[Halifax] Gorsebrook Park (1048 Wellington) | 30 m | 10 fl | Completed

[counterfactual]

Originally Posted by Hali87

I think Mason probably would, if it conformed to HRMbD and maybe went a bit extra to take into account the adjacent houses and park. Although having a streetwall (which I think is required under HRMbD) isn't actually really desirable here - it would only make sense if the entire street (or at least a large part of that side of it) were to eventually be redeveloped in a similar way.

Then again it's hard to say. I don't think this would be allowed under the Centre Plan, which apparently becomes policy soon.

The Centre Plan is policy soon? I thought we were years away.

I cringe at what it'll say, without someone like Andy Filmore driving the process (as with HRMxD). I checked the Centre Plan website on HRM... hasn't been updated in months.

[Hali87]

Maybe it was that they were doing another phase of planning then. I forget what I heard, just that something's happening with it soon.

[counterfactual]

Originally Posted by Hali87

Maybe it was that they were doing another phase of planning then. I forget what I heard, just that something's happening with it soon.

It's entirely possible. My understanding is that it's supposed to go live in 2015... so they need to get moving on it. They've never been great at keeping the Centre Plan website updated...

[fenwick16]

Originally Posted by Colin May

I'll concede my words " refusing to alter the proposal " are not as accurate as they could be so let me say this : The developer refused to sufficiently alter the proposal to gain staff approval. Seperation was one issue amongst several.
It is a very rare event for staff to send a recommendation against a proposal to the council. If you have a day or two feel free to go through the years of council minutes to find such a recommendation.

Although I somewhat agree with your opinion, separation isn't required for a midrise building according to the downtown land use bylaw. The design was split into two towers presumably to break up the complex massing. Only towers over 33.5 meters are regulated in regard to width and tower separation - https://www.halifax.ca/planning/docu...alifax_LUB.pdf (page 28).

A building design with a similar footprint to this Wellington Street proposal is the 8 storey condo project called "The Keep" at 6112 Quinpool Road. The "Keep" lot isn't as wide but is deeper - http://www.halifax.ca/council/agenda...0110ca1115.pdf than this Wellington Street design - http://www.halifax.ca/council/agenda...1028ca1121.pdf. However, the Keep has ground floor commercial that wouldn't be desired on Wellington Street.

I think it all comes down to a design choice. The developers of the Wellington Street proposal seem to think that two separate narrow midrise buildings are more interesting than a single wide proposal.

[Drybrain]

Okay, posting this here because this is where this discussion has focused most recently.

To again (futilely?) try and rebut the constant assertions on this board (usually from Keith, Worldly, and now The LittleGuy) that Halifax hates change/height/progress while the rest of Canada embraces it, here’s a good example of height-phobia from a city a lot of us look to as a paragon of urban dynamism.

In Inglewood, Calgary—a gentrifying, youngish neighbourhood, pretty much as centrally located as you can get in Calgary without being in the commercial core—more than 800 of the neighbourhood’s 3,500 residents signed a petition against a seven-storey condo building on the main drag, because it was eight feet taller than the height limit for the street (yes, Calgary has height limits too—here it’s 20 metres, because the city wants to encourage mid-rise infill, not just high-rises).

Yesterday, Nenshi voted against it, and council put off a final decision until March, in order to get more community input, though it was approved “in principle.” Now council and residents will angle to get concessions from the developer.

This is a far smaller project than the Wellington project, in a more obviously urban location (an inner-city main street) and while it exceeds the height limit, it’s to a lesser degree. And yet: A full one-third of the neighbourhood’s adult residents are up in arms over losing “eight feet of sky” as one person put it, and the road to full approval is still rocky. The closest equivalent I can imagine would be 800 South Enders showing up to oppose Southport on Barrington—a similarly sized project on a main drag. Of course, that hasn't happened.

