Toronto's Mega Boom

[oceanmdx]

image hosted on flickr

[oceanmdx]

"The fevered pace of condominium construction in Toronto shows no signs of fizzling out."

"In Toronto, there are about 148 skyscrapers and high-rises under construction, far more than any other city in North America, according to data compiled by Hamburg-based Emporis. There are 400 planned developments marketing their condos across the Greater Toronto Area, near an all-time high, said Jasmine Cracknell, a market analyst in Toronto at N. Barry Lyon Consultants Ltd."

For the rest of the story: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/repor...rticle2399137/

[Samuel77]

great pic.

There often seems comparisons between Toronto and Sydney, but it is clear that Toronto is quite a bit bigger with many more highrises. This will be even more evident if many of Torontos proposals get up, especially as Sydney has really lagged development-wise over the last decade.

[oceanmdx]

Actually, I don't think that Toronto and Sydney are all that comparable.... Vancouver is more like a smaller Canadian version of Sydney. Toronto gets compared more with Melbourne. As far as size difference... The greater Toronto area, plus numerous other municipalities that are fairly close to Toronto comprise a region known as the "greater golden horseshoe" with a current population of about 9.1 million.

[ChrisJudd83]

Is that Union Station to the right of screen? It had a recent revamp, No? How far out of downtown does the skyline extend and what are some of the nearby neighbourhoods with skylines not defined as downtown i.e in Sydney Chatswood, Parramatta, Redfern, Homebush? What was the waterfront like 20 years ago? Was it all industrial like Sydney's darling harbour or Melbourne's Southbank or was it used for other purposes? What are the chances of sinking those rail lines in the future? You can see in that image that there are plenty more areas for T.O to dense up in order to make subways such as DRL and Eglinton Crosstown viable. Howcome LRT over subway? Lack of funds or lack of density? I heard Rob Ford wants a subway for Eglington

[oceanmdx]

Chris, I'm going to let someone more knowledgeable than I answer your questions.

A video about Absolute Towers in Mississauga:



Note: the old lady in the video is Hazel McCallion, the mayor of Mississauga (essentially a suburb of Toronto with a population a little over 700,000).... she's 91 years old!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hazel_McCallion

[oceanmdx]

looking north up Yonge in downtown Toronto, pic posted by wmedia over at UT....



Some big stuff is being built along Yonge.

[Eastern37]

Amazing shot!

[oceanmdx]

I mentioned that some big stuff was going up along Yonge St.. Here is one example of that:

[Dimethyltryptamine]

bad design after bad design. architects, quit employing 10 year olds! site has so much potential and really, like a lot of this boom, wasted on sub-par design.

[Samuel77]

I dont mind it. Could have been a little more "inspiring". But overall I wouldn't complain if this was in Oz. How tall is it?

[Dimethyltryptamine]

Originally Posted by Samuel77

I dont mind it. Could have been a little more "inspiring". But overall I wouldn't complain if this was in Oz. How tall is it?

I certainly wouldn't complain either, but usually a building of that size would tend to have something a little more to it. I don't have a problem with simplicity, as I find Pearl and Queensbridge Tower amazing in their simple and elegant form. My main gripe is that this building appears to try hard to be 'cool' but falls on its face in doing so.

Architects there should take a page out of Absolute World's books (Mississauga), as it is by far the best project of significant size in Canada in quite a while. Just clad them in better and a variety of materials.

[Samuel77]

Yeah. Something tells me from that video, they have had to massively compromise on the design. Maybe its just me, but that big "sigh" at 2mins in tells it hasn't been a smooth process. He also doesn't seem that excited or convincing about the project. Perhaps this project wasn't quite as they originally envisioned. I know i am reading a lot into his demeanour, perhaps he is just tired, or that is his natural demeanour - but he does also mention about compromises and "going back to the drawing board".

[oceanmdx]

"While Canada's high-flying housing market continues to stabilize, it's increasingly evident that one city — Toronto — is a glaring exception.

