Great Canadian Skyline Thread II

[Rico Rommheim]

During my recent visit to the parliament grounds I was very underwhelmed specifically by the river facing side of parliament hill. The buildings are beautiful, but the second you walk behind them it's a sad series of parking lots, utility shacks and shabby vegetation.

I also found Wellington Street sadly underwhelming, despite its collection of ornate government buildings.


Also it was the first time visiting Ottawa with Europeans, and seeing the city through their eyes made me realize just how unimpressive Ottawa is as a CapitAl. I actually like Ottawa, but take out a dozen buildings off of Wellington Street and its just a plain Jane Ontario mid sized city.

That's not necessarily a bad thing. Canada has never been a splashy country. So Ottawa is actually an apt representation of the Canadian condition.

[J.OT13]

Originally Posted by 905er

does anyone know what the grounds of Parliament Hill will look like once all the work outside is done? For a national capital the grounds are underwhelming. The buildings themselves are stunningly beautiful as is their placement and then the sad paved road leading to the doorstep and the sad patch of grass out front.. nothing about that says capitol city. I'd love to see a rendering of what it would look like.. I'm assuming some landscaping. Are there any pics of what it'll look like and is there any timeline for when the work is slated to be complete?

I'm not aware of any plans for the grounds of Parliament other than the underground visitors centre and its three entrances below the roadway just in front of Centre Block.

I believe there was a competition in the 1800s for a fully landscaped front lawn, including a large fountain, but the architects of the three Blocks opposed the idea as they believed it would take away from the architecture of the Parliament Buildings.

[J.OT13]

Originally Posted by Rico Rommheim

During my recent visit to the parliament grounds I was very underwhelmed specifically by the river facing side of parliament hill. The buildings are beautiful, but the second you walk behind them it's a sad series of parking lots, utility shacks and shabby vegetation.

I also found Wellington Street sadly underwhelming, despite its collection of ornate government buildings.


Also it was the first time visiting Ottawa with Europeans, and seeing the city through their eyes made me realize just how unimpressive Ottawa is as a CapitAl. I actually like Ottawa, but take out a dozen buildings off of Wellington Street and its just a plain Jane Ontario mid sized city.

That's not necessarily a bad thing. Canada has never been a splashy country. So Ottawa is actually an apt representation of the Canadian condition.

The Government plans on eventually eliminating all parking in the Parliamentary Precinct, but I imagine that may take 20+ years.

I agree that Wellington is underwhelming. Although the buildings are grand and impressive, it has a very sterile museum-ish quality. Using some of those buildings for National museums, maybe add a few restaurants and patios, those kinds of things could help. There's also the proposal for the STO tram (and the debate on making a full loop around Ottawa and Hull) which could remove cars between Bank and Elgin (or reduce car lanes to two).

[someone123]

Originally Posted by ue

Realistically, what do people think is the likelihood of Vancouver, Ottawa, Montreal, or Halifax ever removing their height limits? All of these cities have the growth that could translate into transformative skyline growth, but are impeded by archaic height limits that create a table top effect.

In Halifax there are a few different regulations limiting heights. There's the ramparts bylaw (no new construction to be visible inside the Citadel courtyard), viewplanes (various historical views must be preserved), and then HRM by Design and Centre Plan limits (which I think in some cases are FAR-based and impose some practical limits based on area per floor, although one developer is building a 32 storey tower with only a couple units per floor).

The ramparts and viewplane bylaws in practice only affect the downtown area. I don't think they will disappear anytime soon but it's possible that downtown won't even be in the top 5 or top 10 for tallest buildings.

You can see the effect here with some of the new proposals and U/C buildings west of downtown (mid-peninsula) shown in grey. If you look closely you will be able to see a tower on the horizon near the left end of the shot too, a 28 storey building under construction in the suburbs (also shows the scale of the hills over there which are around 200 m).

Originally Posted by ericmacm

Halifax Watermarked V1-1 by Eric MacMillan, on Flickr

Basically my prediction is that municipal rules won't change much but the notion of what's downtown is going to expand a bit and the Robie and Young area will have its own skyline. The old downtown won't have the tallest buildings. There will be some tabletop effect but not as bad as generally thought because of new construction nearby (and at higher elevation).

