Filip said:
I really think that looks horrific and shoe horned into an inappropriate site for a high rise.
Click to expand...

Agreed. Does nothing to enhance the concept for this complex. Opportunity to relocate parking wasted as well.
 
Tewder said:
Another slab on the water? This is banal. The improvements to the realm are interesting but they come at the cost of another wall to the lake. I'm convinced that Toronto is still uncomfortable with its waterfront.
Click to expand...

stjames2queenwest said:
Slimmer and taller is my vote. Less slabby.
Click to expand...

With all due to respect ... the proposed tower here is rather restrained only about 30 metres / 100 feet wide east-west and could hardly be described as a 'slab'?




https://www.dropbox.com/s/a3iwxdiyhxfvt2c/2016-02-09 Maple Leaf Quay - Public Consultation - corrected.pdf?dl=0
 
Solaris said:
With all due to respect ... the proposed tower here is rather restrained only about 30 metres / 100 feet wide east-west and could hardly be described as a 'slab'?
Click to expand...

It's wider than it is deep. That's a slab in my books.... or not, call it what you want but this design adds to the problem rather than mitigating it. Fail.
 
Visually the new tower will basically form one mass with existing slabs. The perspective of the posted rendering is so stretched horizontally - this is the existing plex look like from the Gardiner

upload_2016-2-26_15-9-14.png

(Google Maps)

AoD
 

Attachments

  • upload_2016-2-26_15-9-14.png
    upload_2016-2-26_15-9-14.png
    421.9 KB · Views: 1,689
The Google Maps view looks more strangely distorted than the rendering does.

If the new tower's a slab, it's nowhere near as slabby as the existing buildings. Grayscale fail for only seeing "slab" in a binary way.

Meanwhile, these guys are looking at giant living walls on the east and west towers, adding architectural elements to the roofs of the existing towers, and greening the rest of the existing rooftops, so, are they really cheaping out on this, trying to squeeze every last dollar out of it with no return? No, we're getting something with some thought to it here… but don't let that stop the auto-bitching.

I think the City will have a problem with the 5-metre trade-off for the tower separation, wanting 25-metres on the west side while they'll want to keep the 30 metres on the east side. Who knows how much density the site should have in total, so who knows how much give and take there'll be, but I am willing to bet that the final plan for the new tower will have its massing changed somewhat. Maybe not as wide, maybe taller?

42
 
Tewder said:
Another slab on the water? This is banal. The improvements to the realm are interesting but they come at the cost of another wall to the lake. I'm convinced that Toronto is still uncomfortable with its waterfront.
Click to expand...
Its just that Toronto has no idea what to do with its Waterfront that's the issue. We should be really thankful for Waterfront Toronto's existence, because if we didnt have them all we would have is condos (a la Humber Bay level) lining the waterfront from Etobicoke to the Portlands.
 
The whole reason the towers exist at Humber Bay is because there is a large, beautiful park between them and the lake..
 
Got notice today the entire parking garage is going to be overhauled, with rolling shutdowns of every spot over 12 weeks starting april 15.
 
Kitsune said:
Got notice today the entire parking garage is going to be overhauled, with rolling shutdowns of every spot over 12 weeks starting april 15.
Click to expand...

That's great. I have high hopes given what they've done so far. Not sure exactly what they can do to the parking garage to make it more waterfront friendly but I'm eager to see it.
 
I"m unhappy with the aesthetic choices here too. Where is the sense of whimsy, romance, fun of being by the water? It's like this was designed for an office park along a highway in Mississauga. This design style turns its back on the lake as surely as the massing does.

What a shame that given such a central 'post card' location on the waterfront a designer would give us this. I would fire anybody who put this across my desk for lack of imagination or understanding of context.
 
From the report linked above:

A pre-application community meeting was held on February 9, 2016 by Councillor Joe Cressy's office. At this meeting, the community raised concerns regarding the height of the proposed 29- storey building and the potential overdevelopment of the site.​

To make it more true, here's how I would have word it:

A pre-application community meeting was held on February 9, 2016 by Councillor Joe Cressy's office. At this meeting, the community was broadly supportive of what was presented. If anyone raised concerns regarding the height of the proposed 29- storey building and the potential overdevelopment of the site, they did it privately and not during the question and answer session that followed the presentation. The planning department, however, has decided for this report to characterize the community response in a way that suits their own bias.​

Essentially, no-one made a single negative comment at the meeting. People seemed pretty impressed with what was presented, especially the living walls on the north side. It's very disappointing that Michelle Knieriem, the planner writing the report, wants to present a skewed reality.

42
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to post here.

Back
Top