In sharp contrast to price moderation in most cities and a significant drop in Vancouver, where buyers are being priced out of the country's costliest market, Toronto buyers are on a spending spree — one that looks as if it won't end well.

New figures from the Canadian Real Estate Association show prices up by 10.5 per cent in Toronto over the past 12 months, the only major city with a double-digit gain. In contrast, Montreal gained a modest 3.7 per cent and Vancouver is down by 3.1 per cent."



For the rest of the story: http://www.montrealgazette.com/busin...#ixzz1sKWj7mI9

[oceanmdx]

Thanks to Filip @ Urban Toronto: Eau du Soleil

216m/708ft... on the lake front





How'd you like to skateboard off those?

[Nouvellecosse]

Originally Posted by ChrisJudd83

Is that Union Station to the right of screen?

Yes.

It had a recent revamp, No?

Work has just gotten going in the last couple of months and is not yet completed.

How far out of downtown does the skyline extend and what are some of the nearby neighbourhoods with skylines not defined as downtown i.e in Sydney Chatswood, Parramatta, Redfern, Homebush?

The skyline doesn't really extend outside of downtown as there are gaps between downtown and other skyline nodes like the Yonge/St. Clair and Yonge/Eglinton area. The downtown extends from the lake in the south to just beyond Bloor Street in the North, a distance of about 4km. However, the highrises along the lake do extend to the west outside what is traditionally considered downtown by perhaps a km or two. The main highrises clusters in Greater Toronto are in North York, Scarborough, and Yonge/Eglinton in the city proper, and in Mississauga in the metro area. There are numerous smaller ones.

What was the waterfront like 20 years ago? Was it all industrial like Sydney's darling harbour or Melbourne's Southbank or was it used for other purposes?

Most of it was brownfield, meaning vacant formerly built up land. Before that, most of it was used for a large railyard for freight services. It's also interesting to note that the land along the waterfront didn't actually exist when Toronto was first settled. The shore of lake Ontario came up almost to where Union station now is. This is partially due to the lake water level slowly dropping since then and partly due to landfill activities.

What are the chances of sinking those rail lines in the future?

There are no current plans for this and based on all info that I've heard, I'd say it's unlikely to happen any time soon. The first reason is obvious in that it would be very expensive, and the areas of Toronto without good rail service take precedence over aesthetic changes to existing. The second is that the rail lines are too important to close to allow the work to be done, and working on the tunnels would be very difficult while the trains are running. It is possible as demonstrated in Boston, but it makes things much more difficult.

You can see in that image that there are plenty more areas for T.O to dense up in order to make subways such as DRL and Eglinton Crosstown viable. Howcome LRT over subway? Lack of funds or lack of density? I heard Rob Ford wants a subway for Eglington

More subway service is already viable, but subway service is extremely expensive to create in Toronto (it costs about $350 million per km, compared to about $150 million in Montreal), so politicians look for ways to service as many areas as possible with the available funds. Since Toronto has intermediate density (higher than Calgary or Atlanta, but lower than New York or Paris) it can be served by either a larger number of lower capacity LRT routes or fewer high capacity subways. Each has advantages and drawbacks and there has been much debate both at city hall and the Toronto section here on SSC as to which is best. In the long term, both will be needed, but there are problems with raising the necessary revenue, since the provincial (state) government and the national government are less willing to contribute than the governments overseeing cities with larger systems.

[Melb_aviator]

Originally Posted by oceanmdx

I mentioned that some big stuff was going up along Yonge St.. Here is one example of that:

I really like that one. Interesting outcome.

[Cariad]

I like it too :o)

[nameless dude]

So this is One Bloor?

A good design overall, I like the facade. But being squarish I think it just needs a more imposing feature on the roof.

[oceanmdx]

Originally Posted by nameless dude

So this is One Bloor?

A good design overall, I like the facade. But being squarish I think it just needs a more imposing feature on the roof.

Yes, it's "one Bloor east"... the original design was by another developer who sold the land soon after the financial crisis of 2008 hit.... so the land went from weak hands to strong hands... and they came up with this new, but shorter building.