The Official Saint John, NB Project Thread - Page 136

Smevo · #**2701** Posted **Jun 20, 2008, 7:19 PM**

I'm split on the renderings. On the one hand, I would've liked more height. On the other hand, it would've looked kinda silly to have a 12-15 storey tower and a large amount of the wharf left empty.

I like parts of it, but it's going to take me a while to decide if I like it as a whole. It's good infill, but I'm not sure if infill is what I like for the site.

SJTOKO · #**2702** Posted **Jun 21, 2008, 5:34 AM**

Beautiful!!!!! Love the green space... The design of the building will improve after public consultatation....

SJTOKO · #**2703** Posted **Jun 21, 2008, 5:37 AM**

So let's sum everything up here..

A GIANT new Irving HQ on Long Wharf - 2010?
North Of Union (Police HQ, Courthouse, two new Condo Towers?) 2010?
Coast Guard Site ( at least two new towers) 2010?
Rocca Condo's - 2010?
Cruise Ship Terminal - 2008

This will make Saint John the most attractive city in the Maritimes..IMHO!!!

Helladog · #**2704** Posted **Jun 21, 2008, 5:49 AM**

It kind of reminds me of the Regional Hospital. A big building on a lot of land. I do like the green roof and the potential for $$$ for public projects and development though.

Joe · #**2705** Posted **Jun 21, 2008, 12:53 PM**

That's what I thought, Regional Hospital. This looks like it could of been a 20 storey tower. In all a great addition to the waterfront. My only concern is the loss of 10 acres of prime waterfront. The renderings of the lantic site in the inner harbour plan looked fantastic. I guess that's now out the window.

PostModernPrometheus · #**2706** Posted **Jun 21, 2008, 1:27 PM**

High rise, it is not.....but as it stands, this is lightyears ahead of the ugly, empty wasteland that is long wharf....the greenspace on the roof is actually a really nice touch...

Parking up town is going to be realy tight with all this stuff going up...

? I wonder if there will be any capacity at all for cruiseship passengers to disembark onto any portion of longwharf in the future....we've become used to using pugsley & longwharf simultaneously as cruiseship terminals in recent years...

There will probably be some opposition to "losing" this port / working site....hopefully, in the end, it encourages the port (which turned a nice profit this year i understand) to reinvest / upgrade / repair the piers of the West side of the Harbour....

PostModernPrometheus · #**2707** Posted **Jun 21, 2008, 1:30 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by Helladog

HISTORIC BARBOURS GENERAL STORE AT NEW PARK

this actually will look preety nice & make much better use of the space....
neat contrast seeing that little historic building / park and the modern high rises around it....

PostModernPrometheus · #**2708** Posted **Jun 21, 2008, 1:35 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by kwajo

I'm not sure anyone has mentioned it in this thread, but Sobeys is planning for a new location at the corner of McAllister and Westmorland. I've included a photo of the lot rather than try and describe it in detail.

That corner lot was for sale for years as the land around was being purchased...I could never figure why it wasnt scooped up & built on before this (besides the fact that it looks like a bit of a swamp)....

Traffic flow could be a nightmare if there are multiple entrances directly onto McAllister & Westmorland....

PostModernPrometheus · #**2709** Posted **Jun 21, 2008, 1:36 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by SJTOKO

This will make Saint John the most attractive city in the Maritimes..IMHO!!!

LOL...I thought we already were.....

kwajo · #**2710** Posted **Jun 21, 2008, 2:09 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by PostModernPrometheus

High rise, it is not.....but as it stands, this is lightyears ahead of the ugly, empty wasteland that is long wharf....the greenspace on the roof is actually a really nice touch...

Parking up town is going to be realy tight with all this stuff going up...

? I wonder if there will be any capacity at all for cruiseship passengers to disembark onto any portion of longwharf in the future....we've become used to using pugsley & longwharf simultaneously as cruiseship terminals in recent years...

There will probably be some opposition to "losing" this port / working site....hopefully, in the end, it encourages the port (which turned a nice profit this year i understand) to reinvest / upgrade / repair the piers of the West side of the Harbour....

The parking impact of the Irving building shouldn't be too bad I would think, given that they've included 2 levels of parking into the structure.

The building will also incorporate a cruise ship welcome centre with stalls for a vendor market, and special roofed area to load people onto tour buses. So yes, cruise ships will continue to dock at Long Wharf, and be almost as well served as those at Pugsley. As well, the port authority did mention that they intended to use part of the money from the Long Wharf lease to re-vitalize the old West side wharfs, which is long, long overdue.

Quote:

Originally Posted by SJTOKO

So let's sum everything up here..

A GIANT new Irving HQ on Long Wharf - 2010?
North Of Union (Police HQ, Courthouse, two new Condo Towers?) 2010?
Coast Guard Site ( at least two new towers) 2010?
Rocca Condo's - 2010?
Cruise Ship Terminal - 2008

This will make Saint John the most attractive city in the Maritimes..IMHO!!!

