Walk through downtown Toronto, Ottawa, or Hamilton, and it’s hard to miss what’s happening.
Projects are no longer single-purpose towers or sprawling subdivisions. They are vertical neighbourhoods where apartments sit above grocery stores, where cafés spill out onto plazas, and where office workers share the same transit stop as residents heading home. These are mixed-use developments, and in Ontario they are quickly becoming a central feature of the urban landscape.
Part of the push comes from necessity. Land is expensive, infrastructure is strained and commuting is increasingly unpopular. Statistics Canada reports that new housing supply is tilting away from single detached homes and toward denser formats such as townhouses and multi-unit projects (Statistics Canada, 2024). Layering retail, office and public space into those same footprints is a logical next step.
Why This Model Is Taking Hold
Mixed-use development has been around for decades, but what feels different now is the scale and intent. Several forces are pushing it forward in Ontario:
- Buyers want convenience. Younger professionals and families value being able to walk to daily needs rather than drive across town.
- Affordability pressures leave little room for waste. Stacking uses in one project makes more efficient use of scarce land.
- Municipalities are updating zoning rules to favour density and transit-oriented growth, often encouraging residential and commercial space to be planned together (Howard & Nightingale, 2025).
- From a financial perspective, mixed use spreads risk. A slow season in retail can be offset by steady demand for housing.
The result is that what might once have been a niche strategy is moving toward the mainstream.
What It Looks Like on the Ground
Ontario already offers examples worth noting. Pinnacle One Yonge in Toronto combines residential towers with office and retail space (Wikipedia). Friday Harbour in Innisfil reimagines the idea entirely, building a resort-style community that mixes housing, hospitality, shops and recreation around the waterfront (Wikipedia). And in Toronto’s South Core, Harbour Plaza Residences integrates towers with a retail podium that connects directly into the PATH system (Wikipedia).
What these projects share is not just density but an ambition to create environments that function as communities, not just real estate products.
Getting It Right Is Not Simple
For developers, success with mixed use depends on more than assembling the right components. It requires foresight. Infrastructure needs to be coordinated from the start, not patched together later. The proportions matter too: too much retail without the population to support it can drag a project down. And ground-level design makes or breaks how a development connects with the surrounding city.
AvranceCorp has taken these lessons seriously. In planning new communities, its focus has been on embedding connectivity, adaptability and a balance of uses from the outset rather than treating them as add-ons. The goal is to deliver projects that hold their value over time while meeting the daily needs of residents.
Why Cities and Investors Care
The appeal extends beyond individual buyers. Cities benefit when density is concentrated near transit and infrastructure is used more efficiently. Neighbourhoods that mix uses also feel more alive, reducing the “dead zones” that occur when offices empty out at night or retail strips sit dormant during the day.
Investors are watching too. A diversified revenue base is attractive in volatile markets, and reports such as PwC Canada’s Emerging Trends in Real Estate 2025 point to growing interest in projects that combine residential and commercial functions.
The Bigger Picture
Mixed-use development is not a passing trend in Ontario. It reflects how people want to live, how cities need to grow and how developers manage risk. At its best, it creates communities that are walkable, adaptable and resilient—places where people want to stay, not just sleep.
As affordability pressures and sustainability goals continue to shape the province’s future, the rise of mixed-use is less about fashion and more about common sense. It is a reminder that real estate is ultimately about building communities that endure.