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-   -   MC² | 31fl, 24fl | 86.9M, 71.6M | Completed (https://skyscraperpage.com/forum/showthread.php?t=193944)

jlousa Sep 17, 2011 7:36 AM

MC² | 31fl, 24fl | 86.9M, 71.6M | Completed
 
Developer: Intracorp
Architect: JKMC

James KM Cheng Architects has applied to the City of Vancouver to rezone this site from C-1 (Commercial) and RT-1 (Two-Family Dwelling) to a CD-1 (Comprehensive Development) District. The purpose of the rezoning is to permit a mixed-use development comprising 446 residential units, 59 rental units, 14 "choice of use" units (residential or commercial), and 10,000 sq. ft. of retail/commercial space. The application proposes a 285-ft., 31-storey tower and a 235-ft., 24-storey tower. Both towers would be set above one-storey, two-storey, and four-storey, ground-oriented podium buildings containing live-work units and townhouses. Ground-level commercial use is located at the corner of Cambie Street and Marine Drive. The floor space ratio (FSR) proposed is 5.1 FSR for the southern portion, and 4.4 FSR for the northern portion.

Project Stats
http://vancouver.ca/commsvcs/plannin...nts/stats2.pdf

Context Plan
http://vancouver.ca/commsvcs/plannin...s/context2.pdf

Floor Plans
http://vancouver.ca/commsvcs/plannin...loorplans2.pdf

Floor Plates
http://vancouver.ca/commsvcs/plannin...oorplates2.pdf

Cross Section/Building Elevations
http://vancouver.ca/commsvcs/plannin...rosseleva2.pdf

Landscape Drawings
http://vancouver.ca/commsvcs/plannin...landscape2.pdf

Shadow Analysis
http://vancouver.ca/commsvcs/plannin...s/shadows2.pdf

The project has changed a bit since the original proposal, the tallest tower has lost 15ft. The shorter tower has increased 29ft and the project is now 2 Phases instead of going all ahead at once. Density and number of units have been cut back a bit. The units in these towers are pretty small.

The original proposal was as follows
Quote:

James KM Cheng Architects has applied to the City of Vancouver to rezone this site from C-1 (Commercial) and RT-1 (Two-Family Dwelling) to a CD-1 (Comprehensive Development) District. The purpose of the rezoning is to allow a mixed-use development comprising of a 300 ft., 31-storey tower and a 206 ft., 21-storey tower both set above a 4 storey podium containing live-work units and townhouses. Ground level commercial use is located at the corner of Cambie Street and Marine Drive. The maximum floor space ratio (FSR) proposed is 5.7 FSR, and the maximum height of the project is 91.4 metres (300 ft.). A total of 587 units are proposed for this project.

hollywoodnorth Sep 17, 2011 8:18 AM

are those 'faux' water towers (nyc style) on the top of the rental components (north ends)? sure looks that way on the Cross Section/Building Elevations ...... anyone else see that?

I like the "choice of use" units as full on retail there would not work ... here you will get a mix of a few offices in with the rest of the 'townhomes'

squeezied Sep 17, 2011 8:51 AM

444 SF units? Clearly they aren't marketing this to the Chinese!

Anyway I'm not too thrilled about these towers. It just screams out cheap. The floor plates of the two towers are just replicas of each other and they're symmetrical about the north-south axis. There's no interesting design about then, just cookie cutter. I guess it may be unfair to judge the design based solely on the floor plates, but then again the architect is James Cheng. In light of all this, the flip side of the coin is affordability, hopefully. A 444 SF unit is definitely going to lose some market value.

Frankly given the convenient access to Richmond, I would think they could market this to asians who seem to prefer (or are able to afford) nicer and larger units.

Owell, my main gripe is the repetitive design of the towers. Hopefully the city will demand some changes to the design, but given how Marine Gateway as turned out, I'm not counting on that.

BodomReaper Sep 17, 2011 8:36 PM

0_0 I never thought I'd see a tower where the largest unit is 816 sq. ft including the penthouses. Interesting approach. Does anyone know how these sizes compare with Marine Gateway's units?