I’m really getting tired of this constant fallacy that Haligonians are uniquely NIMBYish, or that our politicians especially enable NIMBYism. It's impossible to have a productive discussion on this board (or in this city) about height or development issues, because everything is framed in this (mostly false) way. Every time a project is derailed or residents rally against something, we throw up our hands and say, "Ah, Halifax!" as if this is any different anywhere else.

[Keith P.]

You're rushing to defend a group that cannot be defended. We don't know the circumstances of the Calgary project, what the history is, etc. What we do know is that Calgary is not opposed to tall buildings - all you need to do is look at the skyline. Unlike here, which has a tall-building phobia. As for the NIMBYs, of course they exist everywhere. I think everyone has some of that in them. But here they are pandered to by certain council members like MasonWatts in order to find a rationale for their anti-development, anti-height agenda.

Methinks you doth protest too much.

[Drybrain]

Originally Posted by Keith P.

You're rushing to defend a group that cannot be defended. We don't know the circumstances of the Calgary project, what the history is, etc. What we do know is that Calgary is not opposed to tall buildings - all you need to do is look at the skyline. Unlike here, which has a tall-building phobia. As for the NIMBYs, of course they exist everywhere. I think everyone has some of that in them. But here they are pandered to by certain council members like MasonWatts in order to find a rationale for their anti-development, anti-height agenda.

Methinks you doth protest too much.

As a 15-year resident of Calgary who keeps up to date on what's happening, I know all about the development climate there, and this project as well. I'm not really defending those opposed to the Wellington project, just pointing out that there's nothing especially Haligonian or anti-progress about it.

Also, you can't really use Calgary'sskyline to prove anything about it embracing height. Virtually all the city's tall buildings are located in the commercial core between 9th Avenue and the Bow River, with another area of mid-rise/tallish buildings between the 9th Avenue and 17th Avenue. Like this:



Virtually the entire rest of the city (the vast, vast, vast majority of it) is bungalows and 2.5-storey single-family homes, except along the massive traffic arterials, where you get a bit of height in the form of mid-rises and the occasional suburban tower.

But your response, I think, is proof-positive that no amount of fact or national/international perspective can shake some people's stubborn insistence that Halifax indulges NIMBYs like nowhere else.

[OldDartmouthMark]

Originally Posted by Drybrain

Okay, posting this here because this is where this discussion has focused most recently.

To again (futilely?) try and rebut the constant assertions on this board (usually from Keith, Worldly, and now The LittleGuy) that Halifax hates change/height/progress while the rest of Canada embraces it, here’s a good example of height-phobia from a city a lot of us look to as a paragon of urban dynamism.

In Inglewood, Calgary—a gentrifying, youngish neighbourhood, pretty much as centrally located as you can get in Calgary without being in the commercial core—more than 800 of the neighbourhood’s 3,500 residents signed a petition against a seven-storey condo building on the main drag, because it was eight feet taller than the height limit for the street (yes, Calgary has height limits too—here it’s 20 metres, because the city wants to encourage mid-rise infill, not just high-rises).

Yesterday, Nenshi voted against it, and council put off a final decision until March, in order to get more community input, though it was approved “in principle.” Now council and residents will angle to get concessions from the developer.

This is a far smaller project than the Wellington project, in a more obviously urban location (an inner-city main street) and while it exceeds the height limit, it’s to a lesser degree. And yet: A full one-third of the neighbourhood’s adult residents are up in arms over losing “eight feet of sky” as one person put it, and the road to full approval is still rocky. The closest equivalent I can imagine would be 800 South Enders showing up to oppose Southport on Barrington—a similarly sized project on a main drag. Of course, that hasn't happened.

I’m really getting tired of this constant fallacy that Haligonians are uniquely NIMBYish, or that our politicians especially enable NIMBYism. It's impossible to have a productive discussion on this board (or in this city) about height or development issues, because everything is framed in this (mostly false) way. Every time a project is derailed or residents rally against something, we throw up our hands and say, "Ah, Halifax!" as if this is any different anywhere else.

