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Originally Posted by jollyburger
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Are these people actually even reporting on a new tower, or has everyone just got something confused with B6? There already is a 5th tower planned on the Block; B6.
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Originally Posted by jollyburger
Just wondering how they squeeze in a tower if they demolish one of the parkades.
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There should be plenty of space if they demolish either the Eleveigh St. Parkade or the Pender St. one.
Offices don't abide by the same 80ft. Tower Spacing rules as Residential Towers.
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Originally Posted by Prometheus
There has already been talk that it is going to be the parkade on Pender
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Source?
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Originally Posted by Vin
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Yeah, but none of the new office towers coming into existence since the start of the supply crunch have exactly arrived yet.
So far, we're in a lull period where demand is still rising but supply is still constrained due to construction schedules.
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Originally Posted by logan5
Our office district is confined to a very small area because in the last 3 decades the city has allowed almost all of downtown to be developed with residential towers, leaving very little room for office development, so I would have to say that office development is suffocated to a certain extent.
There would appear to be a market for office towers much taller than what the height restrictions dictate, as Vancouver office space costs almost as much as Toronto office space. Occupancy costs in Vancouver are rising faster than any city in Canada, and if current trends continue, we will surpass Toronto as the most expensive office market Canada in short order.
Height restrictions are fine for residential, but for office we need to loosen, or better yet, abolish height restrictions
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Except none of these new towers really seem to be leased out to a single tenant, or have a single tenant dominating the entire building (>50%)- Subleasing tenants don't count. The only times where that happens are in small or mid-rise office projects (like the False Creek Flats office projects)
TBF, abolishing office height restrictions would ruin the point of the viewcones because offices would block the views they are intended to preserve.
Though, note that so far, office towers are continued to be allowed with very little to no tower spacing, which means they need a lot less space over residential for the same FSR. Unless the COV decides to change that for some dumb reason.
There's also still a ton of mid-rise and old A-class office towers that are likely to eventually be redeveloped in Downtown East and the CBD (out of age if not demand), the aforementioned False Creek Flats, and the upcoming Broadway Plan (hopefully rational minds prevail- hard to say anything about what's going to happen yet)
There are a bunch of really big Gastown Parkades, too, not sure if anything would ever be done with them, but a new Woodward's would be nice.
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Originally Posted by Klazu
I really wish 1090 West Pender would be built 15 floors taller. The surrounding streetscape would benefit so much from a taller building in there.
I will be amazed if they will really cram another building on that same block, as it is tiny. Do they own any of the lots around B5? There is a lot of prime real estate to develop there...

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It's not that small. The parkade sites actually larger than the other towers existing right now on the site.
Most of the lots around B5 are old office buildings though.
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Originally Posted by phesto
I've heard the plan is to place the fifth tower where the sunken plaza is along Dunsmuir. Tower height would be approx. same height as Bentall 3.
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Wait, what? At that point, wouldn't it be better to match B4 and basically 'extend' B4's floorplates (assuming that's even possible, since the sunken plaza is so tiny as far as floorplates go.)
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Originally Posted by Vin
That's because we don't build large for them to set up shop here. Simple.
I suppose by your logic tenants must somehow prefer office spaces in suburb town centres because those places are experiencing a boom in office construction. And they go tall: some taller than the recent ones built downtown.
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No, because they don't even take up the large ones we do build anywhere near entirely.
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Originally Posted by s211
A (dated?) scheme may have involved a sliver of that parkade. 
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?
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Originally Posted by phesto
I think there are tower separation issues either way, but the sunken plaza area gives a new tower a lobby and address on Dunsmuir (as opposed to an inferior Thurlow location) and would coincide with a complete redo of the underground retail space.
There have also been talks of a much taller tower on the Pender Street parkade site, but it requires a complicated rezoning and likely heritage designation of Bentall 1 & 2. My guess is this tower doesn't surface for another 5-10 years although the new American owners seem to be very aggressive in developing the property, so who knows. 
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Why Heritage for Bentall 1&2?
Though, if the site is entirely built out- widening of B4 into the Sunken Plaza, widening of B3 onto the BMO site, B7 on the Eveleigh St. Parkade, B8 on the Pender St. Parkade and the old office tower on the site, that's one darn big, dense complex.
That doesn't even count anything on the B5 block (like the Scotiabank Tower?), but that's still easily a doubling, possibly a tripling of existing office space- and wider floorplates and renovations for B3 and B4.