Development along Dundas in Halton is thoroughly suburban with more than enough density to be a walkable neighbourhood. It's a patchwork right now with the quilt not expected to be finished until long after I've been silenced. Perhaps it will become a walkable neighbourhood? I don't care either way. Civic amenities and/ or commercial have grown in scale since my Toronto neighbourhood has been built and that has fundamentally change the design of community masterplans. There's not a half dozen community centres offering different programs in a neighbourhood. There's one central community centre offering all the programs with a catchment area beyond comfortably walkable. Same with schools. One large school that has tech, secondary school and collegiate institute programs all under one roof with a large drop off area. Retail is built around chain stores that ultimately settle on fewer stores with larger catchments and in compartmentalized commercial clusters. Developers will never build for boutique commercial opportunities or, in the GTA at least, will those boutique operations have the opportunity to buy a plot in a master plan and build something. The "high street" isn't dead. It's just artificial.

I fundamentally agree with this, and it's one of the downsides of walkable urbanism that usually gets glossed over.

If you want a "15 minute city", you have to accept a downgrade in the quality or diversity of amenities or services unless your area is hyper-dense - like, say, Manhattan or Hong Kong-levels of population density, where within a 15 minute walk, you can have the population of a midsize city that would support things people have come to think of as standard, like a community centre with an indoor pool. Same with retail. In an era of online shopping, high streets have to support themselves with entertainment and dining; you need a much larger catchment than most residential neighbourhoods that Canadians think of when they think of walkable neighbourhoods can support. Places like Ossington and Little Italy only support great restaurants because people like me come in and dine there, depriving my own neighbourhood of good dining options. They have to be destination neighbourhoods, and a city can only have a few of these. You can forget something like that spontaneously forming in northern Oakville around Highway 407 and Bronte Road. At least Oakville is ahead of other suburban cities in actually having a few walkable destination neighbourhoods like downtown and Bronte.

Not everywhere can be a destination and it would be good if more acknowledge that, but not sure density has to be all that high to support local amenities. Heavy emphasis on the local. I'd still consider somewhere like Oakwood Village in Toronto to be a relatively walkable urban area, but it really isn't attracting people from elsewhere. That should be more of an aspiration - not the next Ossington. You aren't going to do everything locally, but it should be an option for at least some things. Even businesses on Roncesvalles and the western portion of Parkdale are primarily patroned by local residents, though there are certainly exceptions (I know several business-owners in the area).

Of course there are a lot of economic reasons it's very difficult to recreate this model in suburban Oakville (or wherever). The best we can reasonably hope for is something more self-contained at the end of the day.

One thing that's always puzzled me about these new developments incorporating retail though is why there's almost never a bar/pub (even a chain Firkin) anywhere nearby aside from bigger restaurants in big-box areas. Older Ontario suburbia has lots of them and they seem much more common in Calgary suburbia. I can see why given the ethnic makeup of some suburbs but Oakville seems like an easy market. This is the only one I could find in Uptown Oakville: https://maps.app.goo.gl/fDPbD2ZnCywSRiTu9

To add in consideration of the hero/villain labels given to the small business / multi-national conglomerate relationship.

Small business merchandise has homogenized with chain stores. I find the majority buy and sell similar factory made goods from a catalog albeit at higher prices. The ones that still design are likely to have the merchandised manufactured overseas. Even fewer in Toronto design/build and sell under the same roof.

Densities tend to be overblown. Is a 1000 more units in a mediocre residential tower development with minimal commercial and zero community benefits really going to enhance a community?

A 1990s, 905 subdivision is extremely limited on multi-family housing options. Still, the residential densities can't be that different from a streetcar suburb in East End Toronto. A post 2000, 905 subidivision will have multi-family options increasing densities. With that said, Covid and increasing commercial property taxes has severely impacted neighbourhood high streets at least in this region of Toronto. I agree that small business that buys and sell without a design and manufacturing element is going to struggle and ulimately close in the post covid era. However, the post covid era is ideal for a boom in small design and manufacturing operations behind a retail store supplementing an online presence

If no major changes, this will be Hamilton's new tallest. Located right next to First Ontario Centre.

Some of it also comes down to what we mean by 15-minute cities. There's a difference between a nabe with so much of everything that there's no plausible reason to ever leave compared to one where you can access basic services like a grocery store (or perhaps just a well-stocked convince store), a park, and a cafe, etc. The latter isn't possible in many suburbs where there are huge subdivisions where nothing but residential is permitted and the path one needs to follow to get anywhere is multiple time father and more convoluted than the "crow flies" distance.

