The Great Canadian Skyline Thread! II

[caltrane74]

First picture is very pretty!

Looks like a Quebec City of the West!

lol!

[Martin Mtl]

Originally Posted by caltrane74

First picture is very pretty!

Looks like a Quebec City of the West!

lol!

It's pretty, but not THAT pretty.

[Metro-One]

Originally Posted by caltrane74

First picture is very pretty!

Looks like a Quebec City of the West!

lol!

Awesome, thanks! Yeah, it is a beautiful city, I have always enjoyed Victoria, and the natural setting is amazing.

If you ever travel west to Vancouver, Victoria is a must visit (always good for an overnighter).

Here are a couple more pics I took of the city:





The skyline may be stunted, but I love the mixture of architecture throughout the city and the street level is amazing:



With many nice little back alley spots such as this (which Vancouver could learn from):



Pics are my own:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/30634635@N03/page2/

So yes, it may not be Quebec City, but it is very unique for western Canada and again, beautiful gardens and landscape.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by Martin Mtl

It's pretty, but not THAT pretty.

A big part of the appeal of Victoria is really the natural setting and climate. It's pretty unique for Canada. You can go there in January and see flowers and palm trees, and there are a lot of outdoor spaces that really wouldn't work for much of the year in a place like Quebec City. Much of that probably doesn't translate well in photos, particularly when everybody shows the picturesque summer or snowy winter shots.

In terms of architecture and history Victoria is sometimes oversold, however. It is historic as far as BC goes, but its collection of old buildings is very modest and not many important things happened there. I don't even think it's in the same ballpark as Quebec City. It reminds me a lot more of Kingston actually, although it has grown more in modern times.

[ssiguy]

I love Victoria but whnever I think of a Western city that's more in line with QC I always think of Winnipeg.

[Rico Rommheim]

There is no Quebec City equivalent in Western canada. Just like there is no Montreal equivalent in Western Canada, or BC equivalent in Quebec.


Let's just leave Victoria be what it is: a charming, thriving, coastal city in Western canada.

[Metro-One]

Thank you, I don't know why it always has to become a measuring contest.

Take Victoria for what it is, which to me is a beautiful small city, with a decent stock of varied architecture, a great urban form downtown, fantastic gardens, beautiful parks and terrific landscape.

Bottom line, it has its own identity and character, doesn't need to be version of anything else

And as far as western Canada goes, some very nice older buildings

And yes, I do love how they treat their alleys, a much nicer approach than Vancouver (also, dumpsters are few and far between downtown, another great move!)

[Razor]

Originally Posted by Rico Rommheim

There is no Quebec City equivalent in Western canada. Just like there is no Montreal equivalent in Western Canada, or BC equivalent in Quebec.


Let's just leave Victoria be what it is: a charming, thriving, coastal city in Western canada.

It's a safe bet there's no Montreal equivalent anywhere period.

[Nicko999]

Originally Posted by Metro-One

Thank you, I don't know why it always has to become a measuring contest.

Because MY city in MY province is better than YOUR city in YOUR province.

[Witty Nickname]

Calgary Under Sepia Skies by Witty nickname, on Flickr

[Andrewjm3D]

Originally Posted by ssiguy

I love Victoria but whnever I think of a Western city that's more in line with QC I always think of Winnipeg.

How?

[chrisallard5454]

Originally Posted by Andrewjm3D

How?

As Metro said, there is no equivalent to any city anywhere but what I think Rico was saying was that Winnipeg has the most prevalent set of Historic Bones in Western Canada, which it definitely does. This is simply because for the longest time (during which 19th-early 20th century historic buildings were built) Winnipeg was Canada's 3rd largest city, and the others simply weren't there yet. Add to that its decline while other cities replaced their stock with newer buildings (something Winnipeg didn't need to do because it wasn't building anything) and you have one of the best/most preserved historic districts in Canada.

http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/showthread.php?t=189279

[RyeJay]

Originally Posted by Metro-One

Take Victoria for what it is, which to me is a beautiful small city, with a decent stock of varied architecture, a great urban form downtown, fantastic gardens, beautiful parks and terrific landscape.

