Absolutely agree. There are plenty of gems of buildings in Toronto that struggle behind the wall of utility wires, overhead transformers, wooden poles, cracked narrow sidewalks, lack of street furniture, lack of trees etc, etc.
The previous giant space helmet always was just a fantasy. It should never have been taken seriously. This at least has a chance of actually being built.
Check out this guy from @mburrrrr 's pic above. He's walked into the street not realizing the sidewalk is now raised up, while a truck in a narrow lane was heading towards him.
I should probably say "raised" rather than "elevated". I'm guessing it's been graded to match whatever future redevelopment happens to the plaza on the north-west side. There's a good metre or so drop off the side now.
It's been alarming watching jaywalkers not realizing that the sidewalk is now elevated and surrounded by a fence, deciding to walk in the street, dodging fast moving traffic, only to then end up on the wrong side of an active construction zone fencing on the other side of the street!
I've seen cladding deliveries for CIBC square late into the evenings. I assume this is common practice. It makes sense considering less traffic and easier maneuverability on to the sites.
I'd assumed it was precast concrete rather than stone. Happy to be wrong on that though. There was a post of the materials in the SPA somewhere. I'll have to try to find it again.
For future LRT lines, one of my colleagues suggested it would be cheaper and faster to buy every user of the line one of these exoskeletons, and have them all run instead! :D
There is a silver lining here. If you stand in the right place, and squint your eyes, or crop your photos, you can almost pretend that we have Platform Screen Doors! :D
(Cropped from original pic by Reese Martin.)