Obviously there's little point in living in a large metro area if you never leave the radius of a comfortable walking distance. But it's important that people not be forced to travel for every little thing. Having the choice to travel for something great or stay local for some perfunctory is... a great choice to have. People can choose what they prefer based on their personality, mood, and budget (in time and/or money). Unlike the conspiracy theories suggest, 15-minute cities just give the additional option of remaining local rather than removing the option of traveling further. But now there are many (generally suburban) nabes where people have to get in the car and travel well beyond a comfortable walking distance just to access the most basic and perfunctory services.

But of course not all 15 minute communities will turn out equally well.

Zoning in Toronto suburbia is an effect of development proposals preference of compartmentalized single use clusters. It's not the cause for the shape and design of subdivisions. The average residential subdivision was developed by one developer or a consortium of developers as part of a larger master plan that included the residential areas , the community areas and any community related spaces. Planning either accepted or rejected it. The 905 or the post war Toronto boroughs wouldn't look any different in a zoning based multi-verse.

All things considered, restrictive residential zoning has not stopped business activities, real or fake, to operate in these neighbourhoods. I feel technology and buying trends has created an opportunity for small business to take control over contained retail units. The major obstacle is start up costs. $15 billion would go a lot further here than $15 billion to accelerate housing starts in a commoditized housing market. There will be defaults. So too will there be in this housing strategy.

I rented my first place in 1995 and there was a fraction of rental housing availability as there is now. I was fortunate to have insider connections with advanced knowledge otherwise I would have ended up like so many other renters in death trap, cobbled together basements (apartments). Toronto doesn't have a shortage of available housing units compared to much of the 1980s and 1990s or the East Coast of Canada today.

It's not plausible that there would be no difference in a world where municipalities rejected zoning restrictions that prevent say, an individual from opening a corner store or cafe out of an addition on their house. Especially if they also rejected any plans for culs-de-sac enclaves where one has to drive long circuitous routes to get in and out. The barrier of entry is too for there to not be even a few entrepreneurial individuals taking the plunge. Whether or not developers want and push for something is irrelevant if their desires aren't granted.

Developers are responsible for the shape of our suburbs not municipal planning. There's no such situation in which a property owner in association with planning developed a subdivision plan and sold of the parcels to be developed by individual developers or homeowners I'm not going to repeat myself for my understanding behind the shape and form developers preferred for suburbia. One thing I will add is that I wouldn't want to build a mixed building over a single use one. It just complicates everything.

I guess in this multiverse there would have been situations with strict zoning to force streetfront retail but that wouldn't have lasted in the post war building boom just like today. Developers are winning unanimously in getting everything they want.

The Beach when I was growing up in Toronto had corner stores and even a cafe cobbled out of single family homes disperse throughout the various neighbourhoods. I can't think of a single one that hasn't been converted back to a single family home today. It's a pointless topic. No one is going to pay multi-millions to create a store off a main street.

This one was a block away from my high school
https://www.google.com/maps/@43.6839...6656?entry=ttu

today
https://www.google.com/maps/@43.6839...8192?entry=ttu


Also, There's a number of these around East Toronto in residential strips along main streets.

https://www.google.com/maps/@43.6795...8192?entry=ttu

It has been vacant for as long as I can remember. It had a full sized storefront window when I was in high school. **edit. There was actually a second one a few doors down to this when I was in high school.

In the hypothetical I'm not talking about planning rules "forcing" anything to happen. I'm just referring to the fact that they now often prevent many things. Yes developers have a lot of influence, but there are many examples where individual home owners have tried to open businesses and in some cases did so illegally and got shut down. The About Here channel even did a whole episode on the topic, and as a planning major it was discussed in detail including case studies in a good 50% or more of the classes. No one is saying that neighbourhoods don't change and evolve over time and that some areas lose certain features they once had. But the reverse can also happen too, in that areas can also gain such features if they aren't prohibited. This isn't anything new or controversial, but if you've made up your mind I'll leave you be. ;)

This looks very promising for for Victoria - approved.
--

The Roundhouse project in Vic West, which has been in the works for more than 15 years, will get a chance to deliver its promised 1,870 residential units and commercial space after Victoria council approved rezoning and amendments to the official community plan at a public hearing Thursday night.

