottom quartile): only 0% canopy means little summer shade; border-vacuum risk is also elevated (100).

Most distinctive characteristic

Most distinctive feature: exceptionally low natural comfort (34, bottom quartile).

Jacobs reading

Brimley Yard is currently underperforming on both axes: neither integrated into the city nor offering deep natural respite. A candidate for design intervention.

Performance in context

  • Strong underperformer relative to its cohort: raw 17 vs an expected 37 (gap -21).

Typology classification

confidence 70%
Parkette

Classified as Parkette: small (7787 m²) with strong building frontage (4.1 per 100 m)

Edge Activation

25% weightpartial 60%
0.0 / 100

Within 100 m of the park edge: 2 active uses (transit_stop) and 8 dead/hostile uses (rail). Active edges keep "eyes on the park" through the day; parking lots, blank institutional walls, rail and highway frontages drain street life.

Source: OpenStreetMap: cafes, restaurants, shops, schools, community centres, transit, parking, highways, rail. All data sources.

Connectivity

20% weightmeasured 85%
31.6 / 100

Connectivity blends paths, intersections, transit, entrances, and edge density. This park has 0 mapped paths/walkways and 3 sidewalk segments within 50 m; 2 street intersections within 100 m; 5 bus stops within a 400 m walk; 0 estimated access points across ~510 m of perimeter. moderate edge density, small superblock penalty applied. Source coverage: centreline, pedestrian_network, transit_osm.

Streets within 25 m3
Intersections within 100 m2
Paths/walkways (50 m)0
Sidewalk segments (50 m)3
Transit stops (400 m)5 (0 subway/GO, 0 streetcar/LRT, 5 bus)
Estimated entrances0
Edge connections / 100 m perimeter0.59
Park perimeter510 m

Source: Toronto Centreline V2 + Pedestrian Network + OSM transit stops. All data sources.

Amenity Diversity

20% weightinferred 30%
0.0 / 100

No amenities recorded.

Source: Toronto Parks & Recreation Facilities + OSM amenity tags. All data sources.

Natural Comfort

15% weightpartial 45%
33.8 / 100

Natural-comfort components for this park: 0.0% estimated tree canopy; nearest waterbody ~586 m; 1 city-mapped trees inside the polygon (1.0/ha). Reading: exposed. Source coverage: waterbodies, street_trees. Impervious surface is approximated (Toronto's authoritative layer ships only as a raster GeoTIFF).

Canopy coverage0.0%
Canopy area0.00 ha
Inside ravine system0.0%
Water surface inside park0.0%
Nearest water (if outside park)586 m
Estimated green100.0%
City-mapped trees inside polygon1
Tree density1.0 / ha
Cover diversity (Shannon, 0 to 100)0.0
Sample points used56

Source: Toronto Treed Area + Ravine + Waterbodies + Street Tree Inventory. All data sources.

Enclosure / Eyes on Park

10% weightmeasured 80%
52.6 / 100

21 buildings within 25 m of the park edge (0 mid-rise, 21 low-rise, 0 tower); avg edge height 4.3 m (~1 floors); 4.1 buildings per 100 m of 510 m perimeter (strong frontage density); edges are barely there or single-storey; no towers immediately adjacent. "Eyes on the park" come strongest from the 0 mid-rise edge buildings.

Buildings within 25 m21
Buildings within 50 m21
Avg edge height4.3 m (~1 floors)
Tallest edge building7.3 m
Mid-rise (3 to 7 floors)0
Low-rise (< 3 floors)21
Towers (≥ 13 floors)0
Frontage density4.12 per 100 m perimeter
Mid-rise share of edge0%
Tower share of edge0%
Blank-edge share (proxy)0%
Park perimeter510 m

Source: Toronto 3D Massing (building footprints + heights). All data sources.

Border Vacuum Risk

10% weightpartial 60%
100.0 risk

Border-vacuum factors within 50 m of the park: Kingston Subdivision, Kingston Subdivision, Kingston Subdivision, Kingston Subdivision, Kingston Subdivision, Kingston Subdivision. Jacobs warned that highways, rail, parking lots and blank institutional edges act as "vacuums" that suppress foot traffic and isolate the park from its neighbourhood.

Source: OpenStreetMap: highways, rail, parking. All data sources.

