A chunk of land near downtown Toronto will go from barren wasteland to gleaming village on the waterfront in just six years — but only if Toronto hosts the 2015 Pan Am Games.

The West Don Lands was officially announced Sunday as the planned home of the 32-hectare athletes village.

"If Toronto is chosen to host these games, this new neighbourhood will emerge faster and it will be a legacy of the Games," said Ontario Infrastructure Minister George Smitherman.

After the Pan American Games, the village would be turned into a mixed-income neighbourhood serviced by transit, Smitherman said.

The total cost of building the 2,100-unit village won't be known until closer to the start of the games. There will be a bill for developing the site no matter what happens as plans call for housing to be built there, Smitherman noted.

But he said the cost to the Games is estimated to "not exceed $100 million."

Some of that money would be used to build temporary facilities — like the athletes' eating areas — and retrofit the units with kitchens and a new paint job once the Games are completed.

Toronto is competing against Lima, Peru and Bogotá, Colombia for the right to host the 2015 Pan Am Games. The winning city will be selected in November.

While the construction of housing in the area isn't reliant on a successful bid, winning the games would help attract the focus of all three levels of government, ensuring things happen sooner than later, Smitherman said.

The 8,500-bed village will also feature sports and recreation facilities, including a 50-metre pool, a 400-metre track, as well as parkland and walking, running and cycling trails.

There will also be retail space, restaurants, a medical centre, banks and entertainment centres — "all something athletes look for when they arrive for a stay of about two weeks," said three-time Canadian Pan-Am gymnast and Olympian Kris Burley.

"It's got to be comfortable because you are there to compete, you are there to win," said Burley. "So you want easy access to banking, easy access to phones and the internet."

Bid chairman David Peterson said the village has to be the jewel of Toronto's proposal to host the Pan Am games committee because it is the one place all athletes will share.

"The village is what everyone will judge," said Peterson. "It's a celebration of youth, a celebration of sports culture and these buildings will be a very, very important part of that."

Games venues are slated to be in place around the Golden Horseshoe area of southern Ontario and Peterson said this makes the village's location ideal because of its proximity to transportation routes.