It's not on the Uptown side of things, but the new Fort Dufferin condo towers will also add to the Inner Harbour skyline.

kwajo · #**2711** Posted **Jun 21, 2008, 2:13 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by Smevo

I'm split on the renderings. On the one hand, I would've liked more height. On the other hand, it would've looked kinda silly to have a 12-15 storey tower and a large amount of the wharf left empty.

I like parts of it, but it's going to take me a while to decide if I like it as a whole. It's good infill, but I'm not sure if infill is what I like for the site.

Part of me wonders if they decided to keep the building plan relatively short in order to avoid any possible complaints about Fort Howe viewplanes. I know that hasn't ever come up before in Saint John, but viewplanes become an issue in a lot of other cities, so it might have inevitably come up here as well.

Plus it's the Irvings we're talking about, I bet someone in the family was worried about the vulgarity of building a giant phallus in the middle of the harbour.

random11 · #**2712** Posted **Jun 21, 2008, 3:02 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by PostModernPrometheus

That corner lot was for sale for years as the land around was being purchased...I could never figure why it wasnt scooped up & built on before this (besides the fact that it looks like a bit of a swamp)....

Traffic flow could be a nightmare if there are multiple entrances directly onto McAllister & Westmorland....

- This is interesting. I was not aware. I heard that the reason why this corner had not been developed sooner was simply because the owner of this parcel of land wanted an astronomical amount of money. This will be the 3rd move for Sobey's in this area as they were once located in the current Toys R Us location. I wonder what Cadillac Fairview will do with the existing Sobey's location.

random11 · #**2713** Posted **Jun 21, 2008, 3:07 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by Helladog

It kind of reminds me of the Regional Hospital. A big building on a lot of land. I do like the green roof and the potential for $$$ for public projects and development though.

LOL - Glad I am not the only person who thought Regional Hospital - That was my first thought. I still think that this is pretty cool and it's great for the uptown. The city must increase the tax base and one way to do this is to give people a reason to live uptown/city core. With the cost of gas heading directly for planet Pluto, people will continue to look for homes closer to work. I saw an article on Global news last week that talked about homes in Don Mills, Ontario depreciating in value right now because people are selling - can't afford the commute to Toronto. This is a sign of things to come.

PersonPlaceorThing · #**2714** Posted **Jun 21, 2008, 5:04 PM**

I would be interested to hear about how likely a Lantic Sugar site development would be without this land swap. Based on the fact that the land is likely contaminated and pretty far removed from the core of the uptown, as well as being seperated from the community by active port uses, I doubt this would happen at any point in the near future.

thebrad · #**2715** Posted **Jun 21, 2008, 7:21 PM**

I'm against it, but remember Pluto isn't a planet anymore.

kwajo · #**2716** Posted **Jun 21, 2008, 8:04 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by PersonPlaceorThing

I would be interested to hear about how likely a Lantic Sugar site development would be without this land swap. Based on the fact that the land is likely contaminated and pretty far removed from the core of the uptown, as well as being seperated from the community by active port uses, I doubt this would happen at any point in the near future.

From what I recall (and I may be wrong), the Lantic site is very contaminated, and it would cost millions to clean up the site before you even think about a residential development, not to mention the trouble of rebuilding the seawall in that area to protect it from storm surges.

I too wanted a full-scale re-development of that whole lower cove area, but maybe it just wasn't likely to happen in the near future. Perhaps we shall never know...

Seely32 · #**2717** Posted **Jun 21, 2008, 8:57 PM**

Well all in all I am not impressed with the height but if they go go through with the gardens green space and walk across the slip It's not that bad. I would have like to see an additional 2 stories. Hopefully this will also have a trickle down effect and attract more stores, restaurants, and retail to support the amount of people who will work in this building. The foot traffic alone will be astronomical and it will help uptown seem way more lively.

Further on restaurants, I wonder what is happening with the Keg, I know they were in town looking at the city last year and I think the amount of development on water street alone could merit one in saint john. There buildings are usually quite nice and hopefully can be added to water street.

Seely32 · #**2718** Posted **Jun 21, 2008, 8:59 PM**

I could also see alot of the bigwigs for BP and irving moving into either one of the three sisters condos or one at the coast guard site. Hopefully our housing market still stays inexpensive in comparison to other cities on the east coast of north america.

Seely32 · #**2719** Posted **Jun 21, 2008, 9:01 PM**

One last thing, I want to put a call out there for someone to do a rendering including all the current projects uptown. I would try but my computer is in the shop and to be honest I just dont have the talent.

Smevo · #**2720** Posted **Jun 21, 2008, 11:46 PM**

I wonder if this will have any effect on Main Street. The pedestrian friendliness isn't the greatest, but it would be nice to see Main Street perk up a bit.

I wouldn't be surprised either if Fort Howe views were a consideration. With legislated viewplanes popping up out of nowhere in a few Maritime cities these days, I guarantee there would have been stiff opposition to Fort Howe views being blocked from the usual suspects. Mind you, the views from the Fort are quite nice and I'm not totally against them being preserved.