[J.OT13]

Originally Posted by ue

Realistically, what do people think is the likelihood of Vancouver, Ottawa, Montreal, or Halifax ever removing their height limits? All of these cities have the growth that could translate into transformative skyline growth, but are impeded by archaic height limits that create a table top effect.

For Ottawa, I can pretty much guarantee that the height limits in the traditional downtown will never be removed.

Up until 2011, developers seemed to think that those height limits applied city wide until one proposed a building slightly taller than the then tallest Place de Ville Tower C. That 35 floor proposal was Mastercraft Starwood's SoHo Italia near Preston and Carling. It was rejected by the City, but a year later Claridge proposed a 42 storey building (Icon) across the street. Not only was it approved, but the City suggested it be built at 45 floors instead.

Icon is now nearly complete and SoHo Italia is now u/c as a 30 storey building. About a dozen towers between the CBD and just west of the Trillium Line are now proposed or approved over the traditional downtown height limits, ranging from 30 to 65 floors.

Even in the traditional downtown, just west of the CBD, we're seeing the tallest approved towers in decades at 29 and 35 floors, within the limit but the 35 is slightly taller than PdV C.

[Rico Rommheim]

Originally Posted by ue

Realistically, what do people think is the likelihood of Vancouver, Ottawa, Montreal, or Halifax ever removing their height limits? All of these cities have the growth that could translate into transformative skyline growth, but are impeded by archaic height limits that create a table top effect.

Over the years I've moved from being super hard-core anti-height limit SSPer, to now being quite ambivalent about it. Downtown Montreal doesn't taller buildings, that's not what makes it interesting or charming. Downtown Montreal's 200m height limit could certainly be changed to a good 225 or 250m, certainly a key points like Central station, but it wouldn't change much.

I'm perfectly fine with our downtown quickly getting filled with 200m towers, there will be over a dozen in a few years. One day, when there's no choice to build up above that we can think about tearing down obsolete buildings and going higher, but now it shouldn't be necessary.

My views on height over everything else was certainly changed for good upon my last 2 or 3 visits to Toronto and suburban Toronto, the least interesting things about Toronto are its bland condo downtown towers and it's suburban subdivision in the skies. Really, these towers only SSP nerds like us who like to gawk at skylike pictures, in practicality they really don't offer much of an interesting street scene. My visit in some of these condos completely turned me off that type of lifestyle.

Give me a city built of plexes and midrise apartments. I could never live in a shoe box condo 50 stories up.

Also, I predict Montreal will get 70 and 80 storey condo towers in the not so distant future, but they will be around transit hubs out in the off-island suburbs. And I guarantee it, nobody will envy the condo dwellers on floor 65 at the Panama Mall TOD. It'll look good for the Mount-Royal lookout though.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by Rico Rommheim

Over the years I've moved from being super hard-core anti-height limit SSPer, to now being quite ambivalent about it.

I feel the same way. Adding to the skyline is just one characteristic a new development can have and there are many others. I tend to rank the net impact on the pedestrian realm more highly. I think my top question for a new development is "does this expand the area that's interesting to explore on foot and spend time in?". Of course a big characteristic of new development is the space that the buildings provide for the new owners and/or tenants.

In Vancouver the buildings are somewhat monotonous and I am not sure it matters if the skyline blob goes up to 200 m or 300 m. The northeast quadrant of downtown running through the old prewar highrises, Gastown, the DTES, and Chinatown is by far the most interesting but maybe on paper is the most underwhelming scale-wise. Maybe a skyscraper would be interesting here if we got a landmark building that looked different and were scaled like the older landmark towers in other major cities.

[Peggerino]

For a city like Winnipeg I think a height limit could be a good thing to be honest. Rather than the few tall buildings we've had in the last decade we could have had dozens of smaller projects filling up parking lots and other unused spaces.

I agree with Rico's statement on Montreal too. In Montreal, as in most nice cities, the best parts of the city are not the cbd where the tallest buildings are but the immediate periphery where there is good density but not super tall buildings (eg Plateau-Mont Royal, Hochalaga, NDG, Verdun). For me, the only major appealing factor to high rise buildings is that they hypothetically can feed a street pedestrians and help generate streetlife. Often though even this doesn't even happen.

