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Originally Posted by Hali87
Then it looks like turning this one down would be a reasonable outcome, because the elevations point out specific building features to be constructed of specific materials, and the rest (about 90% of the visible surface area) is glass, with some aluminum cladding. I guess a building clad largely in metal might look cool, but I think that's the only thing they could really get away with. There's no way to reasonably infer from the elevations that any of the cladding could potentially be precast/wood/brick/whatever.
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Except the elevations in that link are not the ones attached to the DA. The DA ones are even more vague, and while they could be inferred as glass, I would say it's also possible to argue that they do not depict glass and instead are some sort of panellized concrete.
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Originally Posted by someone123
It makes sense for DAs to be specific, and for changes to the plans to require approval, but I wonder if that would slow development down a lot because of poor turnaround times.
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And therein lies the challenge and art of writing good DAs. You can be specific, and risk needing time-consuming amendments if market conditions change or if the developer realizes that what they promised is just not possible. On the flip side, you can be non-specific and risk the developer doing the absolute bare minimum allowed under your loose wording. I'm not sure which is better.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Drybrain
That's definitely true, and I actually think the all-glass towers you see in Vancouver and Toronto are getting a bit tired-looking. BUT, while glass towers may be know for poor insulation and heat loss, this particular developer's other buildings are known for being super crap-looking. So...
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And I guess that really is the nub of the issue. What we're really discussing/should be discussing is quality of materials, rather than the materials themselves. There are certainly some very nice glass buildings that are likely also energy-efficient (new NSP building has tons of insulation behind the glass), and there are also some very crappy glass buildings. The same goes for cast concrete; some is nice, some is disgusting. And so the million dollar question (to which I have no answer) is: how do we get quality design and materials out of our developers? It's not like there's some objective scale of quality that you can write into a DA. So are we stuck just hoping for the developers who get it "right"? Is it a matter to be left to market forces, or can we encourage it in some way?