It's refreshing to read a little reality from time to time. Thank you!

[halifaxboyns]

The history on the Inglewood area is that it's the first main street in Calgary - it was the original settlement. When the area plan was done, the Land Use capped development to 20m and as the new land use bylaw was done, that height cap was retained. You might here the term modifier used - the particular zone that applies in most of Inglewood is the Commercial Corridor 1 zone which dictates height, density and floor area ratio through a modifier (although density is this district is done through floor area). What that means is in the zoning map - those items are specified in the zoning and are absolutely - they cannot be given variances or relaxations. In fact, the Land Use Bylaw says - if you exceed them; we have to refuse your application.

So you might see on the zoning map something like this: C-COR1f2.8h20. That translates to: Commercial Corridor 1 District (zone) - max floor area ratio of 2.8 (2.8 times the area of the parcel) and a maximum height (in metres) of 20. The issue council was being asked to consider was a change from h20 to h22.5 (from 20 metres to 22.5 metres).

The challenge people had was that the community has grown out at 20 metres (and there are several active construction and DP applications going on) that meet this and now someone came in asking for greater. There were very cogent arguments on both sides of the issue because the folks to didn't want it were not just the 'we don't want tall' but brought up issues of shadow impacts, massing. So it was a well informed discussion, IMO.

[Keith P.]

Originally Posted by Drybrain

But your response, I think, is proof-positive that no amount of fact or national/international perspective can shake some people's stubborn insistence that Halifax indulges NIMBYs like nowhere else.

That's because we do, as has been demonstrated time and time again. Thanks for the cheap shot though.

@Halifaxboyns gave a good summary of the background and history. It is exactly as I suggested. A clear planning directive that had no ambiguity, unlike what happens here far too often.

[Drybrain]

Originally Posted by Keith P.

That's because we do, as has been demonstrated time and time again. Thanks for the cheap shot though.

@Halifaxboyns gave a good summary of the background and history. It is exactly as I suggested. A clear planning directive that had no ambiguity, unlike what happens here far too often.

Oh my god, get over it. There's no ambiguity with the Wellington proposal either. It exceeds the allowed height. By quite a bit. So let's all get over it.

If this exactly same issue arose in Halifax—a bunch of folks worried about shadow impacts from two-and-a-half metres of additional building heightyou'd be the first to decry them as radical NIMBYs holding development hostage out of self-concern.

Just because people are expressing such opinions in another city doesn't make it any more or less reasonable. Halifaxboy seems to suggest it was a pretty nuanced discussion in Calgary, but than, the Wellington discussion also involved complicated issues like shadow impacts and massing, and Keith doesn't have much good to say about the folks raising those concerns. I know a fair number of people in Calgary who feel the Inglewood folks are being totally ridiculous, though, and if you go over to the Calgary forum, you can read a lot of people dumping on them over there.

The issue is ostensibly that the developer wants to exceed the rules, which shouldn't be allowed unless the rules are revisited, as it creates a precedent and essentially tosses the rulebook out the window, creating a confusing development environment and potentially allowing developers to run roughshod over communities. But make no mistake, they're worried about height: The newspaper quotes about "robbing our sky" etc., make that clear.

[Hali87]

Originally Posted by Drybrain

Okay, posting this here because this is where this discussion has focused most recently.

To again (futilely?) try and rebut the constant assertions on this board (usually from Keith, Worldly, and now The LittleGuy) that Halifax hates change/height/progress while the rest of Canada embraces it, here’s a good example of height-phobia from a city a lot of us look to as a paragon of urban dynamism.

In Inglewood, Calgary—a gentrifying, youngish neighbourhood, pretty much as centrally located as you can get in Calgary without being in the commercial core—more than 800 of the neighbourhood’s 3,500 residents signed a petition against a seven-storey condo building on the main drag, because it was eight feet taller than the height limit for the street (yes, Calgary has height limits too—here it’s 20 metres, because the city wants to encourage mid-rise infill, not just high-rises).

