Today:

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Thanks to all photo posters (waldo22, midtowner, Red Mars and the like).

Just noticed the orange...
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The streetscape is looking better and better. Cinema Tower, Shangri-La, TRUMP and the Festival Tower. Soon to be added, Pinnacle on Adelaide and The Bond in this shot.

Excuse the lens flare - tried to spice up the picture a bit.
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arvelomcquaig said:
I couldn't agree more. The obsession with podiums of late has always bothered me for these reasons. I find the scrawny-tree-sprouting-from-a-planter look to be extremely ugly and almost suburban. It's like apologetic urbanism; we're making a tower, but we don't want to offend the height-averse, so we'll make a stick tower pop out of a bucket podium. Why do so many of our buildings need to look so diffident? It destroys any sense of grandeur and cultural pride that I get from buildings in Manhattan, for instance. This tapering-at-the-podium technique is another symptom of Toronto's insecurity.

Also, as you say, the attempt to fit into the context with the podium always seems to have a terrible effect on the architecture, as the tower becomes painfully generic and completely aesthetically divorced from the podium below. Another thing that bothers me is the waste of (air) space. I wish these buildings could use all the space above the property rather than waste so much in setbacks and podiums. Using space efficiently, to me, is so much more important than not seeming “oppressive” to those who are architecturally sensitive.
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Do podiums cause cancer too? Towers in the park are suburban, the whole point of podiums is to be urban. A well designed podium has retail on the ground floor directly opening to the sidewalk, architectural details catering to pedestrians, and multiple floors rising straight up. They're no different from any of the urban neighbourhoods we already have. You seem to equate "urban" with "Manhattan skyscraper canyon". There are other ways of building cities - just look at Europe. Allowing sunlight to hit the streets isn't suburban. Neither is having height limits. "Urban" doesn't necessarily mean 40 storeys straight up from the sidewalk. Now I do think that a lot of podiums are too short and badly designed, but that's a whole other conversation.

By the way, the whole concept of setting towers back from the street originated in New York. Some of the city's most famous skyscrapers - Chrysler, Empire State, Rockefeller - are all built with podiums. The Haussmann boulevards in Paris were designed with buildings that have stepbacks on the upper floors so they wouldn't be opressive. Some of the biggest cities in the world are designed like that. I guess they're all suburban and insecure :D
 
Another Manhattan comparison that simply doesn't work when applied to Toronto. We have sprawling podiums because we have sprawling land. When a [modern] tower is built on Manhattan island, it makes a lot more sense to use the entire footprint of the property to build a highrise. Property values are inflated due to lack of land on the island. Here in Toronto however, we build our towers on old industrial brownfields, parking lots and former rail yards. Our only geographical limits are the lake and the greenbelt, meaning in short we have the space to build large podiums and point towers. It is only in locations such as Bay and Adelaide (very Manhattanlike in density) that small lots are built to property lines. If our entire city had the density of the financial district, as Manhattan does, then block long podiums would be a lot less economical.

There is nothing suburban about a podium. A Wal-Mart and Best Buy with nice flat parking lot between them. Thats suburban.
 
I said skinny towers with fat podiums seem almost suburban, as in they feel more suburban than tall buildings that occupy the entire upper lot. Obviously I'm not equating this sort of development with a Walmart + parking lot, but I do dislike the way they look and the waste of vertical space. I don't understand why everyone speaks of shade as such a catastrophic effect of buildings. I'd much rather have shady streets than buildings that have to hide themselves with setbacks and svelte widths.

Mr F, you make the point that there are other ways of building cities apart from that of of Manhattan. I don't dispute this, but I think that Manhattan's way is better. You say that I equate “urban” with “Manhattan skyscraper canyon”; it's not that I equate it thus, but I see it as a more urban (if not the most urban) form, possessing more of the qualities that distinguish a place like Toronto from a place like Pickering, for instance, than anything else I can think of.

My problem is that the dominant view (in society, not [necessarily] on this forum) is that the “Manhattan skyscraper canyon” is an abomination, and that shade destroys neighbourhoods, and that a good street can't have many tall buildings. The popular view seems to be that the more tall buildings there are (and the more their presence is felt by passersby), the worse it is for the area. I don't understand this. Let me ask you: Do you think that a solid, tall, continuous street wall – à la Manhattan – ruins a good street/precludes a good community feeling? If so, why?
 
I agree that I like shaded streets, but I also like some sun to peek through too. In deeply urban spaces there will likely be a number of high rises, in which case having several point towers will create that shaded space but also provide for some sun to come through too. I do love streets like Carleton between Yonge and Church with its massive street walls creating near-perpetual shade, but I also love the sun soaked Bloor Street at the end of the day too.
 
arvelomcquaig, there are plenty of ways to create shade on a street - street trees, awnings, even temporary fabric covers for the entire street. But let's face it, we don't exactly live in a hot climate. It might be easy to forget when it's 35 degrees like today, but the sun is just as important on our streets as shade. There's a reason that people get depressed when it's cloudy for long periods of time, and why weather forcasters get so excited when the sun comes out - that's what people like. Especially in winter.

Put it this way - a street that gets sun can be shaded in a variety of ways. But once you put a street in permanent shade with buildings, the sun's gone for good.
 
I don't think the problem here is inherently podiums themselves, but rather that a lot of them seem so detached from the tower above (despite being literally attached to the towers above). I find there's often little to no design relation between the two, with the podium struggling to serve as some sort of bridge between the existing vernacular and the (often) generic glass tower above.

Now, Market Wharf on the one hand has done an excellent job. The two contrast to a point of complimenting each other (rigid, off-centre brick work podium against a wavy/curvy glass balconied tower). However it's all tied together with the "peanut" motif on the podium and roof of the building.

Here at Cinema though, the tower itself looks like it could've been plucked anywhere from the Etobicoke waterfront and dropped onto this gussied up parking structure.
 
MisterF said:
arvelomcquaig, there are plenty of ways to create shade on a street - street trees, awnings, even temporary fabric covers for the entire street. But let's face it, we don't exactly live in a hot climate. It might be easy to forget when it's 35 degrees like today, but the sun is just as important on our streets as shade. There's a reason that people get depressed when it's cloudy for long periods of time, and why weather forcasters get so excited when the sun comes out - that's what people like. Especially in winter.

Put it this way - a street that gets sun can be shaded in a variety of ways. But once you put a street in permanent shade with buildings, the sun's gone for good.
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True. I guess what I'm saying is that I think the benefits of extreme density outweigh the benefits of sunlight. I'd rather Toronto moves towards a shady Manhattan than a sunny Paris.
 
arvelomcquaig said:
True. I guess what I'm saying is that I think the benefits of extreme density outweigh the benefits of sunlight. I'd rather Toronto moves towards a shady Manhattan than a sunny Paris.
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That your opinion. Toronto doesn't have the wide streets that Paris or Manhattan so often have, so there is a necessity for setbacks that makes the street a little more habitable - particularly during the darker winter months. You may not like sunlight, but some of us actually do. Besides, there isn't some either/or scenario at play when it comes density and sunlight. That's a false dilemma.
 
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