I keep hearing "Toronto is coming close to Chicago" but I dont see it - Page 7

kolchak · #**121** Posted **Feb 13, 2017, 7:13 AM**

http://www.citymayors.com/statistics/richest-cities-2020.html

Chicago also has 12 Fortune GLOBAL 500 company headquarters (14 in Illinois) and Canada has 11 total. McDonald's is moving its headquarters to the West Loop (where Google just opened its midwest headquarters.) Companies from around the midwest are relocating to Downtown Chicago to take advantage of the world wide trend among educated newer workers to live in the central city.

Chicago's general population continues to shrink but with a lot of that coming in neighborhoods on the south side where families that relied on factory jobs for generations begin resettling in other parts of the country as those places have shuttered. In contrast, Downtown Chicago is experiencing a rapid rise in population and development with over 45 high rises currently under construction. That group includes three residential buildings over 850 feet (with Wanda Vista at almost '1,200.)

koops65 · #**122** Posted **Feb 15, 2017, 12:33 PM**

I'm not sure if it was deliberate or not, but in those screenshots you posted, you only showed the southern half of downtown Toronto... and it's several years old, with many of the biggest towers built in the last 3 yrs not in the picture...

GeneralLea · #**123** Posted **Feb 15, 2017, 9:34 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by koops65

I'm not sure if it was deliberate or not, but in those screenshots you posted, you only showed the southern half of downtown Toronto... and it's several years old, with many of the biggest towers built in the last 3 yrs not in the picture...

Yea, that screenshot show's perhaps a fifth of the core, if we're going off of official-ish boundaries. Anyways, I think that screenshot is from at least 2012, since the Shangri-La is there......jeesh.

kolchak · #**124** Posted **Feb 16, 2017, 8:15 AM**

No fellas. I didn't intentionally change the size. It was just a quick comparison :-)

Those shots are old, however. The three towers just completed at the river confluence in the Chicago pic are also missing. I chose it to merely illustrate the very different land density usage in central Chicago vs Toronto.

kolchak · #**125** Posted **Feb 17, 2017, 6:14 PM**

This article explains why general statistics about Chicago as a whole do not reflect the dynamic growth that is occurring downtown -

http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/c...eadquarters-0717-biz-20150716-story.html

Urban recluse · #**126** Posted **Feb 18, 2017, 4:58 AM**

Chicago's skyline is dramatic, with an amazing mixture of styles, and taller towers. Toronto's skyline is beginning to change, but Chicago still dominates.

isaidso · #**127** Posted **Feb 20, 2017, 8:44 PM**

It bears mentioning that a skyline is just one of many criteria. If we just looked at towers one might believe that Dubai was a far more important city than London. That said, the SSP database itself suggests that Toronto's skyline will pull even with Chicago's if the current inventory of buildings coming down the pipe get built.

isaidso · #**128** Posted **Feb 20, 2017, 9:01 PM**

Skylines? Chicago has 5 more super talls than Toronto but Toronto handily beats Chicago in the other 2 height categories. At the very least, Toronto is even if the proposals in both cities get built.

Buildings Built, Under Construction, Proposed

100-199m: 330 vs 438
200-299m: 32 vs 43
300m+: 10 vs 5

Chicago in red Toronto in blue

Doady · #**129** Posted **Feb 22, 2017, 9:39 PM**

Chicago skyline is along the lake, Toronto is perpendicular. Chicago skyscrapers is more clustered together, Toronto more spread out. I also think subjectively speaking the architecture of Chicago is better. More older towers, more variety. Also more office towers, less residential towers. So overall I feel Chicago does have more impact.

rbt · #**130** Posted **Feb 23, 2017, 2:10 AM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by isaidso

At the very least, Toronto is even if the proposals in both cities get built.

I don't like including proposals which haven't gotten their zoning approvals yet; the largest proposals are the most prone to substantial change.

