Great Canadian Skyline Thread II

[kool maudit]

Originally Posted by rousseau

Edmonton/Calgary/Winnipeg etc. are to Toronto as Toronto is to northeastern cities like New York and Montreal. You can argue that Toronto's urban form is a lot more dense and funky than a prairie city, and it certainly is, but then Toronto's outside of the city centre is itself practically pastoral compared to the Plateau and, well, anywhere in Manhattan and most of Brooklyn.

I was just in Toronto briefly; it was my first visit to Canada in nearly five years.

I stayed in Cabbagetown (Wellesley right at the ravine) and while the neighbourhood was charming and #comfy, as were my morning walks across the park to Rooster coffee on Broadview, the built form kind of hints that there might be a few blocks of Sloane Square-style things around Yonge, but there just aren't. The transition to towerville is abrupt. Passing Maple Leaf Gardens heading west is like going from Brookline, Massachusetts, into Midtown Manhattan in the space of a block.



Toronto is a transitional built form between the Eastern Seaboard and the Midwest, like a big, busy Columbus or Pittsburgh. it's interesting because it's the only one of these cities to function in a truly metropolitan fashion (transit usage etc).

The construction boom has given the city so many new focal points, but it's still very gappy, especially east of Yonge. This is to be expected as the area that Torontonians have come to consider "downtown" is very large compared to the city centre's historic size, and the boom is very ambitious. Ultimately, and if it continues, the product will be a really interesting and very large-feeling North American urban experience.

[TorontoDrew]

[IMG]are you someone? by Dustin William, on Flickr[/IMG]

[IMG]In-between by A Great Capture, on Flickr[/IMG]

[IMG]The Night Is Yonge by kotsy, on Flickr[/IMG]

[IMG]Straight Down Yonge by Frogyprod, on Flickr[/IMG]

[IMG]37792130824_bc6c302255_o by Zirocket, on Flickr[/IMG]

[mistercorporate]

RailDeck Park render:

City of Toronto

[suburbanite]

I need it.

[KnoxfordGuy]

Holy shit. That's amazing.

[OTSkyline]

Whoever currently owns a condo alongside the tracks would get a MAJOR increase in their property values... It would almost be like TO's version to Central Park. And we all know that living directly adjacent to the park (5th Ave, Park Ave, etc...) is where all the prestige is at.

Plus, if it gets built, it basically guarantees you will always have a "view" and that another condo tower wont get built directly in front of yours.

[suburbanite]

The Well would become, in my opinion, the most desirable office development in the city.

[Brizzy82]

so Winnipeg..


source

[isaidso]

Originally Posted by kool maudit

I was just in Toronto briefly; it was my first visit to Canada in nearly five years.

I stayed in Cabbagetown (Wellesley right at the ravine) and while the neighbourhood was charming and #comfy, as were my morning walks across the park to Rooster coffee on Broadview, the built form kind of hints that there might be a few blocks of Sloane Square-style things around Yonge, but there just aren't. The transition to towerville is abrupt. Passing Maple Leaf Gardens heading west is like going from Brookline, Massachusetts, into Midtown Manhattan in the space of a block.



Toronto is a transitional built form between the Eastern Seaboard and the Midwest, like a big, busy Columbus or Pittsburgh. it's interesting because it's the only one of these cities to function in a truly metropolitan fashion (transit usage etc).

The construction boom has given the city so many new focal points, but it's still very gappy, especially east of Yonge. This is to be expected as the area that Torontonians have come to consider "downtown" is very large compared to the city centre's historic size, and the boom is very ambitious. Ultimately, and if it continues, the product will be a really interesting and very large-feeling North American urban experience.

When the largely built out CBD expanded south the footprint of 'downtown' expanded. The construction boom in Yorkville massively enlarged it to include everything from the lake all the way to Bloor. Now it seems it will stretch west to Liberty Village and east to the DVP.

