Quote:
Originally Posted by GlassCity
Those Richmond proposals look spectacular, but as always everything will depend on execution. Great to see some office space in that second proposal too, it's much needed in Richmond's city centre. Hoping these get approved!
Absolutely. Buildings don't need to be tall to be interesting, or be part of good urban form. Richmond's city centre development is textbook smart growth, and the resulting landscaping and street interaction results are superb. Its downtown won't be nearly as tall as others' for obvious reasons, but its services will easily match anybody in its weight class.
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After all the current projects are done, the next layer is going to cause Richmond to become a very interesting place. Eventually that kind of density is going to attract increasingly interesting non residential components: services, cultural facilities and even things that are destination scale attractions. Imagine the restaurants, clubs, arts facilities, parks and urban spaces, the built structure and improvements to the public realm. All of these things are bound to follow the number and density of residents central Richmond is accomplishing.
(How about a permanent, intensified, expanded and richer version of the night market. What could it be in 10, 15, 20 years?)
The flat building height limited form should be exciting to people on this forum. Here, in Vancouver, home of the clustered and endless highrise, we have this unique example of a mid-rise, on a small scale of older Milan, Vienna, etc., centre with which we can witness a different kind of growth . . . it is and will be fascinating.