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CATHEDRAL SQUARE - fictional piazza concept

3D, I want to commend for your vision and leadership in designing and pushing 'Cathedral Square.' There's a real lack of good public squares in in this city, and, certainly, nothing like the grand European-style piazza you've designed exists anywhere in Toronto. A 'Cathedral Square' development would be a significant contribution to the public realm through its size and design, and it may help revitalize that part of the city.

You've found the right location, at the right time, and you've got a winning design. The site is a huge parking lot; the owners are willing to sell the property; and you've designed a distinctive European piazza that fits perfectly over the site. Perfect!

I have two questions regarding your design, however:

First, why place two tall towers so close to the square? I feel that the towers would dwarf the square. Rather, I think your concept works even better without the towers.

Second, why close the square? (This is one of my beefs with Nathan Phillips. The upper concrete wall around the square is an eyesore and walls the square off from the city.) I think the concept is strengthened by removing the fence and opening the square to the city, which it tries to be a part of.

That's just my two cents.

Again, 3d, I want to thank you for taking the initiative to think of ways to improve the public realm of the city. I hope that one day Toronto will have a public square as beautiful as the one you have designed and proposed.
 
Thanks for your post and support.

I agree that the square likely doesn't need to be closed in any way since the south side of Queen Street does a good job of that "naturally" (see pic below). I suppose I was looking for places to grow things (gardening is in the genes) to green the square up a bit and make the Queen Street gateway even more inviting.

Re: towers

Although I'm an admitted skyscraper geek, the towers were almost an afterthought... other than stacking them somehow on the north portion of the site to optimize sunlight conditions, their main job is to make the economics work for a developer.

I think it is safe to assume that the present owners want a larger return for the property than developers are willing to pay (they weren't successful selling the site in the past due to the price tag). There is quite a lot of approved density already judging by the 2004 staff report, so I'm betting any future development that leaves a legacy of this much open space to the public realm, is going to have build skyward.

Queen Street
southside.jpg
 
After many visits to the site, and thinking about the massing based on thread comments and neighbour issues (Jazz, Boot etc.)... I've done a rethink of where the density goes. It's clear that most of the density belongs on the north-east corner of the site in order to keep the neighbours happy.

I also agree that more depth can be exploited from Shuter to the south. The attached rendering shows the basic changes and where the neighbours are.

Comments welcome... I am meeting Steve Diamond in the future so hopefully this can move from "fictional" to maybe even "proposed".

CATHEDRALredux.jpg
 
3D you will be a hero for us all if this becomes a proposal!!! Cheers! Again, when I get a chance to meet up with Kyle Rae, I'll give him that promised nudge.
 
Excellent, excellent work here 3D. Please keep us posted on any and all developments-no matter how small. I'm really a big fan of this.
 
Thanks Tony and HiRiser.

I'm going to keep tweaking it while I wait and wait and wait... for those promised meetings. I want to experiment more with colonnades, indoor/outdoor glazing elements (retractable solariums etc.) and maybe even one very substantial weather-protected feature (to avoid rain-outs for special events). I figure the more hospitable the square is in all seasons... the better chances for success.

I've managed to gain some critical neighbourhood support... from a very, very tough audience. It's all good. I'm particularly licking my chops at the rumour that the Armoury site might one day become a neighbourhood.

Maybe we can just buy the Cathedral Square site and start an UrbanToronto development team (good brand - sounds like a developer). I'll check with ED to see how many extra millions he has in the kitty from those VISA donations.
 
I love the design, but there are a couple problems I see. One, I just don't know if that parking lot alone is big enough to accommodate structures around the exterior, with a big open Piazza in the center. If it was, it certainly wouldn't have the sense of space your renders portray. And two, if it was big enough I don't think there would be any way to make the project economically feasible. The structures on the perimeter wouldn't have much depth and if they were too tall, it would block the sun from getting into the square.

I think if you assembled the entire block from Church to Mutual that would be big enough.

Just for curiosity sake, what is the land owner looking to get for the parking lot? Someone mentioned it had been for sale previously. It would be interesting to get an idea of numbers to see how possible it would be.
 
As far as towers in this city are concerned, I actually thought they were ok.

Anybody know what the owner is looking to fetch for the property? Something tells me if he couldn't get it sold in this recent condo boom due to price, he won't be selling it any time soon.
 
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