Here Are All The Crazy Cars That Showed Up At Toronto’s Astonishing Rooftop Car Meet

While summer might be over, we still have a few months of fun car weather left, and across the northern hemisphere, that means there’s still a ton of fun to be had. Owing to its geography, Toronto has a fairly short car season, but the city makes the most of it. The Vaulture is T.Dot’s chill, often-rooftop kickback for lovers of ’80s and ’90s European cars, and it’s a meet that deserves to be on your list.

When The Vaulture rolls into Yorkville, it does things a little bit differently from most meets. You have to register for free online if you want a shot at being selected to park your car on the rooftop of the Cumberland Parkade, but the lower levels are open to anyone willing to pay the $10 parking garage fee. Just want to spectate? Hop the subway, grab a bike, or take a walk and bring your camera, because these events that usually happen on the first Sunday of May through September are free to take in the sights of.

Last weekend, eBay invited us out to The Vaulture for the reveal of the Speed Academy x Karl Conrad manual-swapped M Sport 535xi Touring. With Apex ML-10RT forged wheels, Fortune Auto coilovers and rear lowering links, an upgraded intercooler, charge pipe, and MHD flash, and an Apple CarPlay retrofit, it’s pretty much the perfect daily driver, provided you’re willing to take on an N54.

What do you park next to a tastefully modified E61? How about an Alpina B10 3.5? This 254-horsepower big six-powered E34 5 Series isn’t just a great example of the fast road philosophy, but was also specced with the standard manual gearbox. Also, check out that Mercedes-Benz 300 SEL 6.3, the ur-super sedan. By squeezing the big M100 V8 from the 600 into an S-Class, Mercedes-Benz created a monster.

Taking in the early arrivals to The Vaulture, this immediately stood out. I’m a huge fan of greens on Porsche 911s, and the original owner of this 964 was in the same boat. Not only does the Wimbledon Green paint look great, whoever specced this ROW-spec example took things to the extreme.

Whoa! Alright, so it’s a Tiptronic car, but beyond the all-wood automatic gear selector and wooden handbrake knob with matching veneered button, just about everything inside this 964 is covered in green leather or green carpet. Yes, even the car phone holster. It’s the right sort of brashness, extroversion that encompasses the sweet life of enjoying a sports car.

Speaking of rarities, you don’t see a VIP-style Toyota Century every day. While the five-liter 1GZ-FE V12 cars have only been eligible for U.S. import for a handful of years, Canada’s 15-year rule means these JDM flagships have been coming to the Great White North for enough time for people to really personalize them. Work Emitz wheels just look so perfect here, and all the little touches like the subtle front lip and rear mast really give this build an edge.

How’s this for a two-car solution? Well-kept Range Rover Classic, perfect track-prepared E30 M3 with a cage and all that, both done up under the watch of restrained, tasteful eyes. White letters out on the Range Rover, proper livery with some serious thought to it and absolutely period-correct alloys on the M3.

Then again, if the S14 four-cylinder engine that comes stock in an E30 M3 doesn’t quite do it for you, why not put the 333-horsepower 3.2-liter S54 straight-six from an E46 M3 in a regular E30? That’s what this one’s rocking, with a chopped hood to really showcase the swap.

While we’re on the subject of bonkers things, here’s one of a mere handful of TVR Griffiths officially sold in Canada as new vehicles. That’s right, beyond the side markers, it also received metric instruments and is left-hand-drive. Land Rover V8 under the hood, drive to the back, and positively petite dimensions. I could go on for ages about the dainty door handles, the bonkers targa-cabrio roof with a hard roof panel and a folding rear section, and how the entire V8 sits behind the front axle, but I’ll sum it up this way: Even though this example seemed to be experiencing some gearbox problems, I still want one badly.

Oh, and how cute is this Fiat 600? All quaint in its robin’s egg blue, this little four-cylinder city car was Italy’s answer to the Renault 4CV. It somehow fits right in with the vibe of The Vaulture, not to mention the haute couture location of Yorkville.

And here we see two very different takes on a coupe from two different countries, strategically placed by The Vaulture. The Mercedes-Benz 250 C was a restrained bank vault of a car, but it almost seemed staid in comparison with the menace of an all-black Mercury Cougar with dog dish hubcaps. There really aren’t any wrong answers here on which one to pick for the fantasy garage, but the most correct answer is one of each.

I’m a sucker for a Volkswagen Cabriolet, and this root beer brown VR6-swapped, Jetta-clipped Mk3 example is right on the money. It’s a full-on shaved bay show car, dressed to the nines including bright hood struts, and is a stellar example of what the Volkswagen scene used to be, and if you look hard enough, still is.

Likewise, check out this Mk2 Jetta. Clear tail lights are already great, but add a clear Heckblende to the mix and things get wild. It’s just a super clean build, from the subtle kit to the flares to the great paintwork, one that reminds me of why I fell in love with the German car scene in the first place.

Oh, and now here’s another rarity, a C5 Audi RS6 Avant. With a twin-turbocharged 4.2-liter V8 under the hood, expect zero-to-60 mph in around four-and-a-half seconds, all with the confidence of a Torsen center diff. While U.S. residents will have to wait another two years to start importing them, Canada’s 15-year import law means these beauties are all-clear up here.

The Acura NSX has always been a hero car, one that rewrote the supercar rulebook by proving that you could have an incredibly exotic mid-engined car and still use it every day. I’d like to think it forced Ferrari’s hand on the 1994 model year updates to the 348, but regardless, the path to the modern liveable supercar all started here.

Oh, and who doesn’t love a Diablo? It’s wild to think that this is technically a Chrysler product, but the lay of the land around the turn of the ’90s was weird. Lotus had heavy General Motors investment, Jaguar was owned by Ford, you know the deal.

If there’s one rule to abide by with car meets in multi-story parking complexes, it’s to always check the lower levels. You never know what’s hiding out of the sun, such as a marvellous Peugeot 106, or an intriguingly restomodded Alfa Romeo GTV-6, or an orange E60 M5, or a yellow Volkswagen Corrado, or a drift taxi Lexus GS, or a Saab 9-3 on BBS RKs with massive brake calipers.

So, if you find yourself in Toronto on the first Sunday of a warm month and don’t have anything on your schedule, drop by The Vaulture. It’s a chill, restrained, mature event with a great mix of cars. You can find the meet series on Instagram here.

Top graphic image: Thomas Hundal

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