Canadian City Proposals

[hipster duck]

Even though they've been the [distant] secondary city for centuries, there is still some metropolitan ambition in Quebec City's DNA.

Every generation, they knock something out of the park. If building grand railway hotels was the thing to do in the 1890s, they built the grandest. If building mighty steel bridges was the thing to do in the 1910s, they built the mightiest. If building extensive freeway systems was the thing to do in the 1960s, they built - well, about as extensive as one would imagine for a city of its size.

And now, I guess, they may get around to building the tallest tower outside Toronto. It's not without precedent.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by hipster duck

Even though they've been the [distant] secondary city for centuries, there is still some metropolitan ambition in Quebec City's DNA.

Every generation, they knock something out of the park. If building grand railway hotels was the thing to do in the 1890s, they built the grandest. If building mighty steel bridges was the thing to do in the 1910s, they built the mightiest. If building extensive freeway systems was the thing to do in the 1960s, they built - well, about as extensive as one would imagine for a city of its size.

And now, I guess, they may get around to building the tallest tower outside Toronto. It's not without precedent.

Pretty good eye there for someone who lives at the other end of the country.

People living in French-speaking Canada interact as you can imagine with people from Quebec City all the time, and certainly there is something there - even a few hundred years after the fact you can still tell the city was once the capital of a huge imperial domain that covered a good chunk of present-day Canada and the U.S.

[CanadianCentaur]

Speaking of the Calgary Tower...I wonder why they didn't build it taller in the first place? It sounds to me like they weren't thinking Calgary would end up with a whole bunch of tall skyscrapers down the road!

If they'd have built it in the other end of downtown Calgary, that would've been cool, as one could have had an even better view of the Rockies from up there.

[Matrix19]

Kaffloc just posted in Quebec thread that Cominar will unveil the project tomorrow PM (Wednesday).

Summary of the infos : It should be 4 towers, 3 of them around 30 floors and the tallest one (phase I) is expected to be 60+ floors with ~275m and an observatory deck at the top.

[GreaterMontréal]

Yoo Montréal Philippe Starck should start construction soon.

https://justeduneuf.ca/blogue/nouveau-projet-dans-griffintown-yoo-montreal/

[Dirt_Devil]

Originally Posted by Matrix19

Kaffloc just posted in Quebec thread that Cominar will unveil the project tomorrow PM (Wednesday).

Summary of the infos : It should be 4 towers, 3 of them around 30 floors and the tallest one (phase I) is expected to be 60+ floors with ~275m and an observatory deck at the top.

Yes and from what I heard, "pretty much all the details of this project have been reported in the medias right now". We'll be set tomorrow around 1 or 2pm

[vanman]

Originally Posted by MonkeyRonin

Grassy setbacks & surface parking, really? The hats are a nice touch straight out of 2004, too.

The setbacks and surface parking are for the existing railroad overpass that is conveniently glossed over in the rendering.

After playing around with google streetview it looks as though that 🞵🞵🞵🞵🞵🞵 setback from the street for the corner of surface parking in the above rendering is actually underneath the footprint of the overpass.

[Rico Rommheim]

Originally Posted by Dirt_Devil

Yes and from what I heard, "pretty much all the details of this project have been reported in the medias right now". We'll be set tomorrow around 1 or 2pm

So all of a sudden Quebec gets a tower as tall as the Scotia building, good enough for third tallest in the country. No Big Finance, no Big Oil, no real economical rationale, just the will of a boisterous mayor. Unreal.

[Ashok]

Originally Posted by GreaterMontréal

Yoo Montréal Philippe Starck should start construction soon.

https://justeduneuf.ca/blogue/nouveau-projet-dans-griffintown-yoo-montreal/

Am not too sure if i truly understand this project... I mean the whole hype behind it, apart from it being a well known developper?

[lio45]

Originally Posted by Rico Rommheim

So all of a sudden Quebec gets a tower as tall as the Scotia building, good enough for third tallest in the country. No Big Finance, no Big Oil, no real economical rationale, just the will of a boisterous mayor. Unreal.

Two "tallest" skylines in the country, Toronto and Ste-Foy, in that order -- wow, that sounds weird.

[vanman]

A preliminary render of the massive Lougheed Town Centre redevelopmet in Burnaby. Lougheed is just 5 skytrain stations east of the Amazing Brentwood also by the same developer Shape Properties.

Originally Posted by officedweller

Just noticed this rendering in the Leasing Brochure:

http://www.shapeproperties.com/sites/default/files/brochures/lougheed_new_1.pdf

What the area currently looks like.