Locked In Sep 18, 2011 5:52 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by hollywoodnorth (Post 5414004)
are those 'faux' water towers (nyc style) on the top of the rental components (north ends)? sure looks that way on the Cross Section/Building Elevations ...... anyone else see that?

The landscaping PDF jlousa linked to above has a photo of some NY water towers (with the ESB in the background for good measure), and lists "rain barrels" as being part of the Urban Agriculture component. Will be interesting to see how that turns out...

Here's the project's website: http://cambieandmarineproject.ca/intracorp/

s211 Sep 18, 2011 2:31 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BodomReaper (Post 5414382)
0_0 I never thought I'd see a tower where the largest unit is 816 sq. ft including the penthouses.

Maybe in a rental project... nonetheless, insta-ghetto.

jsbertram Sep 18, 2011 6:01 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BodomReaper (Post 5414382)
0_0 I never thought I'd see a tower where the largest unit is 816 sq. ft including the penthouses. Interesting approach. Does anyone know how these sizes compare with Marine Gateway's units?

I was amused to see the top floors are called "Executive Level" in the PDFs, not "Penthouse Level".

Perhaps a unit that is less than 1000 sq.ft. doesn't deserve to be called a Penthouse.

I noticed that the "Executive Level" drawings don't actually show the unit layout, so I wonder how many of these units will be bought as pairs to be joined together.

Millennium2002 Oct 9, 2011 11:32 PM

One would hope that the adjustments that occurred at Opsal will apply to many other developments across Vancouver like Marine Gateway and this development.

whatnext Oct 10, 2011 5:06 PM

An already bad intersection is going to be overloaded by these developments. In addition, the Canada Line construction made a complete mess of Cambie south of SW Marine. The sidewalks there are totally inadequate in width for the amount of people coming off the train and many just wander off into the road, which will be deadly once the area's developed.

jsbertram Oct 10, 2011 5:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by whatnext (Post 5439554)
An already bad intersection is going to be overloaded by these developments. In addition, the Canada Line construction made a complete mess of Cambie south of SW Marine. The sidewalks there are totally inadequate in width for the amount of people coming off the train and many just wander off into the road, which will be deadly once the area's developed.

I've noticed that too. I suspect the City expects the redevelopment next door will become the main connection between the Cambie/Marine Dr intersection and the entrances to the C-Line station. From the renderings I've seen the new plaza will connect directly to the mezzanine of the C-Line station.

jlousa Mar 1, 2012 5:28 AM

We shouldn't be surprised to see this one be reworked now that Marine Gateway has been approved. Looks like height has stayed the same but it's bulked up a bit as the FSR has increased by quite a bit.

Quote:

James KM Cheng Architects has submitted a further revised application to the City of Vancouver to rezone 8018-8150 Cambie Street from C-1 (Commercial) and RT-1 (Two-Family Dwelling) Districts to CD-1 (Comprehensive Development) District. The proposal is for a mixed-use development comprised of:

- a 31-storey tower (285 ft.) and a 24-storey tower (235 ft.), set above a 7- and a 5-storey, ground-oriented podium buildings containing live-work units, artist's studios;
- ground-level commercial uses located at the corner of Cambie Street and Marine Drive, with a second commercial space at 64th Avenue;
- a proposed total floor space ratio (FSR) of 5.80 - 5.21 (south) and 6.23 (north); and
- a total of 551 units, including 441 strata units, 96 market rental units, 14 market rental "choice of use"/live-work units, and 9,494 sq. ft. (882 m²) of retail/commercial space.
Project Stats
http://vancouver.ca/commsvcs/plannin...ojectstats.pdf

Context Plan
http://vancouver.ca/commsvcs/plannin...ts/context.pdf

Parking Plan
http://vancouver.ca/commsvcs/plannin...ts/parking.pdf

Floor Plans G-3
http://vancouver.ca/commsvcs/plannin...floorplans.pdf

Floor Plans 4-R
http://vancouver.ca/commsvcs/plannin...plans2_000.pdf

Building Section Drawings
http://vancouver.ca/commsvcs/plannin...ctions_000.pdf

Building Elevation Drawings
http://vancouver.ca/commsvcs/plannin...ents/elevs.pdf

dleung Mar 1, 2012 7:57 AM

Bigger podium, still virtually non-existant retail. The first 3 words from your quote already made me not want to see the renders.