[Chadillaccc]

Originally Posted by Peggerino

For a city like Winnipeg I think a height limit could be a good thing to be honest. Rather than the few tall buildings we've had in the last decade we could have had dozens of smaller projects filling up parking lots and other unused spaces.

Many of us in Calgary feel the same way, in regard to our residential mega-builds like the Guardian and West Village twin tower developments, each of which are 150 meters (x 4) and house around 1800 people in the four towers. That could have filled up some seeerious real estate! Not to mention the 22 other 100+ meter residential towers built in the last 10 years.

[giallo]

Originally Posted by Rico Rommheim

Over the years I've moved from being super hard-core anti-height limit SSPer, to now being quite ambivalent about it.

I've spent the last 15 years of my life living in cities with some of the world's tallest buildings, and you know what? After taking a few pictures, and seeing them scroll past in the distance here and there, they offer absolutely nothing to my life or the city's. In fact, they tend to kill the block they're on with massive block-long floor plates, only one or two entrances, and, usually, zero retail at the base.

As time has gone on, I appreciate a good, urban fabric over ego-driven showpieces. Give me central Paris over Lujiazui, Yeouido and Chaoyang put together.

[Monolith]

https://www.flickr.com/photos/photodg/49989829798/

[Metro-One]

Originally Posted by giallo

I've spent the last 15 years of my life living in cities with some of the world's tallest buildings, and you know what? After taking a few pictures, and seeing them scroll past in the distance here and there, they offer absolutely nothing to my life or the city's. In fact, they tend to kill the block they're on with massive block-long floor plates, only one or two entrances, and, usually, zero retail at the base.

As time has gone on, I appreciate a good, urban fabric over ego-driven showpieces. Give me central Paris over Lujiazui, Yeouido and Chaoyang put together.

Put me in the middle ground.

Giant 500 meter + towers with broad bases that are completely disconnected from the urban fabric (essentially being massive towers in the park) are waste besides their symbolism.

But, that said, 250m, 300m, even 400m towers can be incorporated well into an urban fabric while providing iconic status in several ways.

In Japan, most of the tallest towers peak between 250 and 350 meters and are built above / with major transit hubs. These areas are often the most lively and layered areas of the city. These towers in no way take away from the urban experience.

Recently many taller towers no longer require the sprawling base they once did. For example downtown Vancouver could easily build a 250m tower within the same base area as those that are 150m.

So while many places (such as China and Dubai) do a terrible job of incorporating their excessively tall towers into a decent urban form, it is not impossible (especially if the towers aren’t excessively large) and has been done in many places.

Vancouver would benefit from having a good half a dozen towers downtown over 200m with the tallest around 250 or 275m. The transit hub of Granville and Vancouver City Centre would be the ideal location for such. This is where height restrictions should be more relaxed and flexible.

[ue]

Thanks for all the responses, folks!

Originally Posted by scryer

There's a rumour in Vancouver regarding the Bay parkade...

Outside of the core, Senakw in Vancouver is going to let the tall building genie out of the bottle just south of False Creek with its tallest tower at 56 floors as well as a collection of other tall towers. I know that it's not much in comparison to Toronto (or even the Albertan cities' taller towers) but it's pretty significant for Vancouver to start changing its mentality on density & height.

Right now the tallest building in BC is anticipated to being the Gilmore Place building (technically still being proposed but dug out) at 64 floors in Burnaby. In Burnaby and Surrey, they don't have any view cone restrictions or height restrictions AFAIK.

IF I were to throw a prediction out there right now: I don't think that the height restrictions in Vancouver will be adjusted until the next wave of projects completes first: specifically Senakw and the Gilmore project.

That's interesting about the Senakw development. I know about the Burnaby proposals, but I was more or less speaking to the traditional Downtown peninsula. Mostly because I don't think, regardless of what gets built in Burnaby, the image of "Vancouver's" skyline will shift there, or grow to incorporate it (like what happened with Midtown Manhattan or Canary Wharf in London). It's not even necessarily because it technically isn't Vancouver, because it may as well be, but more because there simply aren't the same view corridors for it, unless you are using a telephoto lens (correct me if I'm wrong though). Downtown Vancouver has so many angles that are readily accessible to take in, by comparison, and has all the established buildings.

