Seems strange that a proposal of this scale, especially one including office space, would land right as interest rates climb and the real estate bubble seems set to burst. Yes Calgary is contrarian in almost all aspects, but a project this size would be very challenging to market.

Also, very off brand for Calgary's tallest to be anything other than an office tower.
 
Last edited:
FCC1982 said:
Thanks for that hcf, I would have thought tower Elevations would be there. Possibly just not uploaded by the City yet.
Click to expand...

Based on the plans of the towers shown so far being generic outlines I'm guessing the design of the towers is still in flux. Think they just wanted to get into the city for the most contentious part, the podium and it's major major impacts to the existing buildings. Get approval on that and you can move forward on demolition and all the grade impacts.

Towers will come along as a separate item, with less controversy. That's also going to be part of the problem in my mind as it feels like the towers are going to appear disconnected from the lower 6/9.
 
Well, if they are part of the DP application, a design will need to be completed. Can't approve a DP if you don't know what it is.

I have heard less than stellar things from people who have seen the design, but I may just be spreading rumours at this point. I really want to see a rendering released. I am a bit surprised this hasn't garnered media attention yet. You would think the largest project in downtown Calgary in at least a decade (ever?...) would warrant a David Parker story in the Herald, including flashy renderings.
 
All I can say is that if a building with this kind of massing gets built, it will just reinforce all the worst aspects of downtown Calgary. You really want more of this?? Because you're going to get more of this. It's the perfect example of how we can keep building tall towers (including residential!) while also making our downtown deader and deader.

I can't believe anyone would entertain the idea of bulldozing the last remaining block of pre-war, human-scaled retail buildings, and replacing it with a single glass monolith. Have we learned nothing from the past 70 years of development in North American downtowns? I can't believe people on this board are actually excited about this project. And the idea of doing all of this just to reclaim the tallest tower in Western Canada has got to be the most "Calgary" sentiment I've ever seen.
 
MichaelS said:
Well, if they are part of the DP application, a design will need to be completed. Can't approve a DP if you don't know what it is.

I have heard less than stellar things from people who have seen the design, but I may just be spreading rumours at this point. I really want to see a rendering released. I am a bit surprised this hasn't garnered media attention yet. You would think the largest project in downtown Calgary in at least a decade (ever?...) would warrant a David Parker story in the Herald, including flashy renderings.
Click to expand...
Perhaps they are going for minimum media exposure until the project is well underway.
 
There is also a real risk here than if a full block side of Stephen Ave is reduced to facades that its National Historic Site designation could be revoked.

Also I see 5 of the 7th avenue buildings have municipal heritage designation, ie legally protected. Therefore if that portion proceeds as planned that will be the end of the municipal designation program, no one will think it's worthwhile if council votes to strip it away from 5 buildings at once.
 
Last edited:
JoeUrban said:
There is also a real risk here than if a full block side of Stephen Ave is reduced to facades that its National Historic Site designation could be revoked.
Click to expand...
The Canadian system is little like the USA system. The plaque would stay as long as character-defining elements remain. The plaque went up after the facadism of the convention centre. The

Those elements are:
1652139605193.png
 
darwink said:
The Canadian system is little like the USA system. The plaque would stay as long as character-defining elements remain. The plaque went up after the facadism of the convention centre. The

Those elements are:
View attachment 399279
Click to expand...
The question becomes how much of the existing strip can lose those characteristics before it's not worthy of being considered a site of national importance?
 
I’ve seen some of the renders now, nothing to blow my hair back. Confirmed a lot of my issues with it honestly. The elevation drawings are pretty accurate I can see why they left out the colour and detail, frankly I have a lot of problems with the design, lots to unpack. For a signature group of towers improvements have got to be made IMO. Office is first phase, residential is massing models so no detail on those really they are massing models.
 
Last edited:
Two new tallests, in a cluster with our four current tallests.
 
MichaelS said:
I have heard less than stellar things from people who have seen the design, but I may just be spreading rumours at this point. I really want to see a rendering released. I am a bit surprised this hasn't garnered media attention yet. You would think the largest project in downtown Calgary in at least a decade (ever?...) would warrant a David Parker story in the Herald, including flashy renderings.
Click to expand...
Following the process used for the Stantec tower. The design can be a piece of crap as long as it's the tallest.
 
Absolutely brutal. It will destroy Stephen Avenue and Stephen Avenue is one of the only character areas we have in a downtown that desperately needs revitalization. How do I know? Keeping the facades of historical buildings while building a large podium in behind was tried with the Telus Convention Centre. Does anyone genuinely feel like that block is a part of Stephen Ave or draws any interest? No.

Tearing down historical buildings of no real historical value has also been done before. Remember Penny Lane? Sure we now have 2 nice towers in the skyline but I remember reading all the fancy architect speak on Eighth Avenue Place documents about how the podium was going to integrate with the pedestrian realm on Stephen Avenue and create street presence and blah blah blah. That block is now completely dead and the incredible street level vibrancy and character (even if a little gritty) we had in Penny Lane is gone forever.

This new development takes the worst parts of how we have already destroyed vibrancy on Stephen Avenue and combines them into one mega-project that will also block out the lighting installation on Telus Sky from the south. Just so what? We can brag we have an ugly tower on a crappy podium that's taller than Edmonton's ugly tower on a crappy podium?

Sadly I don't see any defenders of Stephen Avenue on this Council. They are going to see rising downtown property values and density and they will gleefully rubber stamp this and future generations of Calgarians will be wondering WTF was in those Covid vaccines that caused us to make such a stupid decision for the future of our city.
 
You must log in or register to post here.

Back
Top