On the agenda Tuesday at Scarborough Community Council, the proposal would put up 1,370 units in eight buildings ranging from seven to 38 stories and expand the mall from 320,000 to 427,000 square feet.

Three decades old, Bridlewood, ringed by Warden Avenue, Finch Avenue and Bridletowne Circle, is surrounded by apartment towers of up to 23 storeys but is also a block away from streets of single-family homes.

A year ago, soon after he heard about the plan, Del Grande invited to a residents to a meeting. There, in spite of arguments from Malibu Investments Inc. representatives that the condos would be "a shot in the arm" for both the aging mall and neighbourhoods around it, most of the 400 ratepayers signalled they opposed any condos on the property.

This spring, after meetings with Del Grande and an ad hoc community group, the developer submitted a formal proposal Del Grande said was essentially the same, with density and buildings unreasonably high for the area.

"The community's very upset that they never listened one iota," he said this week, warning the city may have to oppose the plan at the Ontario Municipal Board.

Terry Lustig, a Malibu director, said the company will work with the community for a development everyone wants and one that will be good for everybody.

"We're seeing redevelopment of these types of parcels all over the city now," or at least development proposals for them, Lustig said this week.

Though Malibu believes its plan is reasonable as it is, "we know this process is a give and take," she said, adding since Bridlewood will be phased development, "it has to be good and it has to make good sense."

Ward 40 (Scarborough-Agincourt) Councillor Norm Kelly, who chairs the Scarborough Community Council, said the city expects to house a million more people in the next quarter-century and those who live along arterial roads and commercial nodes such as Bridlewood can expect developers will propose intensive housing there.

"To oppose that by saying, 'I don't want any of this' is to misunderstand the direction the city is going."

The trick, Kelly said this week, is to make sure those developments don't overload neighbourhoods with added traffic and demands for services.

But Del Grande, who has asked for a study to guide future development over a large part of Scarborough, said the Bridlewood proposal is on a scale the city hadn't expected.