Millennium2002 Mar 1, 2012 9:06 AM

Well one thing about the retail... unless it's something big, they're probably thinking that the guideway will prevent people from seeing into the smaller shops, hence why they left it out. I agree though that they'll probably miss out on building something for the community many years down when the path to the north gets busier.

SpongeG Mar 1, 2012 11:01 PM

well it fits with the area now - most of the north side of marine drive is residential with south side being retail/commercial

wrenegade Jun 6, 2012 11:14 PM

At urban design panel right now, second reading.

This one was approved uninanimously. Comments from the panel mainly revolved around the ground plain and interaction with the guideway. Most were very supportive, although some mentioned that it could be too linear and repetitive, and that the tower entrances were not pronounced enough. The lane/mews is designed to work with concord's future development next door and as the main visitor drop off and live/work loading area. As for the overall design of the building, the architect mentioned that he specifically designed the building to be unremarkable (as if he could any different! Lol) and that Marine Gateway tower(s) are designed to be the "alpha male" towers so to speak. Unfortunately their design was numbed down so much that there isn't much remarkable that remains. The panel referred to the building and high quality, understated and restrained, but I feel the whole area may turn out to be a whole lot of blah.

Edit: still going here...panel is suggesting that work should be done with sustainability with regards the heat loss and treatment of vertical fins and overhangs. It also suggested that the applicant works on improving the feel of the project with regards to incorporating more of the feel of Marpole, whatever that may be (seems pretty ambiguous to me).

Cypherus Jun 7, 2012 2:49 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by wrenegade (Post 5725373)
At urban design panel right now, second reading.

This one was approved uninanimously. Comments from the panel mainly revolved around the ground plain and interaction with the guideway. Most were very supportive, although some mentioned that it could be too linear and repetitive, and that the tower entrances were not pronounced enough. The lane/mews is designed to work with concord's future development next door and as the main visitor drop off and live/work loading area. As for the overall design of the building, the architect mentioned that he specifically designed the building to be unremarkable (as if he could any different! Lol) and that Marine Gateway tower(s) are designed to be the "alpha male" towers so to speak. Unfortunately their design was numbed down so much that there isn't much remarkable that remains. The panel referred to the building and high quality, understated and restrained, but I feel the whole area may turn out to be a whole lot of blah.

Edit: still going here...panel is suggesting that work should be done with sustainability with regards the heat loss and treatment of vertical fins and overhangs. It also suggested that the applicant works on improving the feel of the project with regards to incorporating more of the feel of Marpole, whatever that may be (seems pretty ambiguous to me).

So apparently the tower had to be designed to be unremarkable? Generally if you want an unremarkable product, you need to lack effort, insight, and vision. That's all it is. I wonder if the internal workmanship and finishings will be designed to look like amateur-hour too?

wrenegade Jun 7, 2012 3:05 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cypherus (Post 5725613)
So apparently the tower had to be designed to be unremarkable? Generally if you want an unremarkable product, you need to lack effort, insight, and vision. That's all it is. I wonder if the internal workmanship and finishings will be designed to look like amateur-hour too?

His words were understated and restrained, I see it as unremarkable.

squeezied Jun 7, 2012 4:09 AM

^an excuse to cheap out on design... sigh....

jlousa Jun 7, 2012 5:42 AM

Here's the current proposal as it's been submitted to the DPB. This project was never going to be special, look at the size of the units, I feel the city is dropping the ball by allowing units of this size outside the core.

