Canadian Skyline Thread III

[kool maudit]

There was also a huge and possibly excessive degree of love and admiration for the cities that gave us the early skyscrapers, as well as their general aesthetic. So you might see a thread titled "what are the greatest cities in the world?" and like Detroit, Pittsburgh and Baltimore would be in a lot of people's top five.

Montreal, speaking to the point above, actually had an enormous amount of forum cred for resembling/being one of these cities.

[giallo]

Originally Posted by kool maudit

At its best, the 21st century urban boom in North America created some livable central spaces in former dead zones. It did not create anything glorious. In Canada, Griffintown is probably the best, which is due mostly to its legacy streetplan and fabric. Liberty Village is OK. CityPlace is not great.

I haven't been to Griffintown, but it looks like the city planners created something significant out of nothing.

I wouldn't ignore Olympic Village in Vancouver either. It was basically a polluted industrial site up until 2003, and now it's a vibrant, walkable neighbourhood, blending into the rest of the city's urban fabric. It's still a work in progress, with the southern portion seeing new developments.

It's taken a few years to come into its own, but I find myself going there for a drink or a stroll quite often.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by kool maudit

I think it is fair to ask, having built so much, why so little of it is of any aesthetic value?

As someone who's currently trying to make the math work on building a ~10 story tower in my hometown's downtown, the answer you're looking for is "costs". The costs of regulations, etc. as well.

At first sight, the only way I'd be able to build nice architecture would be a greenfield development of luxury SFHs. For that, sure, no problem. The buyers will be there.

But for rental housing, sorry, no way.

[MonkeyRonin]

Originally Posted by giallo

I haven't been to Griffintown, but it looks like the city planners created something significant out of nothing.

I wouldn't ignore Olympic Village in Vancouver either. It was basically a polluted industrial site up until 2003, and now it's a vibrant, walkable neighbourhood, blending into the rest of the city's urban fabric. It's still a work in progress, with the southern portion seeing new developments.

It's taken a few years to come into its own, but I find myself going there for a drink or a stroll quite often.

Where the Olympic Village really shines is at street level - and it's a pretty simple formula: intimate scale, narrow streets, varying building heights & sizes, attractive streetscaping, and integration into the broader cityscape. Of course, the prime waterfront location doesn't hurt either. It's no Greenwich Village, but it's a solid neighbourhood all the same - probably one of the better examples of new build hoods I've seen anywhere.

While not quite at the same level of quality, the West Donlands in Toronto are also shaping up to be one of the better new builds in Canada, though moreso as bit of a lesser version of the type of stuff going up in Copenhagen or Amsterdam or whatever than anything specific to Toronto.



Going back to Kool's point, I think it's a bit too harsh. While there has been no shortage of development of questionable aesthetic value and soulless brownfield neighbourhoods that have added density & Rexalls and little else; there are also countless neighbourhoods that have been improved through infill development filling in the gaps and stitching the urban fabric together and adding interesting new businesses & public spaces. There have been some monumental skyscrapers, institutions, and public works projects that have been undertaken. And the effect of just "more people" shouldn't entirely be discounted as well.

I do lament the fact that we've largely squandered a generational opportunity to rebuild our cities with a more cohesive and locally-derived architectural language & human scale; but there are still many successes worth acknowledging. Canadian cities by and large are much better places than they were 25 years ago (as far as the urban form goes, at least).

Originally Posted by lio45

As someone who's currently trying to make the math work on building a ~10 story tower in my hometown's downtown, the answer you're looking for is "costs". The costs of regulations, etc. as well.

At first sight, the only way I'd be able to build nice architecture would be a greenfield development of luxury SFHs. For that, sure, no problem. The buyers will be there.

But for rental housing, sorry, no way.

Strongly disagree with the premise that good design boils down to cost; when it's primarily a function of taste. AAA parametic starchitecture might be out of the budget for most projects, but any halfway decent architect can still design something attractive and contextually appropriate with simple, low-cost materials and basic forms.

Money + no taste can still yield some interesting, if not at least audacious results (eg. Dubai); but the big problem in a place like Waterloo is the unfortunate combo of no taste + no money.

[Nouvellecosse]

I also lament that our cities don't have more pre-war building stock but that is a dead end unfortunately. Because as a city grows, the percentage of its building that were completed pre-war can only drop. Even if the absolute number remained the same, new stuff has to constantly be added. And the absolute number doesn't stay the same because buildings get destroyed from things like fires even when they aren't intentionally re-developed.

