Garage door repair, installation and openers in Woodbridge

A village on the Humber inside a city

The Crown granted the west halves of two Vaughan Township lots to Jacob Philips and Hugh Cameron in 1802. Rowland Burr bought 100 acres and the mill water rights in 1837 and the settlement took his name, Burwick, until 1855, when the post office found another Burwick in the province and the village became Woodbridge for its bridges over the Humber. It had a thousand residents and a village charter by 1882. The fair has run since 1847. In 1971 the village was amalgamated with the rest of Vaughan Township into the Town of Vaughan, so a Woodbridge building permit is a Vaughan building permit and the office is Vaughan's.

Woodbridge's core is one of the City of Vaughan's four Heritage Conservation Districts. Its district plan lists new or different doors among the work that needs a heritage permit, and exempts maintenance and repair of existing features and any alteration not visible from the street or another public space, so a street-facing garage door is the one to check. Ask Cultural Heritage staff before the order goes in.

Built outward, decade by decade

The 1950s brought spillover from Metropolitan Toronto, and the built-up area ran past the village boundary. In the early 1980s the centre filled in, and older stores in the village were turned into small housing. The late 1980s and early 1990s pushed west to Highway 27. Sonoma Heights went up at Islington and Rutherford, and Vellore Village and Vellore Woods grew around the old hamlet of Vellore. The 2010s carried building north of Major Mackenzie toward Purpleville, and it is still going in the 2020s.

Italians who had settled in Toronto's Little Italy moved out to Woodbridge in those decades. The house those years built is a detached two-car with the door facing the street, a wide double on a torsion shaft, and above it the opener the builder hung. On a 1988 street that opener is on its second or third replacement. On a 2016 street north of Major Mackenzie it is the original, and the first call is usually a remote that stopped pairing or a photo-eye kicked out of line. The openers page covers both.

Water and wind

Hurricane Hazel hit Woodbridge in October 1954. The Humber went from 20 metres wide at its narrowest to 107, nine people died and hundreds lost their homes; the river diversions the conservation authority built in 1962 are the reason the low streets by the water still exist. On 20 August 2009 an F2 tornado crossed Woodbridge, flipped cars and damaged dozens of houses, a school and businesses; more than 600 Vaughan homes were damaged that afternoon and more than 40 were uninhabitable.

The garage door is the largest opening in a house wall, and in a wind event it is the first thing to fail inward. A door bowed by wind is a replacement, because the panels do not go back. When you get a quote for a new door, ask for its wind-load rating and ask the installer to note it on the paperwork. Garaga, Amarr and Stanley all publish ratings by model, and the installer should be able to say which one fits a street that saw 2009.

What Protech does in Woodbridge

Residential doors and openers, supplied and installed. Installation where a 1980s door has rusted at the bottom rail. Garage door repair for a spring that went overnight, a cable off its drum, or a door that a car backed into. Commercial doors and openers for the shops and yards along Highway 7 and Highway 27.

Getting a van from Mississauga

Bonhill Road is off Dixie Road, and the van takes the 407 to Highway 27 and Highway 7 into Woodbridge, about 20 km by road. It is the nearest of the York Region pages to the branch. There is no Woodbridge premises. Repairs are booked same day, and the street matters: the village core, Sonoma Heights and the streets past Major Mackenzie are different trips.

Repair or replace, and what it costs

A 1990s double on Islington with one spring gone is a repair. A single steel door on a converted stable behind an 1880s house on Kipling Avenue, rusted through, is a replacement, and a heritage question first. Ask for the repair figure and the replacement figure together.

Garage doors in Woodbridge

Garage doors in Woodbridge divide at the edge of the heritage district. Inside it, the materials lists in section 6.2 of the 2009 district plan are plain about the door: single-bay, wood panelled garage doors are appropriate, and double-bay, slab or metal garage doors are not. A steel double on a street-facing garage in the old village is the very door the plan lists against.

Outside that boundary, in Sonoma Heights, Vellore Village and the streets north of Major Mackenzie, no district plan applies and the house decides: an insulated door where a bedroom sits over the garage, the panel and colour settled in the Build Your Door designer, and a Garaga, Amarr or Stanley model built to the opening that is already there.

Send the form

Use the contact form or email info@protechgarage.ca. Say the street and what the door is doing. For a new door with no rush, the Build Your Door designer lets you set the panel and colour before asking for a price.