Also disappointed Chicago Spire didn't get off the ground; that was a nice looking hole.

koops65 · #**131** Posted **Feb 23, 2017, 3:10 PM**

Toronto has a ton of proposals, over 200 of them. More get added weekly. Far, far more than most cities have, probably more than most countries have. Many wont get built of course, but a bunch will. Hard to say which though...

kolchak · #**132** Posted **Feb 28, 2017, 4:42 AM**

Here is an aerial shot that shows how Chicago's development pattern and density are much different than Toronto's which are more sprawl oriented. This photo is from several years back. That being said I was browsing the Toronto threads and it is really amazing how much the city has built up. It's really booming right now and undoubtedly in the top three in North America in quantity and quality. If it ever closes that gap between the 'two Downtowns' it will be astonishing.

isaidso · #**133** Posted **Mar 1, 2017, 1:06 AM**

Yorkville's Four Seasons hotel was the first tall building north of the traditional CBD. It topped out in 2012 so the expansion of the skyline north has been very recent. Yorkville is now a skyline unto itself.

It's 5km from the lake to the northern edge of Yorkville so that's a huge footprint. That said, it will likely be a wall of tall buildings one after the other the whole stretch by 2025. The skyline is also growing east to west starting at the Don Valley and stretching west all the way to Liberty Village. It's going to be one massive downtown when they finish building it.

kolchak · #**134** Posted **Mar 4, 2017, 6:18 AM**

I am going to enjoy Toronto's rise up. Looks like a trip there in the future may be in store. But though the North Side is not in the same towering scale as the downtowns of the two cities let's not forget that Chicago's skyline travels several miles up the shore of Lake Michigan. The North Side also contains the city's most densely populated neighborhoods.

koops65 · #**135** Posted **Mar 4, 2017, 3:13 PM**

^ That photo requires a source please... I like it and wouldn't want a moderator to remove it.

Let's also not forget that Toronto has multiple high-rise districts that aren't downtown. Scarborough Town Centre, North York City Centre, Etobicoke/Humber Bay (with the first 200 metre+ tower going up outside downtown), and there is Mississauga too, plus the emerging skylines of Vaughan and Markham as well. A new high-rise zone is emerging at the 401/404 interchange also, with multiple 30 and 40 storey towers rising now. All this is in addition to the literally thousands of high-rises scattered about everywhere.

kolchak · #**136** Posted **Mar 5, 2017, 3:12 AM**

Repeated post

kolchak · #**137** Posted **Mar 5, 2017, 3:16 AM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by koops65

^ That photo requires a source please... I like it and wouldn't want a moderator to remove it.

Let's also not forget that Toronto has multiple high-rise districts that aren't downtown. Scarborough Town Centre, North York City Centre, Etobicoke/Humber Bay (with the first 200 metre+ tower going up outside downtown), and there is Mississauga too, plus the emerging skylines of Vaughan and Markham as well. A new high-rise zone is emerging at the 401/404 interchange also, with multiple 30 and 40 storey towers rising now. All this is in addition to the literally thousands of high-rises scattered about everywhere.

I deleted the pic until I can find it again and credit the source. My apologies to the mods.

True about Toronto what you said - but it's still not the same as Chicago's older and tighter fabric of urban development.

isaidso · #**138** Posted **Mar 5, 2017, 5:58 AM**

Chicago's core definitely looks denser. What strikes me about Toronto is how one can be right downtown and it doesn't feel dense at all (Yonge and Wellesley) while some parts you feel like you're surrounded on all sides by monumental buildings (Yonge and King). There's a truly massive inventory of functionally obsolete buildings in downtown Toronto that are prime for re-development.

It's good that the pace of construction is high as it would take forever to build out the core otherwise. Even if things stay as they are it will take 20 years before it starts feeling built out over the entire footprint.

kolchak · #**139** Posted **Mar 17, 2017, 5:10 AM**

On an interesting side note, two buildings in Downtown Chicago rank in the top 50 worldwide in floor square feet.

The Sears Tower (forever ST) and Merchandise Mart. Do any forumers here know what the 'biggest' building in Toronto is? I unsuccessfully tried looking for it.

isaidso · #**140** Posted **Mar 17, 2017, 6:14 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by kolchak

On an interesting side note, two buildings in Downtown Chicago rank in the top 50 worldwide in floor square feet.

The Sears Tower (forever ST) and Merchandise Mart. Do any forumers here know what the 'biggest' building in Toronto is? I unsuccessfully tried looking for it.

First Canadian Place is 2,700,120 sq ft. Pearson airport's Terminal 1 is 6,000,000 sq ft while West Edmonton Mall is 5,300,000 sq ft but for an office building FCP is likely the largest. Btw, Complex Desjardins in Montreal has 4,500,968 sq ft but it's not 1 tower. It's a massive podium that takes up an entire city block with 4 short towers rising from it.