Notification Letter
http://vancouver.ca/commsvcs/develop...ie/notiltr.pdf

Site Plan
http://vancouver.ca/commsvcs/develop...bie/sitepl.pdf

Design Rationale
http://vancouver.ca/commsvcs/develop.../designrat.pdf

North Tower / N+S Elevation
http://vancouver.ca/commsvcs/develop...towernsele.pdf

South Tower / N+S Elevation
http://vancouver.ca/commsvcs/develop...towernsele.pdf

East Elevation
http://vancouver.ca/commsvcs/develop...ambie/eele.pdf

West Elevation
http://vancouver.ca/commsvcs/develop...ambie/wele.pdf

Landscape Base Plan
http://vancouver.ca/commsvcs/develop...capebasepl.pdf

Landscape Green Roof
http://vancouver.ca/commsvcs/develop...egreenroof.pdf

Darren Tate Jun 7, 2012 6:52 AM

If this building is being marketed to foreign investors—like Marine Gateway and Granville at 70th—then the small size of the units shouldn't matter since these people won't actually be living in them anyway. Are these buildings not designed to maximize profits above all else? What's the incentive to increase square footage and have less units to sell? Surely someone stands to make a huge amount of money from this project. These aren't homes, they're investment properties—to be scooped up by wealthy foreigners in huge blocks and rented out or left vacant. Isn't that how it works with buildings like these? Isn't that what happened with Marine Gateway and Granville at 70th? Should we not expect the same thing here?

Built Form Jun 10, 2012 9:25 AM

Working models.

http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f5...1/P1070174.jpg

http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f5...1/P1070173.jpg

http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f5...1/P1070179.jpg

http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f5...1/P1070180.jpg

http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f5...1/P1070178.jpg

http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f5...1/P1070176.jpg
all pix by Built Form

BodomReaper Jun 10, 2012 10:22 PM

Yikes, James Cheng wasn't joking when he said the buildings would be intentionally "unremarkable". It looks like he went out of his way to make them as boring and insipid as possible.

AverageJoe Jun 10, 2012 11:56 PM

Wow. Welcome to Scarborough.

easy as pie Jun 11, 2012 2:21 AM

decent laneway treatment, very nice plaza and commercial treament on the marine and cambie corner, terrible work along cambie where there ought to have been a commercial wall. this artist space trend in vancouver belongs on a late night comedy show, like who does anyone think they're fooling with this? just ticking a box. hopefully some of the councilors look really carefully at this one and decide that they don't want a bunch of dead plazas and joke planning department quarter-measures and instead actually want to build a neighborhood. personally, in this hood, destined to be low-income types and atomized newbies, the design quality, unit size, etc doesn't bother me nearly as much as does the poor urbanism.

hollywoodnorth Sep 1, 2012 12:16 PM

website and name for the project are up

http://intracorp.ca/mc2living/

AdrianT Sep 4, 2012 7:03 PM

Here's a render of it:
http://image.exct.net/lib/fef11c7273...MC2_eblast.jpg
http://image.exct.net/lib/fef11c7273...MC2_eblast.jpg

phesto Sep 4, 2012 7:28 PM

^It hurts to look at, but thanks for posting.

dleung Sep 5, 2012 12:06 AM

e = exploitation of Vancouver udp's inertia
e = extra - extra - ordinary

djh Sep 5, 2012 1:46 AM

Is there some logic to the naming that I'm missing? I mean, yes you have to "brand" your projects so people don't just call it "the condo building next to the Starbucks" or whatever. But who in their right mind is ever going to say "Meet me at Em Cee Squared"?!? It doesn't roll off any tongue, it is not referencing anything in the neighbourhood, it has no element that looks remotely nuclear or physics-related, and therefore the name will probably be slightly embarrassing to say, and thus be quickly forgotten.

Ironically, because the given name is so bad, most people *will* end up saying "Meet me in front of that condo building next to the Starbucks"

dreambrother808 Sep 5, 2012 2:34 AM

M = Marine

C = Cambie

djh Sep 5, 2012 6:27 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by dreambrother808 (Post 5820373)
M = Marine

C = Cambie

Understood. But trying to tie the letters of the cross-streets to an equation...and what about the "squared"? And what about the unspoken "E"? It's too forced. Once the ad campaign is out of the papers, nobody will connect the dots.