Dockside Green is reason enough to be totally in love with Victoria.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by chrisallard5454

This is simply because for the longest time (during which 19th-early 20th century historic buildings were built) Winnipeg was Canada's 3rd largest city, and the others simply weren't there yet.

Winnipeg was only third for a period of about 20 years, and only if you look at city populations rather than metropolitan areas. It grew tremendously (more than tripling) from 1901-1911 and was third in 1911, a bit ahead of Vancouver proper. By 1931 it had fallen a bit behind Vancouver, and was a bit larger than Hamilton or Quebec City. Calgary and Edmonton were still small back then.

There's a nice Wikipedia page explaining this here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_Canadian_cities_by_census

The only thing to keep in mind is that these are city populations, not CMAs. CMAs were not used when the census was first recorded, but some cities nevertheless were broken up into multiple municipalities, particularly if they were older or had broken up geography.

[caltrane74]

From what I've seen - Victoria is the second prettiest city in Canada.

[RyeJay]

Originally Posted by caltrane74

From what I've seen - Victoria is the second prettiest city in Canada.

Your subjection is noted; many consider it to be 'the' prettiest.

Some consider Victoria to be boring as hell.

My appreciation for the city is its green initiative through urban planning.

[roccerfeller]

Exactly ^

Everyone will have different opinions; part of the reason everyone lives in different cities or appreciates different things about different cities



I for one am simply happy to be in Canada as a whole. I don't care where I go. Its great coast to coast, I love how distinct each city is. I am happy cities like Vancouver and Victoria are so different, and different from Quebec City or Halifax, or from Winnipeg and Saskatoon, Edmonton and Calgary. Tall skyscrapers define some cities, like Toronto, whereas others are defined by other reasons - the beautiful outdoors. And that may be the wide open skies of the prairies or the Atlantic Ocean. That diversity is awesome.

It would suck if every city was just on this linear scale of growth where "the next step was to become more like ______"

Ew.

What other country in the world can one go up in the mountains and down by the beach in once province, only to go to super flat lands? Where the lifestyle between Vancouver and Regina is so different? Where one is submerged in English culture in one area and then transported to French culture in another area? 2 official languages? A huge array of outdoors and different economical boons? Where some cities can have mixes of everything or be wholly something else? The fact it is so vast and so many cultures call one place home, yet don't have to patriotic to an indoctrinating degree but rather because we all found a way here through some hard ship somewhere down someone in our family tree.

Where the one thing that unites everyone despite political views is a love for Hockey?

Canada is awesome. And this is coming from someone who became a citizen only a few summers ago.

[chrisallard5454]

Originally Posted by someone123

Winnipeg was only third for a period of about 20 years, and only if you look at city populations rather than metropolitan areas. It grew tremendously (more than tripling) from 1901-1911 and was third in 1911, a bit ahead of Vancouver proper.

This was the time period I was referring to, with its large increase in population in the early twentieth century it saw a great number of construction projects, including Canada's first skysraper.



This followed by Winnipeg's slow growth period from 1931 onward protected everything that Winnipeg had built in that time. 20 years is a long time to remain the 3rd largest city in the Country, especially for someone who is only 20, that represents my entire lifetime.

Throughout this time period Winnipeg was almost twice the size of Quebec city, and 1/2 to 1/3 the size of Hamilton. To say it was a bit larger is not quite giving credit where credit is do.

[Andrewjm3D]

Originally Posted by chrisallard5454

This was the time period I was referring to, with its large increase in population in the early twentieth century it saw a great number of construction projects, including Canada's first skysraper.

That was Western Canada's first skyscraper.

Toronto's first was built 3 years earlier in 1895 the Temple Building.



Montreal's Place D'Armes is Canada's first skyscraper though built in 1888.

[Andrewjm3D]

Even those don't really count as 12 storeys has always been the official entry level height to be called a skyscraper. The Traders Bank Building completed in 1906 was Canada's first true skyscraper.