Yesterday, Nenshi voted against it, and council put off a final decision until March, in order to get more community input, though it was approved “in principle.” Now council and residents will angle to get concessions from the developer.

This is a far smaller project than the Wellington project, in a more obviously urban location (an inner-city main street) and while it exceeds the height limit, it’s to a lesser degree. And yet: A full one-third of the neighbourhood’s adult residents are up in arms over losing “eight feet of sky” as one person put it, and the road to full approval is still rocky. The closest equivalent I can imagine would be 800 South Enders showing up to oppose Southport on Barrington—a similarly sized project on a main drag. Of course, that hasn't happened.

I’m really getting tired of this constant fallacy that Haligonians are uniquely NIMBYish, or that our politicians especially enable NIMBYism. It's impossible to have a productive discussion on this board (or in this city) about height or development issues, because everything is framed in this (mostly false) way. Every time a project is derailed or residents rally against something, we throw up our hands and say, "Ah, Halifax!" as if this is any different anywhere else.

For what it's worth, I agree with this basically 100%.

A - NIMBYism happens pretty much everywhere. It seems to increase with development pressure, as more and more people are affected by development and the scale of changes on the city increases. As easy as it is to dismiss NIMBYism as some kind of invalid non-argument, construction and the resultant new buildings do actually affect the quality of life of nearby residents, and sometimes in negative ways.

B - Not all "anti-development" sentiment in Halifax is necessarily NIMBYism. Things like preserving viewplanes, sky views, mitigating wind impacts etc. are more concerns about preserving quality of life and things that make our city unique. While I do not agree with all of the arguments (though I also don't think any of them are inherently invalid) these things are also common in other cities. 1970s San Fransisco was having the same kinds of debates as Halifax is now (which resulted in things like height limits that were deliberately lower than existing buildings, angle controls, etc.). My roommate is from Brussels, another city that is still kind of in reactionary-mode to some very heavy-handed modernist developments a few decades ago. I am surprised neither city is ever referenced in the development debates here.

C - We are at a point right now where developers should be following the rules. There is enough development in the inner city right now that we don't need to be changing the rules for every development that comes along. There isn't exactly a housing crisis here. I guess it could be argued that there is, in terms of housing geared towards the city's poorest residents, but this particular development certainly isn't geared at them.

D - There's more to building a good city than just adding more and more people to the core without regard to the physical environment we're creating. I'd rather see a couple projects stall out in the name of staying true to the urban design principles we've been adopting than just make sure everything gets approved, and then in 30 years find that we've created an urban environment that makes no sense, full of buildings that nobody really wants to live in. I'm not saying this is the only possible outcome, but considering the relatively high rate of development (as compared to population growth etc), the relatively stable housing market, and the (IMO) already very livable state of most of the inner city, I think we can afford to be prudent.

[Keith P.]

Originally Posted by Drybrain

Oh my god, get over it. There's no ambiguity with the Wellington proposal either. It exceeds the allowed height. By quite a bit. So let's all get over it.

You fail to see the inconsistency with the 40 year-old "rules" that deem 2 existing buildings non-compliant?

The Wellington debate is all about NIMBYism and nothing but. You don't want to admit that, so I'm done.

[Hali87]

Originally Posted by Keith P.

You fail to see the inconsistency with the 40 year-old "rules" that deem 2 existing buildings non-compliant?

The Wellington debate is all about NIMBYism and nothing but. You don't want to admit that, so I'm done.

Whether the existing rules are 40 years old or not, this would likely not be supported under Centre Plan either. Either way, the two existing buildings are non-compliant.

