Rescaling Ambitions: Waterfront Governance and Toronto's 2015 Pan American Games

Toronto is a rare global city because negotiating public land ownership remains a defining feature of the city's urban politics. The awarding of the 2015 Pan American Games to Toronto is a prime occasion to witness how fragmented governance can limit the ambition and enthusiasm of a sporting mega‐event. Historically, Toronto has not been known for its ability to host large‐scale sporting events but it has recently used a series of failed Olympic bids and smaller sporting events to trigger piecemeal “legacy” development. In this article we argue that the awarding of the Pan American Games to Toronto was predicated on a process that removed local politics from the bidding process. Focusing on the development of the athletes’ village in the West Don Lands and incorporating a number of interviews with key stakeholders across Toronto, this research illustrates that the heavy involvement and investment of the Province of Ontario in the Pan American spectacle forces us to ask: Whose waterfront? Whose games?