Originally Posted by biguc

Senakw is outside the view cones, right? I get the impression that the view cones were created to limit tall buildings downtown. They don't seem to cover much outside of downtown, almost as if nobody would ever dream of building a skyscraper anywhere else.

Well, Vancouver is ready to build tall outside downtown. Just ignore the view cone limits and build big around them. Who wouldn't love to see supertalls on Terminal Ave?

Yeah, I agree about Terminal Ave. Could turn Pacific Central into a sort of RER hub too. It would be an extension of the downtown core and its skyline, and there is ample underutilized space.

Originally Posted by someone123

In Halifax there are a few different regulations limiting heights. There's the ramparts bylaw (no new construction to be visible inside the Citadel courtyard), viewplanes (various historical views must be preserved), and then HRM by Design and Centre Plan limits (which I think in some cases are FAR-based and impose some practical limits based on area per floor, although one developer is building a 32 storey tower with only a couple units per floor).

The ramparts and viewplane bylaws in practice only affect the downtown area. I don't think they will disappear anytime soon but it's possible that downtown won't even be in the top 5 or top 10 for tallest buildings.

You can see the effect here with some of the new proposals and U/C buildings west of downtown (mid-peninsula) shown in grey. If you look closely you will be able to see a tower on the horizon near the left end of the shot too, a 28 storey building under construction in the suburbs (also shows the scale of the hills over there which are around 200 m).



Basically my prediction is that municipal rules won't change much but the notion of what's downtown is going to expand a bit and the Robie and Young area will have its own skyline. The old downtown won't have the tallest buildings. There will be some tabletop effect but not as bad as generally thought because of new construction nearby (and at higher elevation).

Thanks for this. So basically you see the South End densifying significantly. I kind of thought the area would be NIMBY central. I could see something like this working, though, as it would essentially be an organic extension of the pre-existing downtown core and its high-rises. It would have as many vantages as the existing skyline does, being surrounded by water.

Originally Posted by J.OT13

For Ottawa, I can pretty much guarantee that the height limits in the traditional downtown will never be removed.

Up until 2011, developers seemed to think that those height limits applied city wide until one proposed a building slightly taller than the then tallest Place de Ville Tower C. That 35 floor proposal was Mastercraft Starwood's SoHo Italia near Preston and Carling. It was rejected by the City, but a year later Claridge proposed a 42 storey building (Icon) across the street. Not only was it approved, but the City suggested it be built at 45 floors instead.

Icon is now nearly complete and SoHo Italia is now u/c as a 30 storey building. About a dozen towers between the CBD and just west of the Trillium Line are now proposed or approved over the traditional downtown height limits, ranging from 30 to 65 floors.

Even in the traditional downtown, just west of the CBD, we're seeing the tallest approved towers in decades at 29 and 35 floors, within the limit but the 35 is slightly taller than PdV C.

Yeah, I figured Ottawa would be a harder sell. The area around Dows Lake, though, could be an interesting development of a new skyline for Ottawa.

Originally Posted by Rico Rommheim

Over the years I've moved from being super hard-core anti-height limit SSPer, to now being quite ambivalent about it. Downtown Montreal doesn't taller buildings, that's not what makes it interesting or charming. Downtown Montreal's 200m height limit could certainly be changed to a good 225 or 250m, certainly a key points like Central station, but it wouldn't change much.

I'm perfectly fine with our downtown quickly getting filled with 200m towers, there will be over a dozen in a few years. One day, when there's no choice to build up above that we can think about tearing down obsolete buildings and going higher, but now it shouldn't be necessary.

My views on height over everything else was certainly changed for good upon my last 2 or 3 visits to Toronto and suburban Toronto, the least interesting things about Toronto are its bland condo downtown towers and it's suburban subdivision in the skies. Really, these towers only SSP nerds like us who like to gawk at skylike pictures, in practicality they really don't offer much of an interesting street scene. My visit in some of these condos completely turned me off that type of lifestyle.

Give me a city built of plexes and midrise apartments. I could never live in a shoe box condo 50 stories up.

Also, I predict Montreal will get 70 and 80 storey condo towers in the not so distant future, but they will be around transit hubs out in the off-island suburbs. And I guarantee it, nobody will envy the condo dwellers on floor 65 at the Panama Mall TOD. It'll look good for the Mount-Royal lookout though.

