Surrey Updates

[SpongeG]

as seen from Coquitlam - brunette overpass area

[Whalleyboy]

wow thats awesome

[raggedy13]

Great shot. Makes Surrey's skyline look much more compact and booming.

[Alex Mackinnon]

Originally Posted by twoNeurons

Unless they plan a massive system change, I don't see trolley wires in the future. With low-pollution hybrid buses and quiet electric buses (battery-driven) just around the corner, what are the advantages of trolleys?

Trolley wires tie you to a system with little ability to upgrade for capacity. It's not as if trolley buses can carry more people.

They work in cities with established networks, because they have the infrastructure.

If you're going to string up trolley wires, you might as well lay track as well... and that's called LRT... a system that has advantages in that it can be upgraded for greater capacity down the road... or "rail" if you prefer.

Trolleys will always be the most energy efficient system when it comes down to it though, and after capital costs will have the lowest cost of maintenance and operations.

Battery powered busses are a long way off I'd say and in my opinion hybrids really aren't anything all that special unless you're in stop and go traffic all the time.

[Whalleyboy]

apparently there is a upcoming meeting for a redesign of newton town centre

Please join the City of Surrey and TransLink on June 2, 3, 4 in the next phase of public consultation for the Newton Town
Centre, Land Use, Urban Design and Transportation Plan. Help the project team as they create a new plan for the Newton
Town Centre core. The new plan will guide the development of a mixed-use, high-density, transit-oriented town centre,
fully integrating new and enhanced transit facilities into a high quality, safe, vibrant and sustainable urban centre.

heres the link

http://www.surrey.ca/NR/rdonlyres/BA...Poster_prs.pdf

[metroXpress]

^ In the NOW newspaper...there was a whole section of dates for the public forums. The city of Surrey wants our input.

[officedweller]

Great shot. Those towers at Gateway are great.

******

WRT Newton, remember that TransLink purchased that large parcel where the interurban track crosses King George Highway.

[Whalleyboy]

First reported on over a year ago, the three high-rise Guildford Towers project does seem to be moving ahead, although it’s still in the “city bureaucracy” stage. New renderings for the project have appeared, as you can see below.

from www.civicsurrey.com

[raggedy13]

^Those towers look nice enough but for the most part I'm not a fan of the whole towers in the park concept.

[nickinacan]

Originally Posted by raggedy13

^Those towers look nice enough but for the most part I'm not a fan of the whole towers in the park concept.

Yeah, there's two schools of thought on this type of development. It looks like wasted space, but it also allows breathing room. This would most likely be residential only, so it's not a bad thing. I love the touch with the pond coming right up to the building on the bottom left.

[Kodii]

Towers in a park??!!

*GASP*

Mais non! You are going to have horrible permanent shadows cast upon such a jewel! *cue in Bert Schendel*

I DEMAND we get our maximum allotment sunshine. No questions asked.

[metroXpress]

lol.....here's another update from civic surrey:

The new gateway signage has been installed, and the initial response hasn’t been pretty. I’ve heard complaints about how small the new signs are, and the poor choice of colours, leaving little contrast between the signs’ sections and a park like background. See below for yourself.



Olympic Temp sign



New gateway sign at Hwy 10 and Scott Road

This is the signs that I saw when I was hunting for the new one

The new singage will be made from metal and include a separate flat panel at the bottom, which will initially indicate Surrey’s Olympic Venue City status. I personally find them to look even better than Vancouver’s newest signs.


THIS



AND THIS

[officedweller]

The Vancouver signs are definitely harder to miss.

*****

WRT towers in the park - depends on the location. If it's a purely residential area with no streetfront retail at all (i.e. not a "downtown" retail or designated retail street) - then towers in the park just means "front yards" for the buildings. i.e. most towers in the West End - old or new, if not on a retail high street - have "yards".

[raggedy13]

I'm not entirely sure where those towers are planned for in Guildford but if they're anywhere near Guildford Centre it would make more sense for the development to have been a little more urban in form since I assume Guildford Centre will become another node of highrises in the future which would benefit from having developments with streetfront retail or even rowhouse podiums. If there are too many wide open spaces the area won't be as conducive to walking and the surface parking won't help much in that respect either. The area could also have benefitted from a higher, more concentrated population and that site could've easily have fit twice as many towers. Sure it's nice to have nearby green space but when it's criss-crossed by roads, parking lots, and buildings and shows no attempt to interact with its surroundings the result will just be underutilized space that may look pretty but will ultimately be detrimental in terms of opportunity cost. In the end it's just an attempt at high density with few of the benefits of high density. And I don't think any of the "yards" in the West End are comparable in scale to this.

[SpongeG]

Originally Posted by officedweller

The Vancouver signs are definitely harder to miss.

*****

WRT towers in the park - depends on the location. If it's a purely residential area with no streetfront retail at all (i.e. not a "downtown" retail or designated retail street) - then towers in the park just means "front yards" for the buildings. i.e. most towers in the West End - old or new, if not on a retail high street - have "yards".

sort of like the towers south west of metropolis - its like towers surrounded by "park" looks okay there

[Whalleyboy]

Originally Posted by raggedy13

I'm not entirely sure where those towers are planned for in Guildford but if they're anywhere near Guildford Centre it would make more sense for the development to have been a little more urban in form since I assume Guildford Centre will become another node of highrises in the future which would benefit from having developments with streetfront retail or even rowhouse podiums. If there are too many wide open spaces the area won't be as conducive to walking and the surface parking won't help much in that respect either. The area could also have benefitted from a higher, more concentrated population and that site could've easily have fit twice as many towers. Sure it's nice to have nearby green space but when it's criss-crossed by roads, parking lots, and buildings and shows no attempt to interact with its surroundings the result will just be underutilized space that may look pretty but will ultimately be detrimental in terms of opportunity cost. In the end it's just an attempt at high density with few of the benefits of high density. And I don't think any of the "yards" in the West End are comparable in scale to this.

If you read the link on the orginal report you would see they are right beside guildford centre. There located off the 101A Avenue cul-de-sac

[VanCvl]

I don't know if this has been posted previously, but here is a new map of the developments in Surrey Centre that are either in construciton, approval or development phases.

http://www.surrey.ca/NR/rdonlyres/EC...ARY1620091.pdf

[REX]

That's a good map. There's actually a few projects on there that I've never seen before, namely a 43 storey tower beside Sky Towers.

[paradigm4]

Originally Posted by Allen

lol.....here's another update from civic surrey:



This is the signs that I saw when I was hunting for the new one

For the record, I was commenting on the rendering when I said I thought they looked better than Van's. As it ends up, the colours don't work well, and the sign is tiny. So obviously, now I would consider them something of a failure.

[Whalleyboy]

from www.civicsurrey.com

The City has decided to name both the Games Preparation Centre and one of its gyms after two prominent members of the Whalley community. The building itself, post-Games, will be named the Chuck Bailey Recreation Centre, while the gym will be called Joe Burns Gymnasium.

Both men were actively involved for years with the popular Whalley Little League, and both recently passed away.

The City is pushing to install a large “urban digital screen” on the west side of the new Games Preparation Centre. The plan is to install a high-powered data projector on a tower, which will then illuminate the wall of the building with imagery.

The first round of imagery will be the Glocal project, part of the Cultural Capitals of Canada award, which forms relational links between over 5,000 pictures which have been submitted from across the world.

It’s estimated that up to 30,000 people daily will see the public art.

The City is currently short $51,250 to complete the installation, but is seeking federal funding for the shortfall.

thanks paul=P