Originally Posted by officedweller

https://www.facebook.com/evergreenline

[davidivivid]

Originally Posted by Rico Rommheim

So all of a sudden Quebec gets a tower as tall as the Scotia building, good enough for third tallest in the country. No Big Finance, no Big Oil, no real economical rationale, just the will of a boisterous mayor. Unreal.

I feel I must once again mention that it is Cominar's CEO who approached the mayor with this project and not the other way around. I do not know any responsible CEO who would build an empty tower for the sake of pleasing any mayor.

Also, the tower will have multiple components and as I previously mentionned, Quebec's office space innoccupation rate, at 6.3%, was the lowest in the country in february 2015. Furthermore, the innoccupation rate drops to 3.6% in Ste-Foy, where this project would be situated.
http://www.lapresse.ca/le-soleil/aff...x-a-quebec.php

Some hotel chains, including Hotel des Gouverneurs, have already manifested their interest. After all, Cominar recently demolished two hotels in this part of town to make way for its projects so the demand for new hotel rooms is there.

However, if there is one question mark in all of this, it is the residential component. A lot of condos have been built in Quebec City in the last few years so there are many unsold condos on the market right now. Consequently, the construction of condos has slowed down this year but I don't know what the market will look like in a few years.

[davidivivid]

Originally Posted by Rico Rommheim

So all of a sudden Quebec gets a tower as tall as the Scotia building, good enough for third tallest in the country. No Big Finance, no Big Oil, no real economical rationale, just the will of a boisterous mayor. Unreal.

Quebec City obviously isn't Toronto when it comes to finance but it does have an oversized insurance and financial services industry. It generates as much as 20% of the region’s gross domestic product (GDP) and more than 10% of its jobs. We are talking about 46000 direct and indirect jobs. The insurance HQs situated in QC (Desjardins, SSQ, La Capitale, Industrielle Alliance, Promutuel, Ledor, etc) control 42% of the province's individual home and auto insurance market and 34% of Québec's general insurance and financial services market.

Desjardins recently built a new tower at its HQ campus, La Capitale recently built a new HQ, Promutuel recently built a new HQ, rumour as it that IA wants to build a new tower downtown and SSQ has been working on a new tower in Ste-Foy for a while now...


http://www.quebecinternational.ca/media/19646/InsuranceAndFinancialServices-QcCity-CMA-web.pdf




P.S. I do not think a tower that tall in Quebec City is fitting.

[GreaterMontréal]

You don't need to sell a lot of condos if you want to build a 275m tower. s'ils ont 20 étages de bureaux, 20 étages d'hôtel, assez pour le faire meme si la vente de condos est moins bonne.

[Matrix19]

Originally Posted by Rico Rommheim

So all of a sudden Quebec gets a tower as tall as the Scotia building, good enough for third tallest in the country. No Big Finance, no Big Oil, no real economical rationale, just the will of a boisterous mayor. Unreal.

Do you really think the mayor can force someone or a cie to spend half a billion dollar for his ego ?

If Cominar is building it... it's because there is money in Qc City !

[WhipperSnapper]

Originally Posted by GreaterMontréal

You don't need to sell a lot of condos if you want to build a 275m tower. s'ils ont 20 étages de bureaux, 20 étages d'hôtel, assez pour le faire meme si la vente de condos est moins bonne.

Single use is usually a whole lot easier to sell/lease. Going to need a massive crown/spire with that arrangement too. It may be the tallest outside of Toronto but, not everyone in our world will agree with it.

[caltrane74]

20 floors hotel/ 20 floors condo/ 20 floors office.

I think it's doable. Do I expect it to happen anytime soon? No.

[Dirt_Devil]

Originally Posted by WhipperSnapper

Single use is usually a whole lot easier to sell/lease. Going to need a massive crown/spire with that arrangement too. It may be the tallest outside of Toronto but, not everyone in our world will agree with it.

I agree with you, I hope they don't put a huge spire on it. To me, it's like "false height". Anyways, we will know tomorrow. Still an exciting news coming from this city.

[Matrix19]

Originally Posted by caltrane74

20 floors hotel/ 20 floors condo/ 20 floors office.

I think it's doable. Do I expect it to happen anytime soon? No.

Well, it's up to the city.
Cominar CEO said they could start it next year, If the city is giving the authorisation quickly

[GreaterMontréal]

the top floor of the imposing tower would house an observatory