I do agree generally. Cities are best viewed at street-level and the focus should be on ensuring that environment is as good as can be. Towers, like those sprouting up in Griffintown (or Toronto, as you mention) often are terrible for this. They don't have to be necessarily, but such as it is. And of course being *in* the city, it makes no real difference if 1250 Rene Levesque is 200m or 300m.

I also agree that I'd rather see a bunch of mid-rise and medium density style developments. Small apartment blocks, triplexes, rowhomes, etc are far better than a bunch of towers for an urban experience.

However, if we are building towers, an aesthetic component is the skyline itself, and I was merely speaking to that. If Montreal continues to develop a table-top skyline, it'll have no effect on what it's like to experience the city itself. Well, the towers themselves may, but the skyline effects won't. I was just bringing this as an additional consideration and that having a table-top skyline kinda sucks.

Originally Posted by Peggerino

For a city like Winnipeg I think a height limit could be a good thing to be honest. Rather than the few tall buildings we've had in the last decade we could have had dozens of smaller projects filling up parking lots and other unused spaces.

I agree with Rico's statement on Montreal too. In Montreal, as in most nice cities, the best parts of the city are not the cbd where the tallest buildings are but the immediate periphery where there is good density but not super tall buildings (eg Plateau-Mont Royal, Hochalaga, NDG, Verdun). For me, the only major appealing factor to high rise buildings is that they hypothetically can feed a street pedestrians and help generate streetlife. Often though even this doesn't even happen.

I mean, aside from 300 Main, Winnipeg's new construction is pretty stubby. True North Square makes zero dent in the city's skyline, and you have to be within a few blocks of it to really notice its presence.

But yeah, those vast parking lots would be better filled up by some nice, human scaled multi-unit developments, like rowhomes or small apartment blocks, mimicking the scale of the Exchange, perhaps, at most.

[MonkeyRonin]

These debates on the merits of height limits usually seem to present a false dichotomy of examples that essentially boil down to Cityplace vs Paris, in the exteme.

But, those are not the actual options we're being presented with in 2020; nor is the quality of the street level interface of a building inherent to its height. And to that end, the ground floor of a typical modern high rise usually ends up looking pretty similar to the ground floor of a typical modern midrise, all else being equal.

In any case, a 200m height limit kind of defeats the purpose. At that height it's already skyscraper, and there isn't going to be any discernable different at grade between a <200m skyscraper and a >200m skyscraper. With that kind of limitation, you're still getting the perceived hostility of towers without getting to enjoy the full extent of their soaring gracefullness.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by ue

Thanks for this. So basically you see the South End densifying significantly. I kind of thought the area would be NIMBY central. I could see something like this working, though, as it would essentially be an organic extension of the pre-existing downtown core and its high-rises. It would have as many vantages as the existing skyline does, being surrounded by water.

I'd say the Robie corridor has the most growth potential. It has a dozen or more developments proposed right now. Some of it is old industrial and commercial land which is easy to redevelop. Part of this corridor extends into the South End (Spring Garden West).

[giallo]

Originally Posted by Metro-One

Put me in the middle ground.

Giant 500 meter + towers with broad bases that are completely disconnected from the urban fabric (essentially being massive towers in the park) are waste besides their symbolism.

But, that said, 250m, 300m, even 400m towers can be incorporated well into an urban fabric while providing iconic status in several ways.

In Japan, most of the tallest towers peak between 250 and 350 meters and are built above / with major transit hubs. These areas are often the most lively and layered areas of the city. These towers in no way take away from the urban experience.

Recently many taller towers no longer require the sprawling base they once did. For example downtown Vancouver could easily build a 250m tower within the same base area as those that are 150m.

So while many places (such as China and Dubai) do a terrible job of incorporating their excessively tall towers into a decent urban form, it is not impossible (especially if the towers aren’t excessively large) and has been done in many places.

Vancouver would benefit from having a good half a dozen towers downtown over 200m with the tallest around 250 or 275m. The transit hub of Granville and Vancouver City Centre would be the ideal location for such. This is where height restrictions should be more relaxed and flexible.

I agree. I was taking a bit more of a black or white approach.

