Ontario's fire marshal office says it cannot determine the cause of a Feb. 20 fire on Queen St. West that destroyed several heritage buildings, leaving both people and businesses homeless
"The investigative protocols require the credible consideration and elimination of all potential ignition sources," said Chris Williams, the OFM's fire investigations manager, in a news release issued Tuesday.
"Unfortunately, the extent of the damage prevented us from identifying the cause and the fire has been classified as undetermined."
He told ctvtoronto.ca that "undetermined" means they can't say either way whether a particular fire was caused deliberately or by an accident.
"It means there are competing hypotheses," Williams said.
"There wasn't sufficient evidence to make a determination that it was incendiary. There wasn't sufficient evidence to make a determination that it was accidental."
The investigation did determine the blaze originated on the main floor of 615 and 617 Queen St. W. Firefighters were called to the scene shortly before 5 a.m.
The fire marshal's office had dedicated a 10-person team to investigate the fire. The rare six-alarm blaze had more than 150 firefighters and 56 fire trucks respond at one point.
For Michael Cranwell, general manager of Duke's Cycle, the news came as something of a disappointment.
"You still want to know what happened and why," he told ctvtoronto.ca.
Daniel Hanna -- who managed Suspect Video, one of the destroyed businesses -- Tuesday's announcement confirmed what he long suspected.
"That had sort of been my assumption for a while," he told ctvtoronto.ca with a laugh. "If an explanation wasn't forthcoming within a couple months, that usually means there will be no news."
If they had found a particular individual, that would have been nice to know, but Hanna said he believes it's likely some simple cause such as a cigarette or space heater.
"No meth lab, no 'evil developers,'" he said.
Rebuilding
Duke's Cycle has been in business since 1914. It owned the building at 625 Queen St. W.
Cranwell said they hope to rebuild on the original location, but for the past 10 months, they've been trying to keep running the business.
The prime time for selling bicycles in Toronto starts in March and goes into early June, he said. "You have four months to make money in this business, and we lost three of them."
Rather than selling bicycles, Duke's instead had to struggle to relocate and reopen, he said.
The current location is at 452 Richmond St. West,
"Hopefully within a year, maybe two years, we'll be back on the old site with a brand-new building."
Hanna rented Suspect's space at 619 Queen St. W., and he had been prepared to move from that old location once the lease expired.
A greater loss was the store's collection of esoteric, one-of-a-kind videos that were virtually irreplaceable.
Hanna has opened a new business -- Eyesore Cinema, located above the Rotate This! record store at 801 Queen St. W., a few blocks west of the fire site.
"We're just starting over," he said, adding, "It would be impossible to duplicate (Suspect), but that's not my intention. Starting fresh gives me an opportunity to retool the methodologies. I'm shooting for an even more specialized selection that gives me an opportunity to not replace things."