And also, historic buildings aren't all suited to modern uses so when their exteriors are preserved the interiors are often gutted and modernized which you see often in places like Paris. And that leads to a lot of debates as to what does and doesn't count as historical preservation.

But also, while people sometimes see the past through these sort of rose coloured lenses, it wasn't really that different. Back then people largely did the same things they do now in that they build the best building they can for a function and make it as attractive as they can within a given budget. The main differences are that they had different materials and technologies available (stuff like window wall, steel frames and open floor plans were in their infancy). And things were more localized because it was before globalization allowed technology and design info to spread across the globe.

But there are some things that just don't work well in a contemporary context because of people's expectation for modern amenities such as light, but sometimes also even building standards. There are even some extreme examples like the Whitney Block that can't even be used now since it doesn't meet modern fire standards. Not that all modern standards are an improvement. There are some that i would argue are not such as the stairs requirement discussed in some urbanist videos. But overall, current technologies and designs are better suited to the modern era.

[hipster duck]

Originally Posted by MonkeyRonin

Going back to Kool's point, I think it's a bit too harsh. While there has been no shortage of development of questionable aesthetic value and soulless brownfield neighbourhoods that have added density & Rexalls and little else; there are also countless neighbourhoods that have been improved through infill development filling in the gaps and stitching the urban fabric together and adding interesting new businesses & public spaces. There have been some monumental skyscrapers, institutions, and public works projects that have been undertaken. And the effect of just "more people" shouldn't entirely be discounted as well.

This.

The big contribution of Canadian urbanism over the past 25 years, and the reason to log on to these fora and follow development is not the masterplanned neighbourhoods built from scratch, but filling in all the gaps that the postwar Canadian city (circa 1950-1995) left behind.

And those were huge gaps. We might as well have been rebuilding downtowns as if they had been destroyed by war; some of them were so compromised. When I first started paying attention to urbanism as a teenager in the 90s, it was hard to find an intersection in downtown Toronto that had buildings on all 4 corners. There was almost always a parking lot, often two, and sometimes two streets basically met surrounded by parking as if they were two rural roads meeting in a field.

A lot of what we built was mediocre, but a lot of the mediocre stuff from ten or twenty years ago has kind of grown in and is part of an urban fabric where previously it was a windswept void.

And some of the stuff we built was downright great. Stewart Street in Toronto might be one of my favourite blocks in the city. With its consistent 8 storey midrise scale and mature trees, it feels more like a genteel block in a 19th century Central European metropolis than pretty much anywhere else in Canada, even if the architectural detailing is completely different.

[cranes]

Northdale Waterloo

Under construction: 316 Batavia Apartments (Phase 2) & crane is up for 88 Hickory Apartments

Proposal: 177 to 179 Albert St (resubmission) [The height of the building has increased from 25 to 30 storeys.]

https://www.realtor.ca/real-estate/2...treet-waterloo



New Sunview Parkette

[GeneralLea]

Due to a recent work-related opportunity, I had the chance to go inside the new Ontario Court of Justice by Toronto's City Hall, and see some of the views. I took these last week.
From the Courthouse by Josh Kennington Photographics, on Flickr
From the Courthouse by Josh Kennington Photographics, on Flickr
From the Courthouse by Josh Kennington Photographics, on Flickr
From the Courthouse by Josh Kennington Photographics, on Flickr

[giallo]

Originally Posted by MonkeyRonin

Going back to Kool's point, I think it's a bit too harsh. While there has been no shortage of development of questionable aesthetic value and soulless brownfield neighbourhoods that have added density & Rexalls and little else; there are also countless neighbourhoods that have been improved through infill development filling in the gaps and stitching the urban fabric together and adding interesting new businesses & public spaces. There have been some monumental skyscrapers, institutions, and public works projects that have been undertaken. And the effect of just "more people" shouldn't entirely be discounted as well.

Very true.

Vancouver has benefited from this a great deal. Neighbourhoods like Mount Pleasant have become something special in the last 20 years.

[Wigs]

Originally Posted by cranes

Northdale Waterloo

Under construction: 316 Batavia Apartments (Phase 2) & crane is up for 88 Hickory Apartments

Proposal: 177 to 179 Albert St (resubmission) [The height of the building has increased from 25 to 30 storeys.]

https://www.realtor.ca/real-estate/2...treet-waterloo

The density is getting there, the buildings leave a lot to be desired in the section of Waterloo I call Novo Vaterlov

[MolsonExport]

Not unlike the vistas of some third-tier Chinese cities that I have visited.

Mind you, much of the Brutalism of the 70s and the POMO of the 90s has aged badly.