As frenetic as the pace of construction has been, the downtown footprint has grown faster. Downtown sometimes feels less built out than before. It's an odd result but makes sense in the context of our expanded view of what constitutes downtown. It's hard to see it expanding further until this vast area starts to fill in. Even with a continued boom it will take 15-20 years to get there.

[travis3000]

Toronto has gone through unprecedented growth with new towers popping up like crazy over the last 12 years. A growth period like never seen before. The reality is though, there's still SO much more to do. I agree there are still tons of empty spaces ready to fill in. You never really get that big NYC feel unless you're down in the financial district. That will change though with Yonge N Bloor corridor expanding greatly and will have a big city feel in the coming years. Also Southcore is also booming and becoming equally as impressive.

Once CIBC Square is built, The Well, 16 York, 160 Front, and the massive One Yonge project this will only add to the density of that southern zone, essentially connecting the traditional downtown to the south and carrying that big skyscraper condensed feel with it. East of Yonge St there still needs work to be done. 88 Scott helped, but we need at least another 20 more of those to pop up to really get that canyon effect going.

I truly believe in another 20 years Toronto will be a beast with massive towers extending from Bloor street south right down to the lake shore. It'll be very impressive.

[WhipperSnapper]

So much going on in Toronto that I don't really have the time for the rail deck park that could be a lifetime away from being built. That said, I do hope it gets rezoned parkland making the air rights claim worthless.

[Calgarian]

Originally Posted by Vixx

The transition from leaving downtown and following the river valley road and entering Old Strathcona has resulted in the best urban built form in Alberta and is a top 10 candidate in Canada no doubt.

I'm sorry, but what? River Valley road? isn't that along the north bank of the river through the river valley in an area completely devoid of urban development?

[someone123]

Originally Posted by kool maudit

I stayed in Cabbagetown (Wellesley right at the ravine) and while the neighbourhood was charming and #comfy, as were my morning walks across the park to Rooster coffee on Broadview, the built form kind of hints that there might be a few blocks of Sloane Square-style things around Yonge, but there just aren't. The transition to towerville is abrupt. Passing Maple Leaf Gardens heading west is like going from Brookline, Massachusetts, into Midtown Manhattan in the space of a block.

Canada has almost no fine-grained, medium-density, mixed-used neighbourhoods. Toronto is growing a lot, but few new neighbourhoods of that style are being built there because land prices are too high and development is too tightly regulated (the developers tend to be bigger companies and there are high fixed startup costs so larger projects are more attractive). For the most part it's highrise or nothing and the building footprints tend to be large.

It's too bad because I think there is a lot more demand for these neighbourhoods than there is supply. It would be nice if new cities could be built like this, or if some areas along the fringes of inner cities could be upgraded to this form. Without so much distortionary regulation I think it would happen naturally, and space in urban cores would probably become cheaper.

[rousseau]

I fantasize about being rich enough to buy a whole area somewhere not far from a city centre, dividing it into narrow Victorian-sized lots, and inviting multiple architects to submit individual designs for the lots.

My fantasy is still in the preliminary stages. Would I simply sell individual lots to anyone and (get the city to) allow them to do whatever they want with them? Or would I pay the architects for the designs and then use the ones I liked to assemble a nice streetscape?

Would the former be too chaotic? Or would it be the only way to produce the kind of satisfyingly fine-grained urban fabric that I'd want, given the tendency to homogeneity of centralized control?

[hipster duck]

I think that 5-6 storey apartment blocks that come right up to the sidewalk of are the best urban form that exists, and that the ornate 19th bourgeois apartment blocks of continental European capitals are the absolute zenith of city design, having not been surpassed before or since.

However, I think that urbanism in the 21st century will be more about shoehorning adaptive uses and DIY public realms into low slung, chaotic environments under a mature tree canopy.

