GEORGE S. HENRY ACADEMY - Building Grounds
Other, below average overall (score 28, rank ~21th percentile). Strongest: connectivity; weakest: enclosure.
Aerial — City of Toronto orthophoto, ~8 cm/px source · cached 5/9/2026
GEORGE S. HENRY ACADEMY - Building Grounds scores 27.8 / 100. Strongest dimensions: connectivity and natural comfort. Weakest: amenity diversity (0). Border-vacuum risk is elevated (48). This score is a transparent reading of Jane Jacobs-style vitality factors — not a definitive judgment.
Area · 5.78 ha
Weighted across six dimensions · confidence 63%
Scores are not bell-curved. Percentiles and expected scores provide context without changing the underlying model.
Explain this score
Where did the 28 come from? Each weighted contribution against a neutral 50 baseline. Green = pushed up; red = pulled down.
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
What limits this park
Most distinctive characteristic
Jacobs reading
Performance in context
- Although its citywide rank is low (21st), it ranks highly among similar others (61st) — strong for what it is, even if the absolute score is moderate.
Typology classification
Classified as Other: does not meet any specific typology threshold (5.8 ha, 0 amenity types, frontage 0.8/100m)
Edge Activation
Within 100 m of the park edge: 4 active uses (transit_stop) and 10 dead/hostile uses (parking_lot, highway). Active edges keep "eyes on the park" through the day; parking lots, blank institutional walls, rail and highway frontages drain street life.
Source: OSM POIs (amenity/shop) + Toronto Building Footprints + land use
Connectivity
Connectivity blends paths, intersections, transit, entrances, and edge density. This park has 5 mapped paths/walkways and 20 sidewalk segments within 50 m; 4 street intersections within 100 m; 15 transit stops within a 400 m walk; 0 estimated access points across ~994 m of perimeter. moderate edge density — small superblock penalty applied. Source coverage: centreline, pedestrian_network, transit_osm.
Source: Toronto Centreline V2 + Pedestrian Network + OSM transit stops
Amenity Diversity
No amenities recorded — score is 0 until inventory is loaded.
Source: Toronto Parks & Recreation Facilities + OSM amenity tags
Natural Comfort
Natural-comfort components for this park: 9.7% estimated tree canopy; nearest waterbody ~542 m; 9 city-mapped trees inside the polygon (1.6/ha). Reading: exposed. Source coverage: treed_area, waterbodies, street_trees. Impervious surface is approximated (Toronto's authoritative layer ships only as a raster GeoTIFF).
Source: Toronto Treed Area + Ravine + Waterbodies + Street Tree Inventory
Enclosure / Eyes on Park
8 buildings within 25 m of the park edge (0 mid-rise, 7 low-rise, 1 tower); avg edge height 13.2 m (~4 floors); 0.8 buildings per 100 m of 994 m perimeter — thin frontage — significant blank-edge share; edges are at a Jacobs-scale walkable mid-rise (3–7 floors); 1 tower ≥ 40 m within 25 m of the edge. "Eyes on the park" come strongest from the 0 mid-rise edge buildings.
Source: Toronto 3D Massing (building footprints + heights)
Border Vacuum Risk
Border-vacuum factors within 50 m of the park: parking_lot, parking_lot, parking_lot, parking_lot. Jacobs warned that highways, rail, parking lots and blank institutional edges act as "vacuums" — they suppress foot traffic and isolate the park from its neighbourhood.
Source: Toronto Street Centreline (highways) + rail layer + OSM landuse + building footprints
Equity Context
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: Toronto Neighbourhood Profiles
Amenities (0)
No amenities recorded for this park.
Nearby active-edge features (30)
- parking lot0 m
- parking lot0 m
- transit stop4 m
- parking lot15 m
- transit stop18 m
- transit stop44 m
- parking lot46 m
- transit stop48 m
- parking lot55 m
- parking lot69 m
- highway — Don Valley Parkway81 m
- highway — Don Valley Parkway84 m
- parking lot95 m
- parking lot99 m
- parking lot104 m
- highway — Don Valley Parkway112 m
- parking lot123 m
- parking lot123 m
- highway — Don Valley Parkway129 m
- highway — Highway 401 Collector138 m
- transit stop142 m
- transit stop164 m
- parking lot165 m
- highway — Don Valley Parkway171 m
- parking lot179 m
- highway — Highway 401 Collector184 m
- parking lot186 m
- parking lot194 m
- parking lot199 m
- highway — Highway 404200 m
Park profile
Five-axis radar across the structural dimensions.
Citywide percentile ranks
Across all Toronto parks in the dataset.
- Overall vitality21th
- Edge activation33th
- Connectivity62th
- Amenity diversity40th
- Natural comfort58th
- Enclosure10th
Most similar parks
Closest in metric space across the five structural dimensions.
- Jolly Miller ParkRavine / Naturalized Park29
- Glendon ForestWaterfront Park29
- Humber ArboretumWaterfront Park26
- Humber River WatercourseWaterfront Park26
- Humber River WatercourseWaterfront Park33
Most opposite parks
Furthest in metric space — useful for recognising what kind of park this isn’t.
- Leslie Grove ParkParkette68
- Kew GardensNeighbourhood Park71
- Market Lane ParkUrban Plaza63
- ALEX WILSON COMMUNITY GARDEN - Open Green SpaceUrban Plaza59
- Bellevue Square ParkCivic Square66
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 GEORGE S. HENRY ACADEMY - Building Groundsmatters. 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.
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.
- Increase canopy and reduce paved area. Shade and water features extend usable hours and seasons.
- Encourage mid-rise, windowed frontages around the park so residents have direct sightlines onto it.
- 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
- City of Toronto Open Data — Parks (Green Space)Polygon boundaries, official names, types.
- Parks & Recreation FacilitiesInventory of in-park amenities (washrooms, fields, rinks…).
- Toronto Pedestrian NetworkSidewalk segments around and through parks; estimated park entrances.
- Toronto Centreline V2Street segments + intersection nodes near park edges; trails and walkways.
- Toronto 3D MassingBuilding footprints + heights for edge-building counts, frontage density, and tower-in-the-park risk.
- Toronto Treed AreaTree canopy share inside park polygons via stratified-grid sampling.
- Toronto Waterbodies & RiversWater surface inside parks + nearest-water distance for cooling.
- Ravine & Natural Feature ProtectionRavine overlap as a cooling / natural-comfort signal.
- Toronto Street Tree InventoryTree count + density inside park polygons.
- Neighbourhood Profiles(Pending) Equity context proxy.
- OpenStreetMap (Overpass API)Cafés, restaurants, retail, transit stops, parking, highways, rail.