Toronto 1 Eglinton East | 211.25m | 65s | Davpart | Hariri Pontarini

I think really we all just want to see some different coloured buildings going up. I know this building. I never thought twice about it until now. The colour is nice but if the new project isn't a pale blue glass then it could be an improvement. We will find out sooner or later.

Its amazing how many people are starting to hate the pale blue green glass. There's too many skyscrapers in Toronto that have gone up in the last decade with the pale blue green colour. And there more to come just look at skyscraperpage.com under Toronto skyscraper diagram. The city needs some changes with colour of the facades!
Let's hope they make this skyscraper the same colour of the CIBC building at the corner that's going down.
 
Its amazing how many people are starting to hate the pale blue green glass. There's too many skyscrapers in Toronto that have gone up in the last decade with the pale blue green colour. And there more to come just look at skyscraperpage.com under Toronto skyscraper diagram. The city needs some changes with colour of the facades!
Let's hope they make this skyscraper the same colour of the CIBC building at the corner that's going down.

Personally, I think glass is fine and looks great.... when mixed with other types of buildings. If you sprinkle glass box skyscrapers among other types of buildings and more creative buildings like we have in many parts of Toronto, it looks pretty good.

I would like to see more non-glass buildings though, like Picasso by Teeple, or B Street.
 
That's one thing I think we agree on is that we need more non glass buildings. They look more solid and stable than just total glass. For all glass windows I think the more darker the glazed windows are. The richer and cleaner the image of the facade looks. Eliminating some of the distraction of what's inside of the building.
 
Personally, I think glass is fine and looks great.... when mixed with other types of buildings. If you sprinkle glass box skyscrapers among other types of buildings and more creative buildings like we have in many parts of Toronto, it looks pretty good.

I would like to see more non-glass buildings though, like Picasso by Teeple, or B Street.

I agree, I actually love glass towers, I just think we need some different materials or colours interspersed. Personally I'm a fan of the colours used in the 80's and 90's. The pink, and turquoise glazing particularly. I am happy to see that things seem to be shifting towards black and white. I'd love more red or purple though. I suspect we will start seeing more variation soon though.
 
I love those colours too I agree with you. We need variations of colours. The eighties and the nineties created those types of colours with the granite columns to boot for the facade. Creating solid new buildings. I hope that fashion comes back again with a new twist to it !
 
115,000 sqft of 1985 class B office space, with direct subway access. That's a pretty valuable asset for a tear-down. Demolition alone will cost a fortune.

Should mean we get something fairly spectacular to justify that kind of outlay.

Hopefully, there will be significant increase to the current office space. It is disappointing that with the current raft of development proposals, there is a projected net loss of commercial office space at Y&E in 2020. Another forum member stated that the economics of office development north of Bloor currently does not add up.

Condo development alone at Y&E surely does not maximize the return on the LRT investment. What percentage of the future condo dwellers at Y&E will use the LRT on a regular basis? Surely the vast majority will get on the already crowded subway downtown, or drive to their offices in the 905.

It seems to me that the LRT investment has been used to push through changes to the planning code to allow otherwise unacceptable density levels at Y&E. The planning code could have been changed, and condos sold, without spending $5.3 billion on the Crosstown.

Has the time come to intervene? How about a temporary freeze on residential development within, say, 200 meters of the new Y&E crosstown station, and tax incentives for commercial development?
 
By "we" I mean any of Toronto's good architects. The best anyone can say about this 8 story building is it's "above average". Y&E will become a major node, density is appropriate, and "we" can build a superior replacement. If you don't agree ye are of little faith.

Guarantee no-one here as ever commented on even admired this building before.

Faith has little to do with it. I understand the limitations of the condo market. For others, they only needs to give the 20 tallest condo towers built some thought.

It is only 8 storeys tall, predates UT, and isn't butt ugly so, it shouldn't come of any surprise that it has been noticed by the forum.
 
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Hopefully, there will be significant increase to the current office space. It is disappointing that with the current raft of development proposals, there is a projected net loss of commercial office space at Y&E in 2020. Another forum member stated that the economics of office development north of Bloor currently does not add up.

