DENVER | Main Development Thread #6

[EngiNerd]

Fitting 19 floors in 200 feet is pretty impressive, that must have been a pain to get all the utilities in those short stories.

[mhays]

In my area, residential buildings are usually right around 10' floor to floor. Often in 65' or 125' zoning, they even squeeze in 7 or 13, mostly by putting two-level townhouse-type spaces on the bottom or top. With tight height limits it usually makes sense to squeeze in as many floors as possible. One method is post-tensioned concrete, which allows thinner slabs. The under-ceiling mechanical is limited to smaller soffit areas, allowing the rest of the space higher ceilings. This building also has a couple parking levels that can be a little shorter.

[comoneymaker]

Originally Posted by mhays

Chicago is easily bigger than Toronto. But definitely Toronto is off the charts with construction. And if the large core isn't enough, it has dozens of substantial suburban highrise nodes.

Pretty sure Toronto almost has the same population as NYC....

[Denver Dweller]

http://www.businessden.com/2015/10/01/wi...loper-buys-rino-lot-for-9-6m/#newsletter

[mr1138]

Originally Posted by comoneymaker

Pretty sure Toronto almost has the same population as NYC....

The numbers I quickly looked up on Wikipedia don't seem to support this. Toronto has about 1.7 million people in the "urban area" (less in the city proper it looks like, not sure how they measure that) and about 5.5 in the metro. Compare that to NYCs 8.4 million in the city itself, and 20-24 million in the metro area depending on where you draw the boundary.

Granted, there is a LOT of disagreement over how to measure a metro area, and most likely differences in how these numbers were sourced. But even taking that into consideration, those numbers aren't even close.

[bunt_q]

Originally Posted by comoneymaker

Pretty sure Toronto almost has the same population as NYC....

Yeah, 6 million and 20 million are almost the same thing.

I too would like to know what the secret sauce is that makes Toronto work politically. I love how Denver "leaders" take trips up to Toronto to learn what works and what doesn't... and then come back here to do absolutely nothing to promote a growth agenda. I think Denver is content being a city of transient renters, so long as we have pot and bike lanes. Should make for a glorious crash when millennials start hitting 40.

That Meriwether project in Portland is what we should be seeing more of in Denver (http://www.gbdarchitects.com/portfolio-item/the-meriwether-2/). You'd think somebody around town would be asking why, if Portland can do it, we can't. I'm not even sure folks in Denver can imagine a residential building that is that tall, narrow, and for-sale.

[mhays]

To be fair, new stuff on the South Waterfront (location of Meriwether) is now mostly lowrise, and SSPers sound much like Denver forumers on the topic.

Narrow buildings are usually driven by zoning requirements. Portland apparently requires small floorplates. It's more economical to build large floorplates, so you can share stuff like elevators.

As for Toronto, something like 7,000,000 is probably more close to a US CSA if I understand correctly. Golden Horseshoe with Hamilton etc.

[PLANSIT]

The Portland examples are, what, 21 and 24 floors? They aren't any taller than what we have in DUS. Difference, as mhays eluded to, is how we zone. Their zoning/design guidelines drive buildings to be narrow/skinny (not necessarily taller) through smaller floorplates. This is the type of work being done in Arapahoe Square. The intent of the Arapahoe Square Zoning and Design Standards & Guidelines is to produce "point tower" buildings that look more like the Portland examples.

And you will see more point towers in AS in the future (current proposals do not have to adhere to future guidelines).

[PLANSIT]

Another Hotel for downtown:

Site Address and Description
1501 Stout St - 2015PM0000553 - 15th & Stout Hotel

[corey]

Is one reason Portland has small floor plates because their city blocks are quite small? That 1950's Muchow designed bank on 38th Ave that a neighbor tried to save with a last minute historic designation application has been demolished. That strip of 38th is beginning to have a cluster of density as compared to the surrounding neighborhood.

[The Dirt]

Originally Posted by PLANSIT

Another Hotel for downtown:

Awesome! I've been dying to see some development spill over to the east side of 15th. There's been 0 activity on that side of the street for decades.

[bunt_q]

Originally Posted by PLANSIT

And you will see more point towers in AS in the future (current proposals do not have to adhere to future guidelines).

