Toronto Sugar Wharf Condominiums (Phase 2) | 283.6m | 85s | Menkes | a—A

nightstreak said:
This image is representative of what should not be happening during a waterfront redevelopment. The Public park is set behind a private development on the water. Yes, the water's edge — all 10 metres of it — is public but people have to go around. That view to the water under the bridge is kind of insulting, considering the pedestrian path is blocked by a private enclosed passageway.

img_3328-jpeg.688963

Photo: @mburrrrr

Waterfront Toronto has been able to mostly avoid this over the last 20 years but missed on this one which is hopefully fixable in the future if the sugar refinery gets redeveloped. The location of the smoke stack could be a passageway to the water from the park.
Click to expand...
Lawns, picnic tables, shade trees and an enclosed dog park. This will become the most used park in the core. The antithesis of June Callwood Park.
 
Amare said:
This is so damn cold, generic, bland, sterile, unimaginative, lifeless, soulless, _______insert any other adjective.

Another piece of prime waterfront real estate is about to be wasted by a soul-sucking, washed up development that brings nothing of substantial benefit to the area.

Honestly, this is atrocious.
Click to expand...
But it will make rich people more rich! Isn't that the goal of society? 🙃

As an aside this reminds me of a-A's work on the Chateau Laurier expansion in Ottawa which took years to get approved because they kept proposing generic soulless dreck over and over and refused to understand why Ottawa didn't like it. Except we don't have Ottawa's ability to say no here, so we're stuck with the soulless dreck.
 
JayRonto14 said:
What a huge disappointment. One of the most plain looking rectangular boxes on such a prime location too... They could not make it anymore obvious with the lack of effort of the design here. What a shame this is.
Click to expand...
...well, they're not really rectangular...the floor plates are angled. Sorta. But I get your point. >.<
 
Otis_YVR said:
The school is back in the new podium? I guess I missed a step. Last I heard it was moving over to the LCBO building - or did I dream that?
Click to expand...
SCHOOL (and Daycare) are in stand-alone buildings along the northern edge of the site closest to the Gardiner and Lake Shore Blvd. inside the "wrapper" of the old LCBO buildings.

1762953909221.png

SCHOOL is within the 4-Storey "Heritage" building on the LEFT side of the image in the most-recent article.

On a plus side, this means that the SCHOOL could proceed without waiting for the Condo project to reach 70% pre-sales -- so we might actually see the school completed before 2035, but I am not holding my breath.
 
So the school at the north, and the park at the south, with condo buildings in between the two? Seems bizarre if that's the case.
 
ComptoirGeneral said:
It looks like this will have a connection to the path. I wonder if they intend to connect it to Sugar Wharf Phase One.
Click to expand...
Yes it would be connected to Phase 1 of Sugar Wharf as well.

Actually if you go to Phase 1, you'll see some PATH already signage up. Not minding the fact that it's currently not connected to anything...
 
I remember when someone posted a comment about the generic design of a particular aA building some 15 or so years ago,. Urban Shocker’s response was that Toronto should be so lucky if all the towers were designed by aA. I can’t imagine a more horrible fate for the skyline. These could easily be buildings from aA 15 years ago.. They have designed some very good buildings, but this is a step backwards and it is, in my opinion, terrible that these buildings will be front and centre on our waterfront.

Urban Shocker- “The Great Man's condominium building spires punctuate the skyline of 21st century Toronto as distinctively and delightfully as Sir Christopher Wren's church spires announced themselves on London's skyline three hundred years ago.” If only it were so. He was an excellent commentator, a beautiful writer and generally had a great understanding of the role of architecture. I loved and miss his posts, but I believe his love for the work of Peter Clewes, as evidenced by the previous comment, blinded him to the bland sterility he was championing. The proof is in these designs all these years later.
 
Last edited:
TossYourJacket said:
But it will make rich people more rich! Isn't that the goal of society? 🙃
Click to expand...
I note your facetiousness. My response to your question, in all seriousness, is that there must be a seismic shift in how advanced societies view wealth, especially extreme wealth. It must begin to be more widely regarded as the obscene affront to humanity that it is. We have thousands of people lying in sleeping bags on the street, dying of hunger, addiction, and neglect, millions more desperately subsisting on low pay in expensive cities, and simultaneously, Tesla is offering that Nazi guy a $1 trillion payout. It's comic-book-level villainy that would be darkly amusing in fiction, yet it is reality, built into the system.

As to the proposed designs, I always seem to be in the minority, but I fancy them. I should qualify that by saying I generally favour, for skyscrapers, boxy designs that aren't outlandish or angular. (e.g. the ugly EY tower or the goofy-looking 160 Front.) Are these new Sugar Wharf buildings in any way groundbreaking? Not at all, but they are sleek and handsome, imo. I just wish developers would delve more into different colours. Not every building has to be the same infernal shade of light blue/grey!
 
The article notes that Menkes is trying to advance the first tower of phase 2 as a rental.

Many of them will be living and working in Sugar Wharf, where preliminary Phase II plans include: three residential towers with more than 2,600 units, including a purpose-built rental apartment with about 750 market and affordable units; an elementary school being designed in collaboration with the Toronto District School Board; and a children's daycare centre designed in collaboration with the City of Toronto.

“Since the condo market is totally shut down, we don't have an anticipated start date yet,” Menkes said. “We’re shovel-ready on the first tower.

"We’re ready to begin construction and we're negotiating our agreements with both our municipal and federal partners towards getting the development of the first tower, which will be a rental building.”
Click to expand...
 
“It's connected to the PATH system right into CIBC Square. It's a mini city and it's pretty awesome that everything you need is right here.”
Click to expand...
I'm still struggling to envision how this can be connected to the PATH through CIBC square. According to another poster in the PATH thread

[It will connect] out of CIBC Square I.

It will be a huge pedestrian bridge out over the parking ramp to CIBC Square off Yonge St, then under the Gardiner and into Pinnacle One Yonge. I have no idea on timing - not sure if Pinnacle is building it as a part of the current phase or waiting for phase 3.
Click to expand...

It doesn't seem possible for a bridge to be constructed under the Gardiner in the area around Yonge & Lake Shore, considering the numerous on- and off-ramps, as well as the Gardiner's low height. The only way it looks possible is if it goes entirely underground but that would be quite the long stretch of nothingness between CIBC Square I and Pinnacle before connecting to Sugar Wharf.
 
You must log in or register to post here.

Back
Top