After the failed Bay of Pigs Invasion of 1961, mounting fears of the city of Toronto falling under attack were at an all-time high.
By January of the next year, the city had a fully operational secret
bunker built more than 50 kilometers away in northern Aurora, its
whereabouts known only to a select few.
The Metropolitan Toronto Emergency Preparedness Center was meant to
be a site where city officials would meet to plan the next steps in the
event of an attack. But decades passed and the center was never put to
the test.
The farmhouse was at times used as an office space, often with a
single employee working in solitude. It later served as a training
facility for the Toronto Police Service.
The city decided in 1992 it could no longer justify the high costs of
maintaining the site. It put the property up for sale and, while offers
flooded in, it was four years until the city approved an offer.
Under this Aurora home lies a historic bunker from the Cold War era.
An expansive shelter fortified by concrete and steel.
Immediately noticeable were the three towering boards at the end of the
room displaying intricately hand-drawn maps of the GTA and southern
Ontario.
Military bases like Camp Borden in Simcoe County were clearly marked.
And lists ready to be filled with the numbers of casualties and
radiation levels in different sites lined the walls of the room,
conjuring haunting images of wartime.
Heritage site
The Town of Aurora has afforded some protection to the house,
registering it as a site of cultural and historical significance, but
the town's Director of Planning and Development Marco Ramunno says that
designation doesn't involve maintaining the property.
"Because it's on a register, if an owner wanted to demolish it or
change the structure significantly, they would need to approach the town
and submit a heritage permit," Ramunno said. He added that the town
would likely intervene if there were any plans to destroy the bunker.
