The Great Canadian Skyline Thread! II

[Martin Mtl]

Originally Posted by rousseau

Toronto doesn't look American. You could say it looks North American, but not U.S.-American. In fact, and it's a bit bizarre that this isn't more well-known or accepted among Canadians, or at least people in Ontario, there is a distinctive southern Ontario vernacular of shop fronts and residential side streets full of detached and semi-detached houses done up in brick that Toronto is very much a part of.

Most southern Ontarians have had the revelatory experience of seeing Buffalo for the first time and realizing that, wow, the place is really different in every way imaginable. Which brings to mind the pet theory that Canadians are more "vertically" aligned than "horizontally," whereby it is held that people in Vancouver have more in common with people in Seattle, etc.

Is that really true? No. Well, okay, it may be partly true for the west and maybe a bit for the Maritimes. I recall visiting a former girlfriend's relatives in southern Manitoba once; her cousins casually mentioned playing baseball and golfing and grabbing a six-pack "over the line." Grand Forks could easily be in Manitoba. I've heard people in Vancouver feel a kinship with their counterparts in Seattle (but not really the other way around--Seattle looks to Portland first, and, of course, the U.S. in general). But Toronto like Buffalo or Detroit? Montreal like, what, Plattsburgh? No. Not even close.

There is a peculiar truism on and off these boards that Toronto's doppelganger is Chicago, but the truth is, Toronto doesn't have one. And now these two Great Lakes cities are looking less and less alike from the sky because of the decade-long frenzy of building in one of them. Witness the photos in this thread.

Toronto isn't ugly. It's not pretty, sure, but it's not ugly. It's a jumbled, utilitarian mess produced by Presbyterians who frowned on continental extravagance, resulting in a very specific charm that subsequent waves of un-Presbyterian newcomers have built upon, resulting in a jumbled, not always utilitarian mess with pockets of sublime extravagance. Works for me.

Great post. I always found Toronto to be funky looking, very distinctive. It doesn't look like any other big city anywhere.

[kool maudit]

rousseau,

oddly, toronto does look like a much flatter pittsburgh... but your general point is well-formed and well-taken.

[Darkoshvilli]

Rare angle


http://www.flickr.com/photos/75487768@N04/7651062022/


http://www.flickr.com/photos/75487768@N04/7651057006/

[Andrewjm3D]

Originally Posted by isaidso

What does Montreal have to do with the fact that Toronto has huge swaths of urban nastiness?

I'm not sure, you're the one who connected the two in the beginning. Ask yourself that question.

[Wooster]

Originally Posted by dleung

This is very misleading for Calgary since the vast majority of the "2001-2006" development isn't actually built up - it just happens to be empty land within Calgary's municipal boundary. For instance, that rectangle of "suburbs" in the lower left hand corner of the city looks like this:

https://maps.google.ca/maps?q=calgary&ll...c2cT3n2DJci-eOjA&cbp=12,345.47,,0,-13.43

[caltrane74]

Toronto was /is an Industrial City. Stuff gets made and built here, like cars, communications equipment and skyscrapers. Thats what Toronto was/is about. Toronto is a machine.

Quebec, Montreal, and Victoria are /were showcase cities. Montreal had a dual role of Finance and Glamour. Toronto was never supposed to be a merchant city like Montreal, Toronto was/is an Industrial City that took the Finance Capital from Montreal by default. We didn't want it nor did we need it. Toronto was happy to be the dirty industrial powerhouse, just building shit and selling it.

Walk around the portlands or entertianment district and you see the beginning of Toronto's industrial beginnings into one of the worlds most powerful manufacturing and warehousing centres.

Toronto was not meant to be pretty, although those pictures give that illusion. From the air.

[isaidso]

Originally Posted by Andrewjm3D

I'm not sure, you're the one who connected the two in the beginning. Ask yourself that question.

I quite clearly mentioned that Montreal was Canada's alpha city for most of our history and its built form reflects that. How on earth does that translate to "well Montreal has areas of urban ugliness so Toronto isn't ugly". There is zero logic in that line of reasoning. I'm astonished that you're even trying to make that connection.

That's a 'Brisavoine' maneuver aimed at making the entire discussion absurd. You can do much better than that.

[Nite]

Forest City

http://www.flickr.com/photos/63649137@N06/7457874870/in/photostream

[davidivivid]

Originally Posted by caltrane74

Quebec, Montreal, and Victoria are /were showcase cities.

Historically speaking, Quebec always was a deeply industrial city before being a showcase one. If it could be considered beautiful, it was more due to its striking location and topograpghy than to its nature. Until the end of the 19th century, about half of the city's workforce was employed in the naval industry, making Quebec's port the third in importance in North America. Unfortunately, this industry died off for many reasons including the 1866 fire, which left a third of the city homeless:



http://www.insitu.culture.fr/image.xsp?numero=3&id_article=d1a-659&no_image=1


The city's economic prosperity came back along with its dirty industries such as paper mills, textile plants, tanneries, ammunition factories and shoe factories. Around 1860, there are 45 tanneries as well as 225 manufacturing plants scattered throughout the lower town (St-Roch and St-Sauveur) and employing more than 10 000 workers. Factory chimneys defined the city's skyline and rail tracks were everywhere.



http://www.ameriquefrancaise.org/en/mediaList-pictures.html?page=41


This reality continued up until the 1960's. Hence, Quebec City at that point was still an industrial, dirty city as you can see in the following pics. If Quebec City is considered beautiful today, it's mainly because a huge amount of work, dedication and planning was put in place. Also, Quebec achieved its transition to a college town perhaps better than most. Anyways, I am officially rambling so I'll end it there...



http://www.obvcapitale.org/plans-directe...rique/bassin-de-la-riviere-saint-charles



http://www.quebecurbain.qc.ca/2010/06/29/voyage-dans-le-temps-la-stadacona-1935/







http://www.quebecurbain.qc.ca/2010/09/14/voyage-dans-le-temps-vieux-port-de-quebec/#comments

[kool maudit]

Originally Posted by caltrane74

Toronto was /is an Industrial City. Stuff gets made and built here, like cars, communications equipment and skyscrapers. Thats what Toronto was/is about. Toronto is a machine.