Equity Context

contextinferred 15%
50.0 / 100

Equity Context requires inputs not yet loaded for this park (Toronto Neighbourhood Profiles). Score is held at a neutral 50 with low confidence. Read with caution.

Source: Not loaded yet: Toronto Neighbourhood Profiles. All data sources.

Amenities (0)

No amenities recorded for this park.

Nearby active-edge features (17)

  • transit stop: Lombardy Crescent1 m
  • rail: Kingston Subdivision22 m
  • rail: Kingston Subdivision27 m
  • rail: Kingston Subdivision32 m
  • transit stop: Lombardy Crescent36 m
  • rail: Kingston Subdivision40 m
  • rail: Kingston Subdivision41 m
  • rail: Kingston Subdivision43 m
  • rail99 m
  • rail100 m
  • rail101 m
  • rail101 m
  • rail124 m
  • rail: Kingston Subdivision167 m
  • rail: Kingston Subdivision169 m
  • rail: Kingston Subdivision171 m
  • parking lot188 m

Park profile

Five-axis radar across the structural dimensions.

Edge ActivationConnectivityAmenity DiversityNatural ComfortEnclosureBrimley Yard
Edge activation, connectivity, amenity diversity, natural comfort, and enclosure, each 0 to 100.

Citywide percentile ranks

Across all Toronto parks in the dataset.

  • Overall vitality
    1th
  • Edge activation
    62th
  • Connectivity
    29th
  • Amenity diversity
    51th
  • Natural comfort
    19th
  • Enclosure
    25th

Most similar parks

Closest in metric space across the five structural dimensions.

Most opposite parks

Furthest in metric space. Useful for recognising what kind of park this isn’t.

Human activity signals: not available

No activity signals have landed for this park yet. The model has scored its physical form but it can’t yet say how often it’s programmed, photographed, or walked through. See /data-ethics for what we will and will not collect.

Does this score feel accurate?

Your read of Brimley Yard matters. We’re testing whether the model lines up with how people actually use the park. Submissions are stored locally; no account needed.

Tell us how this park feels

We measure structure (canopy, edges, connectivity). You measure feeling. Both matter, and disagreement is itself useful civic data.

Rate this park on as many dimensions as you have an opinion about. 1 = not at all, 5 = strongly. Skip the ones you don't feel sure about. Aggregated only, no comments stored at the row level.

feels socially active
feels comfortable
feels safe
feels connected
feels welcoming
feels ecological / natural
feels good for lingering
feels family-friendly
feels culturally important
70%

What would improve this park?

Generated from the weakest measured dimensions: a starting point, not a prescription.

  • Activate the edges: encourage cafés, retail or community uses on the streets that face the park; replace blank or parking-lot edges where possible.
  • Add or open more entrances and improve sidewalk continuity around the park. More permeability means more spontaneous use.
  • Diversify what people can do in the park (playground, washroom, water, shade, performance, sport, garden): even small additions raise this score.
  • Increase canopy and reduce paved area. Shade and water features extend usable hours and seasons.
  • Mitigate border vacuums (highways, rail, parking) with active programming on the still-permeable edges and treat the hostile edge as a design challenge.

Data sources

real Toronto data
  • City of Toronto Open Data: Green Spaces
    Polygon boundaries, official names, land classes. Boundaries are reconciled against OpenStreetMap (ODbL) for new and updated parks.
  • Parks & Recreation Facilities
    Inventory of in-park amenities (washrooms, fields, rinks…).
  • Toronto Pedestrian Network
    Sidewalk segments around and through parks; estimated park entrances.
  • Toronto Centreline V2
    Street segments + intersection nodes near park edges; trails and walkways.
  • Toronto 3D Massing
    Building footprints + heights for edge-building counts, frontage density, and tower-in-the-park risk.
  • Toronto Treed Area
    Tree canopy share inside park polygons via stratified-grid sampling.
  • Toronto Waterbodies & Rivers
    Water surface inside parks + nearest-water distance for cooling.
  • Ravine & Natural Feature Protection
    Ravine overlap as a cooling / natural-comfort signal.
  • Toronto Street Tree Inventory
    Tree count + density inside park polygons.
  • OpenStreetMap (Overpass API)
    Cafés, restaurants, retail, transit stops, parking, highways, rail.