You're already seeing this in Asia, where neighbourhoods like Shanghai's French Concession (see giallo's pics) or Tokyo's Omotesando are some of the most coveted parts of town. I think this phenomenon will only grow as the world gets hotter, and people want to escape from the baking concrete.

In that sense, I think Canada's cities will be looked on very favourably in the future by urbanists.

[Martin Mtl]

Originally Posted by someone123

Canada has almost no fine-grained, medium-density, mixed-used neighbourhoods.

I really need to make you discover Montreal one day. The foot print of such neighborhood in Montreal is so large that we could actually afford to give some of it to other cities.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by Martin Mtl

I really need to make you discover Montreal one day. The foot print of such neighborhood in Montreal is so large that we could actually afford to give some of it to other cities.

I've been to Montreal many times. It has some great neighbourhoods, but how large, really, is the area of medium-scale mixed-use buildings similar to the 5-8 storey flats with shops on the ground floor that you find in large areas in central London or Paris?

There probably was a substantial core like this that was mostly eaten up by the downtown and redeveloped as office towers and highrise apartment buildings. Beyond that it drops pretty quickly to triplex type neighbourhoods that follow a pattern of segregated commercial uses along main streets and residential only on the sidestreets. I think these are great neighbourhoods and they are higher density than the heritage buildings in comparable parts of other Canadian cities but they are somewhat lower density and less mixed use than what I'm talking about.

[kool maudit]

Originally Posted by rousseau

I fantasize about being rich enough to buy a whole area somewhere not far from a city centre, dividing it into narrow Victorian-sized lots, and inviting multiple architects to submit individual designs for the lots.

My fantasy is still in the preliminary stages. Would I simply sell individual lots to anyone and (get the city to) allow them to do whatever they want with them? Or would I pay the architects for the designs and then use the ones I liked to assemble a nice streetscape?

Would the former be too chaotic? Or would it be the only way to produce the kind of satisfyingly fine-grained urban fabric that I'd want, given the tendency to homogeneity of centralized control?

I have had this same fantasy! Even picked a spot in Griffintown that's probably full now.

(Got a few ideas on how to scale traditional Montreal triplex architecture up to six storeys too. But this is just Triplettes de Belleville-style thought doodling...)

We should Kickstarter something like this.

[Martin Mtl]

Originally Posted by someone123

I've been to Montreal many times. It has some great neighbourhoods, but how large, really, is the area of medium-scale mixed-use buildings similar to the 5-8 storey flats with shops on the ground floor that you find in large areas in central London or Paris?

There probably was a substantial core like this that was mostly eaten up by the downtown and redeveloped as office towers and highrise apartment buildings. Beyond that it drops pretty quickly to triplex type neighbourhoods that follow a pattern of segregated commercial uses along main streets and residential only on the sidestreets. I think these are great neighbourhoods and they are higher density than the heritage buildings in comparable parts of other Canadian cities but they are somewhat lower density and less mixed use than what I'm talking about.

Actually, London is remarkably similar to Montreal in its residential neighborhood. Lots and lots of three storeys brick buildings. Paris, now, is another story. The 5-8 storey standard is arbitrary though.. Miles and miles of tighly packed triplexes is already on another level compare to the build form of pretty much any other cdn cities.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by Martin Mtl

Actually, London is remarkably similar to Montreal in its residential neighborhood. Lots and lots of three storeys brick buildings. Paris, now, is another story.

I am talking about stuff like this: https://www.google.ca/maps/@51.5199476,-...qK-bMXktMGl0Hsy58pe3w!2e0!7i13312!8i6656

There is a lot of it in London (many square kilometers) and not a lot in Montreal (or any Canadian city).

The 5-8 storey standard is arbitrary though.. Miles and miles of tighly packed triplexes is already on another level compare to the build form of pretty much any other cdn cities.

It might be arbitrary but it's the range I like the most, and it seems other people appreciate this type of neighbourhood too. I wasn't talking about which Canadian city had the best approximation, or trying to rank Canadian cities.