Condo development alone at Y&E surely does not maximize the return on the LRT investment. What percentage of the future condo dwellers at Y&E will use the LRT on a regular basis? Surely the vast majority will get on the already crowded subway downtown, or drive to their offices in the 905.

It seems to me that the LRT investment has been used to push through changes to the planning code to allow otherwise unacceptable density levels at Y&E. The planning code could have been changed, and condos sold, without spending $5.3 billion on the Crosstown.

Has the time come to intervene? How about a temporary freeze on residential development within, say, 200 meters of the new Y&E crosstown station, and tax incentives for commercial development?

I think demand just isn't that high for new office space in the area, over the last few years the direct vacancy rate has crept upwards, with some mid-size tenants relocating to downtown, Thomas Cook vacated 75 Eglinton east all together (leaving about 80K worth of space left behind, or over 70% of the building), and the other buildings are all somewhere in the 5-20% vacancy range. Its now the worst downtown'ish office node in terms of total space available (12% 'ish I believe) ... do keep in mind when you hear quotes about the sub 5% vacancy rates downtown, that's the direct space available i.e. from the building's landlord, it doesn't count when a firm has left and is attempting to sub-lease a space.

I think this will only get worse going forward, a lot of forecasts show rents downtown can't keep climbing up with all the new space coming online, this makes downtown even more attractive for the mid-size clients around Y&E.

Its easy to have policies that force office development but its another matter entirely to fill them up (though policies can help here).

But I think that's fine, existing office stalk should be protected and if not, replaced, Menkes should be forced to do that ... 161 Eglinton Avenue East, which they'll demolish (~ 60K class B office building) ... but they develops have tricks, I'm sure they'll quote that building is now about 50% empty, that's true, but its been well known there's been development application on this lot for the last 7-8 years .. (a failed one at that earlier) ..

But yes, replace any space (and ideally upgrade) you remove, at a minimum, should be a policy ! The city generally pushes for this too ... I'd hope they'd do this at the much higher quality 1 Eglinoton East.
 
10,947.4 square metres of office (117,837 square feet). Anyone know how much is in the existing building? Sounds good, but not sure if this less or more.

My guess with that sort of number is that the full second to ninth stories (9 storey podium, ground retail) would be office.

ETA: should have read through more thoroughly rather than skipping to the end. Some of my questions were answered in the doc:

The applicant is proposing to construct a 68-storey mixed commercial residential
building with retail on the ground floor and mezzanine levels, commercial office space on
floors 2 to 8 and residential above. The base of the building varies in height from 6-
storeys along Eglinton Avenue to 9-storeys at the south property line. The tower rises
above the base from the sixth storey with a 3 metre step back. The tower steps back from
the south property line at the ninth storey with a 10 metre step back. Servicing is
proposed from Cowbell lane and is interior to the site along with primary loading
facilities. Additional loading and vehicular parking, is provided below grade.
 
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The elevation drawings look interesting. I'm looking forward to seeing the first rendering!

Hariri Pontarini have been putting forward some great stuff recently...

I'm curious, how does office space work in these tall residential buildings? Do they typically get their own elevators and entrance?
 
I found this part very interesting:

Staff are concerned that the application does not comply with Official Plan Amendment
231 which requires that all office space be replaced within any redevelopment of a parcel
containing an office building with a minimum of 1,000 square metres of commercial
office space. The applicant has stated that it believes the application complies as it
proposes to replace the existing 10,689.6 square metres of commercial office space with
10,947 square metres of new office space. However, this figure includes 1,642 square
metres of GFA from 24 Live/Work units located on the tenth, eleventh and twelfth floors.
Staff have looked at the proposed Live/Work units and there does not appear to be any
difference between them and a standard condominium unit. Staff are not satisfied the
proposed units would function as Live/Work Units or that Live/Work units would meet
the intent of Official Plan Amendment 231.

Still glad they're replacing almost all of the office space ... also they can probably argue it'll be better configured and modern anyway in comparison.
 

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