There is obviously a NIMBY dimension here but it's more than that. The developer is proposing a development that violates existing rules. The city has the option to enforce the rules or to make an exception. The actual benefits of allowing this development must be weighed against the negative impacts it would have on the surrounding neighbourhood (and yes, the people who live there), the park/recreation infrastructure that serves this neighbourhood, and also the development regime (ie. relative certainty vs. shitshow where every development requires public hearings). Do the benefits of this project outweigh the negative impacts it might cause in the long run? I'm not sure and frankly, I'm glad it's not my job to decide this.

I know this will not be a popular viewpoint, but I agree in principle with Waye that adjacency is not (necessarily) planning. The view seems to be that with the construction of the two existing highrises on this street, that the destiny of this street is now to be a highrise street, and we need to get out of the way and let the process happen. I disagree with this approach. (For what it's worth, I definitely support the Coburg development next to Dal's Campbell Building - the context, IMO, is very different). If this street were identified as a corridor targeted for intensification, things would be different, but I don't see that happening. There are plenty of other areas where this would make more sense. It's also not like this is some kind of dying neighbourhood or that this proposal represents a turning point where development on the peninsula will stop abruptly if this is refused. It is one proposal and by no means a perfect one. There will surely be others.

The city really needs to reconcile its planning objectives (ie. the Regional Plan/growth targets) with its design and zoning paradigms (which the Centre Plan is basically addressing). The current zoning regime does not really support the objectives of the regional plan in a way that respects current urban design approaches or the existing built form/residents. We certainly should be adding density to the peninsula, but it needs to be done in a deliberate and predictable way. This proposal is not that.

[Colin May]

Originally Posted by counterfactual

It's entirely possible. My understanding is that it's supposed to go live in 2015... so they need to get moving on it. They've never been great at keeping the Centre Plan website updated...

Centre Plan scheduled to be implemented in mid 2016- just before the election.

See here : http://www.halifax.ca/boardscom/docu...esentation.pdf page 18

more information here : http://www.halifax.ca/boardscom/CDAC...2014Agenda.php

[Drybrain]

Originally Posted by Keith P.

You fail to see the inconsistency with the 40 year-old "rules" that deem 2 existing buildings non-compliant?

The Wellington debate is all about NIMBYism and nothing but. You don't want to admit that, so I'm done.

It seems odd that the existing buildings are non-compliant, but like I posted on here a while ago, this is common. Toronto's Annex neighbourhood is full of modernist high rises built in the 70s. The city's official plan, adopted in the 90s and updated more recently, explicitly states they would not be allowed today, in order to preserve the Annex's heritage and low-rise character. (The same is true in a bunch of other areas, but the Annex has some especially large 60s-70s buildings.)

Plus, the planning rules in question in Calgary are 23 years old, so not exactly up to date either.

[Keith P.]

Originally Posted by Colin May

Centre Plan scheduled to be implemented in mid 2016- just before the election.

See here : http://www.halifax.ca/boardscom/docu...esentation.pdf page 18

more information here : http://www.halifax.ca/boardscom/CDAC...2014Agenda.php

Well, they better get their asses in gear. That is a lot of material to consult & redevelop in less than 2 years.

[halifaxboyns]

Is anyone following the council debate?
I've been following a live blog on and off and the discussion has been bizarre. They've approved an amendment to the DA to reduce the total square footage of the development (was that the amendment the developer brought forward?). But there is still a pretty intense debate happening...

[hokus83]

This is approved now, 9- 6 vote

[Keith P.]

It was approved 9-6, with some conditions. Total square footage was reduced to 140,000 from 191,000, and some aspects of HRMxD were imposed on the design - not sure what exactly. That was a last-minute hail mary from Mason to attempt to derail it. Only part of it passed.

It was bizarre though. McCluskey voted for it because, she said, Dartmouth had gotten stuck with some out of scale developments (it's TOO TALL!!!) and she felt Halifax should get a taste of that too (paraphrasing). I remain convinced there was a personal element to this and that a majority of council wanted to send a message to the MasonWatts faction that they were sick of being lectured.