Metro-One Sep 5, 2012 6:31 AM

who cares? In all honesty it will probably just become known as the MC complex or the MC towers.

djh Sep 5, 2012 6:42 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Metro-One (Post 5820590)
who cares? In all honesty it will probably just become known as the MC complex or the MC towers.

That's my point - who cares with all these fancy names that relate to some esoteric concept unrelated to the building? As I said, it'll just be called something bland.

Klazu Sep 13, 2012 3:52 AM

Ugh, already Marine Gateway is pretty bulky, but these two are horrible. I am all pro for any new towers, but they should try at least a bit with these... This is extraordinarily ugly complex, if anything with extra. :yuck:

osirisboy Sep 13, 2012 3:43 PM

again they just look like any typical tower you find getting built now especially in poco etc

idunno Sep 13, 2012 4:31 PM

No I think they are worse. The top 4-5 floors/roof box are horrible.

Klazu Oct 16, 2012 4:13 AM

They had some event at the show room this morning. Didn't see any people at 8:30am when I drove by, but lots of tents and staff preparing for something. Some pre-showing, perhaps?

jlousa Oct 16, 2012 4:36 AM

Real estate agent event, it was quite well attended, they were ~1000 agents there this morning. Sales open at the end of the month and they are hoping to match the one day sell out across the street. They'll have their work cut out for themselves but if anyone can do it it'll be Rennie.

whatnext Oct 16, 2012 5:02 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jlousa (Post 5868117)
Real estate agent event, it was quite well attended, they were ~1000 agents there this morning. Sales open at the end of the month and they are hoping to match the one day sell out across the street. They'll have their work cut out for themselves but if anyone can do it it'll be Rennie.

Well, its not like realtors have much else to do right now. :haha:

The SFH open houses I've been to lately are dead.

Homeowner Oct 16, 2012 11:57 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jlousa (Post 5868117)
Real estate agent event, it was quite well attended, they were ~1000 agents there this morning. Sales open at the end of the month and they are hoping to match the one day sell out across the street. They'll have their work cut out for themselves but if anyone can do it it'll be Rennie.

It will be interesting to see if buyers step up and buy presales in this market.

djh Oct 17, 2012 12:53 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jlousa (Post 5868117)
Real estate agent event, it was quite well attended, they were ~1000 agents there this morning. Sales open at the end of the month and they are hoping to match the one day sell out across the street. They'll have their work cut out for themselves but if anyone can do it it'll be Rennie.

A *thousand* realtors? Are you sure you didn't mean a hundred agents?

Klazu Oct 17, 2012 1:02 AM

I was thinking the same. They looked well-prepared for a crowd, but perhaps not for one thousand people. :sly:

jlousa Oct 17, 2012 3:44 AM

They were prepared for 1500 realtors to attend and there were about 1000 that did attend.

WarrenC12 Oct 17, 2012 3:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jlousa (Post 5869286)
They were prepared for 1500 realtors to attend and there were about 1000 that did attend.

So what, about 3 realtors per suite? :shrug:

jlousa Oct 17, 2012 3:28 PM

They weren't selling, that's at the end of the month. It was a realtor event, gauging the interest it appears that sales will be pretty strong on opening day.

TwoFace Oct 17, 2012 6:31 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jlousa (Post 5869286)
They were prepared for 1500 realtors to attend and there were about 1000 that did attend.

Wow, the market must be slow or they had a great buffet.

Homeowner Oct 18, 2012 5:25 AM

Wonder if there will be a limit of 1 unit per buyer.

Jimbo604 Oct 20, 2012 6:28 PM

Sales start next Saturday, Oct 27th.

http://intracorp.ca/mc2living/

WarrenC12 Oct 25, 2012 10:42 PM

Conspiracy much?

I'd agree sales have slowed down and developers are doing different things to get pre-sales to move (reducing prices, offering interest on deposits, etc).

However the bank financing for projects like this are based on the presale contracts that are signed. If you are suggesting MC2 is engaging in fraud to obtain financing, that's a big accusation.

jlousa Oct 26, 2012 3:07 AM

Removed slanderous post. That type of behaviour is not welcome here.

Sales launch on Sat and it is expected to sell out, I'll keep everyone posted.:tup:


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