NYC, for instance, is a fantastic example of having both. Toronto seems to be doing a pretty good job as well.

[MolsonExport]

In my experiences, no place beats Japan for the sheer density+livability+skyscrapers. Seoul comes pretty close, and in North America, maybe NYC.

Rare is the city that gets the perfect balance of all three.

[ue]

Originally Posted by Metro-One

Put me in the middle ground.

Giant 500 meter + towers with broad bases that are completely disconnected from the urban fabric (essentially being massive towers in the park) are waste besides their symbolism.

But, that said, 250m, 300m, even 400m towers can be incorporated well into an urban fabric while providing iconic status in several ways.

In Japan, most of the tallest towers peak between 250 and 350 meters and are built above / with major transit hubs. These areas are often the most lively and layered areas of the city. These towers in no way take away from the urban experience.

Recently many taller towers no longer require the sprawling base they once did. For example downtown Vancouver could easily build a 250m tower within the same base area as those that are 150m.

So while many places (such as China and Dubai) do a terrible job of incorporating their excessively tall towers into a decent urban form, it is not impossible (especially if the towers aren’t excessively large) and has been done in many places.

Vancouver would benefit from having a good half a dozen towers downtown over 200m with the tallest around 250 or 275m. The transit hub of Granville and Vancouver City Centre would be the ideal location for such. This is where height restrictions should be more relaxed and flexible.

I agree. Your post just made me think of Skytree, which is easily the busiest part of the Sumida area. It’s very integrated with rail and the podium is actually quite nice in terms of urban design, with plaza space and seating areas that spill out of the commercial centre at the base. Unfortunately, this is less how we build skyscrapers in Canada, although there are many examples in Toronto and Vancouver in particular of towers with good pedestrian realms. In fact, for all the flack that I and others will give Vancouver for its wall of green curtain wall glass, the streetfronts of many of these buildings are often pretty pleasant.

Originally Posted by MonkeyRonin

These debates on the merits of height limits usually seem to present a false dichotomy of examples that essentially boil down to Cityplace vs Paris, in the exteme.

But, those are not the actual options we're being presented with in 2020; nor is the quality of the street level interface of a building inherent to its height. And to that end, the ground floor of a typical modern high rise usually ends up looking pretty similar to the ground floor of a typical modern midrise, all else being equal.

In any case, a 200m height limit kind of defeats the purpose. At that height it's already skyscraper, and there isn't going to be any discernable different at grade between a <200m skyscraper and a >200m skyscraper. With that kind of limitation, you're still getting the perceived hostility of towers without getting to enjoy the full extent of their soaring gracefullness.

I agree. Which also begs the question, once you get above a certain height limit (which Vancouver and Montreal’s height limits do get above) the effects matter little in terms of how it adds or detracts from the urban realm. Montreal’s height limits do little other than create a table top effect. Obviously this doesn’t make Montreal any less great as a city, as the skyline itself is a relatively minor (practically nonexistent) role in the city itself.

[ue]

Originally Posted by someone123

I'd say the Robie corridor has the most growth potential. It has a dozen or more developments proposed right now. Some of it is old industrial and commercial land which is easy to redevelop. Part of this corridor extends into the South End (Spring Garden West).

Ahh. Which part of Robie are you actually referring to then? I’m guessing the parts north of Quinpool?

[Hali87]

Originally Posted by ue

Thanks for this. So basically you see the South End densifying significantly. I kind of thought the area would be NIMBY central. I could see something like this working, though, as it would essentially be an organic extension of the pre-existing downtown core and its high-rises. It would have as many vantages as the existing skyline does, being surrounded by water.

That's sort of what's happening already - the parts of the South End adjacent to DT (Spring Garden/South Park area) and along the edges of the university campuses have been densifying quite a bit. To clarify though the Robie/Young area is between the Hydrostone and Forum areas (so sort of the boundary between the North and West ends). There's more "brownfield development" scale stuff happening in that area whereas the South End is more "infill".

(Robie/Young is Young Street, wheras Young Ave which is in the South End is totally separate and doesn't cross Robie. Yes, this is confusing for everyone.)

In response to the above I'd say there's three main development clusters along Robie right now, focusing roughly at Robie/Spring Garden, Robie/Quinpool and Robie/Young.