Vancouver View Cones - Reviews and Amendments

[vanhattan]

While I am in general always excited to see taller building heights in appropriate areas, I am regrettably against the proposed 425 foot towers at the base of Granville bridge north. Why? Because the city has been promising commercial development in this area for years to bridge the huge gap of residential services.

The city finalized a very nice plan for Under the Granville Bridge that it promised to start building more than 2 years ago. Right now, for all of the Concord buildings as well as the Mark and other buildings going up, there is one corner store of about 500 square feet that is rather lame and disgusting and there is one cafe that is great but generally open from 9-4pm. Not exactly what it takes to serve the hundreds if not thousands of current residents in this small area.

I will personally oppose this plan, and I must admit I have never once been a NIMBY ever before, but this neighborhood is pathetically under served by any retail and commercial amenities. I see that this under the Granville Bridge development is still mentioned in the brochure but think it should have been already built years ago. I have lost all hope that it will ever be built as the city has repeatedly broken their promise to the neighborhood residents.

Also, if I was a presale buyer in The Mark, I would be pissed and asking for a refund. There is no way the new building heights allowed for the sites I mentioned above wont totally destroy all of the prime views of The Mark building.

I am all for higher density, but not when it makes a bad situation worse.

Having stated my concerns and rant, I am all for all of the other proposed changes. This city needs a few 500-700 footers in the proposed areas.

[officedweller]

Anyone notice that the City-owned Kettle of Fish site goes from 220ft to 300ft?

Interesting ow they describe the Ritz Carlton site as "developed".

[hollywoodnorth]

Originally Posted by officedweller

Thanks for posting.
It looks like the tall tower is at the Hornby & Drake corner.
Hard to tell what it looks like from the rendering.

Anyways, ultimately, I'd like to see the tallest towers be commercial office buildings - so that they can be more sculptural in form (not a lot of balconies and with a lighted rooftop feature not constrained by residential penthouses).

looks very mixed use to me. the tallest tower looks to have office/retail on the bottom 3 floors if not more.

[SpongeG]

would be cool if the roof or a high level could be open to the public maybe a public viewing deck if not a restaurant

[SpongeG]

Originally Posted by officedweller

Anyone notice that the City-owned Kettle of Fish site goes from 220ft to 300ft?

Interesting ow they describe the Ritz Carlton site as "developed".

i interpret it as whatever goes there will be expected to be tall

[officedweller]

Originally Posted by hollywoodnorth

looks very mixed use to me. the tallest tower looks to have office/retail on the bottom 3 floors if not more.

I meant the CBD ones for commercial, not the Pattison...

[SpikePhanta]

The "Toyota" tower makes me think of the Georgia, I dunno why though

[officedweller]

Ditto - thought the same thing

[Vancity]

Thought I'd never see the day that Vancouver would have 700' towers.

Btw, what's the tallest tower in Canada?

[idunno]

I was gonna say that too, I thought I was looking at the residences for a second! It's probably just a placeholder concept though.

[Yume-sama]

Sigh lol. I heard someone complaining today that Vancouver is trying to be too much like Hong Kong. With our mountains, and oceans, and apparently we're already building "outrageously tall" buildings. This, of course, means we should not allow any buildings to be any more outrageously tall. I'm beginning to think a lot of Vancouver's local detractors really haven't gone anywhere else.

[invisibleairwaves]

Originally Posted by Vancity

Thought I'd never see the day that Vancouver would have 700' towers.

Btw, what's the tallest tower in Canada?

First Canadian Place in Toronto at 1,171ft, unless you count the 1,815ft CN Tower.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_tallest_buildings_in_Canada

[Hed Kandi]

..

[Vancity]

^we do have some of the worse kind of buildings around.

But I guess every city has some pretty bad designs.

I was looking at the tallest towers (link provided by invisibleairwaves - thank you, btw!) in Canada, and realized that Toronto has like the top 4 tallest towers in the nation. Among the the top ten, none of Toronto's seven towers are shorter than 50 floors (the shortest tower out of the top ten that belongs to Toronto is the Bay Adelaide Centre, which stands at 218 metres, 715 feet, 50 floors, completed in 2009). By comparison, our tallest tower is roughly 600'. Wow.

It's about time this city has some towers that'll stand 700 feet. Too many of them are too short!

[trofirhen]

It seems to me that very often, people's visions of tall buildings in Vancouver fall into two camps: pedestrian (usually with turquoise glass) creations using brick or concrete, and looking all the drabber for it ...... or ........ high-tech, outer-space wizardry seemingly inspired by the Burj Dubai, or such.

Can't we find a middle ground, something that is tall, snazzy, elegant, yet not screamingly outrageous or overpoweringly dull? I guess it all comes down to personal taste.

[dleung]

As boring as Vancouver's architecture is, I doubt the solution has anything to do with Hed Kandi's bi-weekly/montly contributions of rendered phalluses from some developing country.

[AlexYVR]

Originally Posted by dleung

As boring as Vancouver's architecture is, I doubt the solution has anything to do with Hed Kandi's bi-weekly/montly contributions of rendered phalluses from some developing country.

Zing!

I know I've seen years-old renderings of the Burrard Toyota site - are they floating around somewhere on here or did I see them at an office? Is the news rendering an actual rendering or just a Georgia-based placeholder for a 50-story building?

[vanman]

^Let's all hope its the latter.

[wrenegade]

At 697', I think something like EAP in Calgary would fit well (perhaps just the taller of the two towers) for one of the 700' sites. It's not just a box, the glazing is nice, and it's mountain-inspired design would suit Vancouver as well as it does Calgary. It isn't anything crazy, but it is interesting.



source: http://www.eighthavenueplace.com/

edit: Upcoming Open Houses:

Originally Posted by City of Vancouver

Tuesday, October 26, 11 am - 3 pm
Rotunda at Pacific Centre Mall corner of Howe and Georgia Street. Staff presentations at 12 noon and 2 pm.

Wednesday, October 27, 5 - 8 pm
Roundhouse Community Centre 181 Roundhouse Mews. Staff presentations at 6 and 7 pm.

[Stingray2004]

Originally Posted by hollywoodnorth

thanks! and here is the news story >> http://www.globaltvbc.com/video/index.html?releasePID=x8BYVXx2RET0kCe4736mOkWLeQ9EMoqG

and a pic of the Toyota tower .. 50 Stories!



photo by global news hosted on pbucket

Reliance Properties in conjunction with TJPG made that proposal public this morning. It's a $500 million project with one 48 (?) storey tower (same height as One Wall Centre) and I think another 34 (?) storey tower. They hope to get the shovels in the ground in about one year.