Quebec, Montreal, and Victoria are /were showcase cities. Montreal had a dual role of Finance and Glamour. Toronto was never supposed to be a merchant city like Montreal, Toronto was/is an Industrial City that took the Finance Capital from Montreal by default. We didn't want it nor did we need it. Toronto was happy to be the dirty industrial powerhouse, just building shit and selling it.

Walk around the portlands or entertianment district and you see the beginning of Toronto's industrial beginnings into one of the worlds most powerful manufacturing and warehousing centres.

Toronto was not meant to be pretty, although those pictures give that illusion. From the air.

montreal was canada's industrial powerhouse. from the lachine canal to angus yards, montreal was the nation's first and largest heavy industrial centre.

it wasn't all greystones on st. james street.

[Martin Mtl]

Originally Posted by kool maudit

montreal was canada's industrial powerhouse. from the lachine canal to angus yards, montreal was the nation's first and largest heavy industrial centre.

it wasn't all greystones on st. james street.

It's a fact that I thought anyone with a minimal interest in canadian urban history would know. Plus, Montreal was a huge port (it still is, by the way) and the hub of rail transport. Montreal lost many of its titles to Toronto, but let's not rewrite history.

[niwell]

Similarly there's this sort of ongoing myth that Toronto "stole" the title of financial powerhouse from Montreal. While there certainly was a shift from Montreal, the reality is that Toronto had a slightly larger financial industry at the end of the 19th century and things only widened from there.

[Martin Mtl]

Originally Posted by niwell

Similarly there's this sort of ongoing myth that Toronto "stole" the title of financial powerhouse from Montreal. While there certainly was a shift from Montreal, the reality is that Toronto had a slightly larger financial industry at the end of the 19th century and things only widened from there.

Also true, which is why the financial district of Toronto has always be more impressive than Montreal's.

[caltrane74]

When I said, Finance Capital, I didn't mean that Toronto took the Finance Capital from Montreal. Only that the banks made Toronto their operation headquarters during the 1970's. Toronto was happy being the second city, the industrial city, while Montreal was the Glamorous merchant city with the money. The Chicago/Detroit to Montreal's New York.

[dtgeek]

Originally Posted by isaidso

People label Toronto ugly because huge swaths of Toronto are ugly. Travel by bus from Kennedy Station to the Toronto Zoo and you pass through some of the most depressingly ugly stretches of urban dreariness in the western world.

Granted it's hyperbole, but that is quite harsh. Most large cities in North America have similar areas. In fact, I actually find most of Scarborough a bit more pleasant than post war suburban areas in other cities because there are high rise clusters sprinkled all over the place. The high rises are ugly, but break up the visual monotony a bit and add density that supports decently busy through streets with frequent bus service. I also think Scarborough has more neighborhood parkland than a lot of suburbs elsewhere (e.g. here in the SF bay area suburbs there are fewer parks in residential areas, and the parks we do have are typically about 1/2 the size).

[someone123]

One of the problems with suburban Toronto is that it's not very scenic. The suburban parts of the Bay Area have a lot of ugly buildings but the North Bay is very nice, as is the Junipero Serra Freeway. On top of that SF just has a much nicer climate -- last time I was there was in February and it was like Toronto in April. There is no dull, protracted period of overcast skies and brown. Not much can be done to fix those problems in Toronto.

Vancouver has lots of hideous buildings but it's got the mountains, water, and evergreens. The cedar shingle style buildings also tend to be more colourful than brick and concrete in Toronto. Halifax similarly has tons of hills, forest, water, and brightly-coloured houses. It is not all entirely practical or optimal in terms of land use but it's prettier.

[Ramako]

Aren't those colourful houses in Halifax just the ones in and around the peninsula? If we're just talking about inner suburbs, Toronto's swathes of Victorians are actually quite nice.

Are the houses in Halifax's mid to outer suburbs any better than those in Scarborough, North York or Etobicoke? I wouldn't know as when I lived in Halifax I rarely ventured off the peninsula.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by Ramako

Aren't those colourful houses in Halifax just the ones in and around the peninsula? If we're just talking about inner suburbs, Toronto's swathes of Victorians are actually quite nice.

It is a popular local style and extends beyond the peninsula, although there are definitely hideous suburban areas with beige or white vinyl siding. Higher-end homes are sometimes done in bright colours that would be hard to imagine in some other cities, but the cheapest possible siding is vinyl, not wood.

It is hard to say which city has nicer looking suburban houses. In Toronto they tend to be dull, and in Halifax they are often garish and cheap looking. One nice feature in Halifax is the relative lack of garages and "snout houses", but I think that style is also less common in Toronto now than it was in the 80's. Toronto's suburbs are much better from the perspective of providing services like transit.

The biggest difference between suburbs is that, because of the topography and all the water, it's hard to find large unbroken tracts of housing and strip malls.

[caltrane74]

Skyline by me

[Darkoshvilli]

http://www.flickr.com/photos/vincebm/6894052362/in/photostream/