While a number of councillors expressed misgivings with the proposal, noting it was far from perfect, council ultimately voted 7-2 in favour of third reading of the bylaw amendments.

The bylaws will be adopted at a later date, after concerns about the impact of the height of the development may have on the Inner Harbour airport have been addressed in consultation with Transport Canada.

Only councillors Stephen Hammond and Marg Gardiner voted against.

The approval means proponent Focus Equities will have the zoning it needs to move forward with a project that envisions nine buildings ranging in height from 10 to 32 storeys at 251 Esquimalt Rd., 210 Kimta Rd. and 355 Catherine St.

The project anticipates 1,870 residential units, including 215 units deemed affordable, 70,000 square feet of commercial space and the remediation and renovation of existing heritage buildings on the site.

https://www.vmcdn.ca/f/files/victori...bgcolor=000000
https://www.timescolonist.com/local-...roject-8165779

Love it. I'm happy to see a project this size get approved for a city like Victoria. Hopefully they can get started on it in the near future.

Garbage. But then Vic West is a crappy masterplanned bore. Inappropriate scale, dull architecture and suburban integration at grade.

At minimum, red brick warehouse style buildings inspired by what's going up in smaller UK/European cities.

This looks fairly close to downtown. Is it walkable?

It’s very walkable - the Songhees/Vic West neighbourhood is directly connected to downtown by the Johnson Street Bridge. It’s a popular walking neighbourhood - I used to cross the bridge and walk along the waterfront there during my lunch breaks. Also a very interesting neighbourhood with lots of unique sights and sites, I’ll share more tomorrow. Couple of my pics for now:

[IMG]https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/...4194192c_h.jpgJohnson Street Bridge - Sunday May 7, 2023. by JohnnyJayEh, on Flickr[/IMG]

[IMG]https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/...e5124061_h.jpgDowntown Victoria BC, October 3, 2023. 2:07 p.m. by JohnnyJayEh, on Flickr[/IMG]

I don't see any intent with a street bisected block plan for lack of a better description. No point to comment on boring oversized tower blocks. There's one too many towers proposed . One less tower would provide more spacing. The tallest, pointiest tower in the right hand side cluster removed with some tweaking to the placement of the others would fulfill the design intent better than the current plan

Yes, the towers are all thoughtfully placed except for the side by side one which then block the view for the tower in behind. Important to keep in mind that while the developers have built a couple of tower, this whole process has been going on for a couple of decades with countless revisions. I’d be shocked if this is the final iteration, it feels more like their way of locking in approval for the heights/density. I’m not even going to comment on the potential design as these are massing renderings, not design - but don’t expect all glass towers like you might see in Yaletown or the Toronto waterfront. As for a street grid, the pics below will probably show why that doesn’t make sense here.

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/...165f082d_h.jpgApple Maps - Songhees by JohnnyJayEh, on Flickr

The buildings in the middle on a rise are what has been built the past couple decade, to the left you can see most of the development site which is situated around a historic train roundhouse which will be restored and incorporated into the development. Also in the pic above on the top right side you can see the continued development of Dockside Green adjacent to the Point Hope Shipyard.

A pic of mine:

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/...95ce6067_b.jpgSonghees neighbourhood, Victoria BC. March 25, 2023 by JohnnyJayEh, on Flickr

Some additional sketches of the design concepts:

https://bayviewplace.com/wp-content/...une07_2022.jpg

https://cc-production-uploads-bucket...areMainWEB.jpg

From Bayviewplace.com

https://cc-production-uploads-bucket...et-viewweb.jpg

TOD proposal for the future Gerrard-Carlaw station (on the Ontario Line) in Toronto. Generally not a fan of these types of master planned high-rise "islands", but I think it works here. Probably just placeholder designs, but I'd be happy if it turned out something like this - heavy on the brick, rational forms, minimal balconies & spandrel:

https://cdn.skyrisecities.com/sites/...111-167277.jpg

https://cdn.skyrisecities.com/sites/...11-167270.jpeg

https://cdn.skyrisecities.com/sites/...11-167272.jpeg

https://cdn.skyrisecities.com/sites/...111-167275.jpg

https://urbantoronto.ca/news/2024/01...-station.55111

^having lived in the area in the past for a number of years I’d say that works fairly well. I just hope it replaces the amenities being removed. Tons of small businesses in the existing building