[Roquentin]

Well, it's nice to know a little more about this, at least. So according to the article, Baydo will be building both towers at the same time, but only finishing the interior of one of them right away (and waiting for the first tower to fill with renters before finishing the second one). I haven't heard of this approach before in a residential context. Is it common? It reminds me of how hospitals are sometimes overbuilt so that they have extra space to grow into over time. Anyway, it seems like a neat way to stagger the construction, and I'm sure the logistics of that decision are quite interesting. With any luck the first tower will rent quickly, and the second tower will be completed without much delay.

Also, I thought that this sentence in the StarPhoenix article was funny: "The property is already zoned for apartments, meaning Baydo can avoid a potentially-contentious public consultation and rezoning process." Are public consultations only required when land is rezoned? Hmm.

Anyway, it looks like they're building this as densely as they can. It would be nice to see renderings from other angles. The separation between the two towers looks like the minimum that's required (10m?). I'm not sure I'd want one of the apartments facing the adjacent tower. The podium is pretty bleak (I assume it's mostly a parkade), but there aren't many apartments in the city with podiums like this, so maybe the zoning bylaws are pretty lax? 11000 sq. ft. of commercial space is decent, and the staggered heights of the podium and retail block looks like a decent way to address 25th Street.

All in all, this is pretty rough, but there are some fine silver linings too. Saskatoon doesn't get projects like this very often, and this part of the core only stands to gain from the increased density. Anyway, it's nice to finally know a little more about this.