And to be fair, the additional density brings many benefits.

London is no better, BTW.

[Rico Rommheim]

Griffintown is lively and has quite a bit of little gems spread around. I visited the hood for the first time in 2 years last week. It is a success, but that's probably mostly because is essentially an extension of downtown. It's a pity it's so ugly.

Waterloo-upon-the-Lachine

DSC05750 by Foofoo MacShoe, on Flickr

[someone123]

Originally Posted by MonkeyRonin

Where the Olympic Village really shines is at street level - and it's a pretty simple formula: intimate scale, narrow streets, varying building heights & sizes, attractive streetscaping, and integration into the broader cityscape. Of course, the prime waterfront location doesn't hurt either. It's no Greenwich Village, but it's a solid neighbourhood all the same - probably one of the better examples of new build hoods I've seen anywhere.

Funny, I lived there for a while and don't like it as much now. The area was quite dark for much of the year and it doesn't have much diversity in the retail or services around there. I think it would have been better with more highrises and a mix of building heights. Mount Pleasant or the West End are superior. And the West End is prettier than the credit it gets, but some of that is old building stock that is hard to replicate today (in general, Vancouver's historic building stock is underrated on SSP).

Increasingly I would say some new builds in areas like Mount Pleasant are quite attractive and as good as or better than some historic buildings visually. This varies by city with Toronto and Vancouver having some new builds that are quite good quality (and ultra expensive in a lot of cases) while in some other cities the construction is mostly really mediocre.

There are different kinds of historic building stock and some baroque masterpieces are prohibitively expensive today but other beloved buildings are kind of simple with modest but attractive details and a lack of visual clutter or actively ugly elements. Modern building regulations preclude doing exactly the same building but you can get closer to the quality of those simpler ones. Seattle has some simple modern infill I like. One aspect, I think, is using public art budgets to meaningfully add to the attractiveness of the building (example: custom decorative metalwork for fences or screens, carved stone around the entryway) rather than putting some abstract blob next to it. Some cities add public art requirements and then produce crap from that budget, which is doubly harmful.

[MolsonExport]

Originally Posted by Rico Rommheim

Griffintown is lively and has quite a bit of little gems spread around. I visited the hood for the first time in 2 years last week. It is a success, but that's probably mostly because is essentially an extension of downtown. It's a pity it's so ugly.

Waterloo-upon-the-Lachine

DSC05750 by Foofoo MacShoe, on Flickr

Big changes in that part of the city from when I last lived in Montreal (2005). Definitely an improvement over the bleak parking lots and disused factories, even with the Waterlooian building designs. It looks much better, though, than a lot of the concrete Concordia ghetto.

[Wigs]

Originally Posted by cranes

https://www.realtor.ca/real-estate/2...treet-waterloo

This is supposed to be a one bedroom unit.
I don't know what you call this: sleeping nook?
But a bedroom it is not. Bedrooms have walls, a window, enough room for at least a queen sized bed, dresser, end table, and a proper door.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by MonkeyRonin

Strongly disagree with the premise that good design boils down to cost; when it's primarily a function of taste. AAA parametic starchitecture might be out of the budget for most projects, but any halfway decent architect can still design something attractive and contextually appropriate with simple, low-cost materials and basic forms.

Money + no taste can still yield some interesting, if not at least audacious results (eg. Dubai); but the big problem in a place like Waterloo is the unfortunate combo of no taste + no money.

I wouldn't say literally "good design boils down to (strictly) costs", but I'd say that in the adversarial environment builders will experience here right now, it's very hard to justify spending any time/money/energy on going to the extra mile for anything that's not required. If I ever build anything in Canada it will be whatever I'm allowed to build, and aesthetics won't be a factor at all. (The builds I did in the U.S., I worked with people from the City who actually helped in exchange for making the properties nicer; the general experience was positive and completely unlike what's happening here. BTW I'm not the only developer complaining about this, everyone else does as well.)

[SteelTown]

Source: https://www.thespec.com/news/hamilto...7592bac29.html

[giallo]

kelowna

[MolsonExport]

I can't get over how much Kelowna has changed since I lived there in 1994-95.

Is Rutland still considered to be on 'the wrong side of the tracks'?

[AuxTown]

Originally Posted by MolsonExport

I can't get over how much Kelowna has changed since I lived there in 1994-95.

Is Rutland still considered to be on 'the wrong side of the tracks'?

Wow haven't heard Rutland in a long time! I was there in '86 when my family drove out to BC for the Expo. Agree that it's changed a ton and I gotta get back out there soon!