Lawrence Heights is a neighbourhood in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is located in the former city of North York, which was merged with five other municipalities and a regional government to form a new City of Toronto in 1998. Lawrence Heights is also part of the area known as Downsview. The neighbourhood is bounded by Lawrence Avenue to the south, Highway 401 to the north, and the Allen Expressway runs through it as well. The area is also referred to as the "Jungle", a sixties' reference to John Huston's film noir The Asphalt Jungle, initially due to the visual impact and the residents' desire to escape a low-income lifestyle. More recently, the media has used the name to reference the high levels of crime within the maze of affordable housing projects. Demographically, the area consists largely of immigrants from the Caribbean and East Africa, but there are also small pockets of Europeans. Nearly all the housing in Lawrence Heights is short-term public housing. Because of proximity to Downsview Airport, high-rise buildings were not originally permitted to be constructed in this area, and the majority of the housing is in low- to mid-rise buildings. In 2007, city councillor Howard Moscoe unveiled a plan to revitalize Lawrence Heights. The plan proposes a demolition of all 1,208 units in the neighbourhood, and they would be replaced by modern affordable units, market housing and retail/commercial streets. [1] There is also a significant minority of Vietnamese and Filipinos living in the Lawrence Heights Projects. The media fails to acknowledge and represent them...
Notable locations
- Lawrence Heights Community Centre
- Lawrence Heights Community Health Centre
- Bathurst Heights Secondary School — once home to one of Toronto's elite basketball teams, the school was closed by the Toronto District School Board, and was temporarily the home of Brebeuf College as Brebeuf underwent a school restoration construction
- Lawrence Square — shopping centre
- Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce Head Office Operations — 750 Lawrence Avenue West
- Yorkdale Shopping Centre — conveniently located just north of the community
- Yorkdale and Lawrence West subway stations
The Vietnamese were largely immigrants called "Boat People" refugees who fled South Vietnam in 1975; during the communist take over of Saigon after the long and bloody Vietnam War(s). Vietnamese "Boat People" started arriving en masse in the late 1970's and early 1980's into large Canadian urban centres like Montreal, Vancouver, and Toronto. Here they struggled to adapt to a new culture/lifestyle while also living with the sufferings of the past war years. Many settled in lower income areas such as Housing Projects and so called "ghetto" neighbourhoods. The Vietnamese people living in such low income places today can either be the same families or, their younger generation descendants. Though many have made great strides in adapting and progressing in Canadian society today despite the ever continuing struggles of contending with 2 cultural upbringings (East meets West)