Going to be a lot harder to make rentals pencil, though. We're not talking Confluence-level location and luxury in AS. I bet we don't see a single one built until condos come back. Union Station would've been the place to start with not having crappy urban form.

[mhays]

Not necessarily. You can do a wide tower on a 100x200' half block, or a 200' square. (The Meriwether is an oversized block btw, in a newly gridded area analogous to the CPV.)

But there are challenges. The 100' dimension is inconvenient for parking, as each row likes to be around 60'. I believe Portland has water table issues in a lot of areas (making it expensive to go deep) and short podium heights depending on location, so it's hard to put a ton of parking below grade or above grade, which limits the unit count. On the plus side, Portland frequently does fewer spaces than housing units if it's rentals, though that's very anecdotal.

[The Dirt]

Originally Posted by mhays

Chicago is easily bigger than Toronto. But definitely Toronto is off the charts with construction. And if the large core isn't enough, it has dozens of substantial suburban highrise nodes.

http://www.nbcchicago.com/news/local/Toronto-Surpasses-Chicago-in-Population-195667131.html

But I suppose that's city proper and I can agree with you on that. Mississauga is a crappy tower-in-the-garden type suburb but, holy hell, it's grown from nothing to a serious skyline in very little time. Consider this - Toronto had 130 highrises under construction this time last year. That's about 40 more than New York. We don't come close to that even if we include the West Highland definition of a highrise.

Originally Posted by Scottk

Toronto is easily twice the population of Denver. That's like being surprised that Boise is much smaller than denver

That's not really my point. I'm not surprised at all. My point is just how much Toronto is growing across the board and how relatively easy a time it's having getting there. They've got a lot of positive national factors in their favor which we'll never have here. Their bones were mostly left intact during the white-flight/urban decay era. Their historical streetcar system is still intact. Canada's national policy promotes immigration across the board. All of these factors along with local factors have really helped Toronto grow but, even then, this kind of growth is very impressive. Like Bunt said, I just wish that our local leaders would apply some of the lessons learned.

[TakeFive]

Originally Posted by corey

Is one reason Portland has small floor plates because their city blocks are quite small? That 1950's Muchow designed bank on 38th Ave that a neighbor tried to save with a last minute historic designation application has been demolished. That strip of 38th is beginning to have a cluster of density as compared to the surrounding neighborhood.

Is the value high for recycled historical rubble?
Wonder if Trammell Crow doesn't move quickly to construction?

PLANSIT... Your link indicates that those new guidelines are a proposal that hasn't been adopted yet? Are you just assuming they'll be adopted or do I misunderstand?

The Dirt... "We don't come close to that even if we include the West Highland definition of a highrise."

[bunt_q]

Originally Posted by TakeFive

The Dirt... "We don't come close to that even if we include the West Highland definition of a highrise."

Epic!

[PLANSIT]

Originally Posted by TakeFive

PLANSIT... Your link indicates that those new guidelines are a proposal that hasn't been adopted yet? Are you just assuming they'll be adopted or do I misunderstand?:

There wouldn't even be a discussion (about new guidelines) if they weren't going to be implemented. This is just part of the process.

[TakeFive]

PLANSIT... Gotcha

Originally Posted by BG918

I thought of all places this could be condos. Personally I'm not a fan, too bulky and should've been split into two towers. Something more like the Meriwether in Portland, also designed by GBD http://www.gbdarchitects.com/portfolio-item/the-meriwether-2/

It just occurred to me that perhaps East-West and Continuum have something comparable to the Portland Meriwether condo project in mind for the Market Street Station redevelopment? It does sound like they've got something exciting in mind.

[bcp]

Hilarious bunt...I recall a bunch of Denver pols going to Vancouver years ago for the exact same reason...but very little changes. Even the new zoning code, designed for context rather than being prescriptive....ended up just as confusing and very prescriptive. Better, yes..but it kinda turned into Homer Simpson's car.

I'm out of the loop now..but has the Denver city council made any moves to address defect liability? Why wait for the state?

[comoneymaker]

mmm I thought the population was 7.x. Must of misheard.