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Toronto Parks Atlas
Debell Lane Parkette, site photograph
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ParketteType:Walkable Mid-Rise Neighbourhood Park (enclosure-leaning)Newtonbrook East

Debell Lane Parkette

Parkette, above average overall (score 42, rank ~77th percentile). Strongest: natural comfort; weakest: edge activation.

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

Data updated

Debell Lane Parkette scores 41.7 / 100. Strongest dimensions: enclosure / eyes on park and natural comfort. Weakest: edge activation (0). Border-vacuum risk is low. This score is a transparent reading of Jane Jacobs-style vitality factors, not a definitive judgment.

Best fora quiet siteveryday neighbourhood use

Area · 0.13 ha

What's here

Recreation
Playground
Facilities
Drinking waterBenches

Getting around

Paths

2 m of mapped path. Too little surface tagging to say how much is paved.

Too little path mapped to check for steps.

Seating

Not enough mapped seating to assess (2 benches mapped).

Arrival

No parking mapped in or within 200 m of this park.

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
42/100

Weighted across six dimensions · confidence 70%

Data Confidence
41.7 / 100

Data confidence: moderate

Citywide
77th
of all 3,753 parks
Among Parkette
83rd
same primary typology
Expected for similar parks
32
median in pocket Parkette (n=263)
Performance gap
+10
raw − expected · context confidence high
modest overperformer

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.

Boundary: OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL).

Explain this score

Where did the 42 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 · p26
-12.5
Border Vacuum Risk0 (risk)
+5.0
Amenity Diversity27 · p78
-4.5
Natural Comfort64 · p81
+2.2
Enclosure / Eyes on Park65 · p62
+1.5
Connectivity51 · p60
+0.1

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

Debell Lane Parkette works because its natural comfort score (64) is above average and its amenity diversity (27) is also top quartile.

What limits this park

Debell Lane Parkette is held back by edge activation (0, below-average): the surrounding streets carry too few active uses to spill into the park.

Most distinctive characteristic

Most distinctive feature: exceptionally high natural comfort (64, top quartile).

Jacobs reading

Debell Lane Parkette is an ecological retreat. The urban-vitality numbers are low because the park exists outside the everyday city. That's the point of it.

Tradeoffs

  • The park is enclosed by buildings (65) but the surrounding streets are quiet (edge activation 0): frame without animation.

Performance in context

  • A modest overperformer for its parkette typology (+10 vs the median in pocket Parkette).

Typology classification

confidence 70%
Parkette

Classified as Parkette: small (1349 m²) with strong building frontage (35.2 per 100 m)

Edge Activation

25% weightpartial 60%
0.0 / 100

Within 100 m of the park edge: 0 active uses (none) and 0 dead/hostile uses (none). 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%
50.5 / 100

Connectivity blends paths, intersections, transit, entrances, and edge density. This park has 1 mapped paths/walkways and 5 sidewalk segments within 50 m; 5 street intersections within 100 m; 7 bus stops within a 400 m walk; 1 estimated access points across ~148 m of perimeter. edge density is healthy, no superblock penalty. Source coverage: centreline, pedestrian_network, transit_osm.

Streets within 25 m2
Intersections within 100 m5
Paths/walkways (50 m)1
Sidewalk segments (50 m)5
Transit stops (400 m)7 (0 subway/GO, 0 streetcar/LRT, 7 bus)
Estimated entrances1
Edge connections / 100 m perimeter1.35
Park perimeter148 m

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

Amenity Diversity

20% weightmeasured 75%
27.3 / 100

3 distinct amenity types in the park (playground, bench, drinking_water). Diversity drives the score, so a park with many distinct activity types can outrank a larger park that repeats the same use.

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

Natural Comfort

15% weightpartial 60%
64.4 / 100

Natural-comfort components for this park: 25.0% estimated tree canopy; nearest waterbody ~221 m; 4 city-mapped trees inside the polygon (4.0/ha). Reading: exposed. Source coverage: treed_area, waterbodies, street_trees. Impervious surface is approximated (Toronto's authoritative layer ships only as a raster GeoTIFF).

Canopy coverage25.0%
Canopy area0.03 ha
Inside ravine system0.0%
Water surface inside park0.0%
Nearest water (if outside park)221 m
Estimated green100.0%
City-mapped trees inside polygon4
Tree density4.0 / ha
Cover diversity (Shannon, 0 to 100)81.1
Sample points used16

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

Enclosure / Eyes on Park

10% weightmeasured 80%
64.9 / 100

52 buildings within 25 m of the park edge (0 mid-rise, 52 low-rise, 0 tower); avg edge height 5.7 m (~2 floors); 35.2 buildings per 100 m of 148 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 m52
Buildings within 50 m52
Avg edge height5.7 m (~2 floors)
Tallest edge building8.9 m
Mid-rise (3 to 7 floors)0
Low-rise (< 3 floors)52
Towers (≥ 13 floors)0
Frontage density35.20 per 100 m perimeter
Mid-rise share of edge0%
Tower share of edge0%
Blank-edge share (proxy)0%
Park perimeter148 m

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

Border Vacuum Risk

10% weightpartial 60%
0.0 risk

Park edges face the city. No significant border vacuum detected.

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 (3 types · 5 records)

  • playground
  • bench
  • drinking water

Nearby active-edge features (4)

  • transit stop: Bayview Ave at Opposite Garnier Park123 m
  • transit stop: Bayview Ave at Garnier Park144 m
  • transit stop: Newton Drive156 m
  • transit stop: Garnier Court184 m

Park profile

Five-axis radar across the structural dimensions.

Edge ActivationConnectivityAmenity DiversityNatural ComfortEnclosureDebell Lane Parkette
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
    77th
  • Edge activation
    26th
  • Connectivity
    60th
  • Amenity diversity
    78th
  • Natural comfort
    81th
  • Enclosure
    62th

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 Debell Lane Parkette 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.
  • Diversify what people can do in the park (playground, washroom, water, shade, performance, sport, garden): even small additions raise this score.

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.