AndreaPalladio
Senior Member
Absolutely. That's where the people and the restaurants are. Great eating in Atlanta.
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Toronto 2024 Olympic Bid (Dead)
- Thread starter Southcore
- Start date
Tewder
Senior Member
Is this comment supposed to be substantive?
Euphoria
Active Member
Thank you, MetroMan, for the thoughtful post with visuals. My point about the Gardner is that, in the long run, the elevated highway has to go. The hybrid mock-ups that are being bandied about leave a long section of elevated expressway along the Keating Channel, which pretty much scuttles the vision of a beautiful tree-lined canal, whether or not it's used as a swimming or rowing venue in a hypothetical Olympics. We need to do better. Maybe just that portion of the Gardner could run underground. The main criticism to burying the Gardner has always been cost, yet there are huge opportunities for revenue from development and air rights over the rail lines. Remember the convention centre proposal? Leave out the casino of course. I never really understood why more creative funding solutions to infrastructure haven't been put forward; for example, continue the Allen Expressway south underground, include room for a subway, and make it a toll highway. Now you've paid for half of the capital costs of a DRL that could run through Corso Italia and Trinity Bellwoods, areas that should be easily accessible for Torontonians and tourists. Instead, Wynne is pushing for a toll lane on the Gardner with nothing to show for it except SmartTrac. And don't get me wrong, SmartTrac makes good sense in terms of bang for buck. Really, is that boutique 3-stop Scarberian subway the best our transit planners can come up with? It's embarrassing. I don't think any toll highways should run along existing routes. It's not necessary. One more point: If we're looking for an iconic building that could create a Bilbao effect, an Olympic stadium might be the solution.
AlvinofDiaspar
Moderator
Thr rowing venue was sited in the Shipping Channel to the south in the 2008 bid - Keating is not long nor wide enough for anything other than what it is. The 2008 plan also foresee the Gardiner staying in any case. A better outcome (now that the decision has been made to keep the Gardiner East) might be to rebuild that stretch into a more pleasing form and integrate it into the LDL plans.
AoD
AndreaPalladio
Senior Member
Was it? I used to row there, and it's neither long enough (less then 2000 m) nor wide enough to run a regatta there. It's not straight either.
AlvinofDiaspar
Moderator
Yup, it was - from the 2008 bid book:
They proposed to straighten out the shipping channel at the eastern end and have the course start from there westward.
AoD
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AndreaPalladio
Senior Member
Thanks. I don't ever recall seeing that before.
Euphoria
Active Member
Didn't know that, AoD. Well done. I still think the elevated expressway along the north side of the Keating Channel is a mistake. Also, the 2008 bid did include a proposal to bury the Gardner and do the Front St. Extension. Maybe the plans in that section of the Portlands were drawn up to accommodate both scenarios, buried expressway or left as-is?
Videodrome
Senior Member
Tory had a press conference today and he said that he wasn't committing to anything, just looking into options.
salsa
Senior Member
For the most part, downtown is just a vertical business park with a few hotels and convention centres thrown in. As for the Olympic legacy, the park helped kickstart a revitalization of the surrounding area, but here's what Jason Paris has to say about it:
http://spacing.ca/toronto/2008/07/13/atlanta-on-my-mind/
So yeah, the Olympics were not exactly a panacea for this city. Unless you like sitting in your car a lot, this place still sucks.
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diminutive
Active Member
I don't really see how it could adhere to the overall plan. The current plan is already roughly 50% development, ~30% floodplains, ~10% park and ~10% roads. Even with the increased amount of development space in the new proposal we're still looking at billions in costs without the Olympics. If you start cannibalizing development space with more expensive Olympic facilities you will tank the project's economic feasibility entirely; adding costs through Hadid and Calatrava-isms and removing development profits.
Euphoria
Active Member
I think most people would agree that if Toronto's waterfront was planned carefully from the beginning, it would've looked more like Millenium Park along the water and Queen's Quay would've looked more like Michigan Ave. Instead we got a wall of condos. Yes, Canada Square, Sherbourne Common and the like aren't bad, and there will be vitality with the mix of uses in Bayside, but I'll take any Hadid, Calatrava or Gehry starchitecture we can get. Do you find it worth the trip to leave the core and head to QQ? What Boston's Big Dig accomplished was to create a seamless transition to the inner harbor and Boston's North End. It opened up land for development and parkland. Hopefully most of the Olympic venues would stay. If it's an iconic stadium with multiple uses, it should stay too. If not, it would be transformed eventually. The point is that it's a Herculean task to transform the Portlands, beyond the scope of WT with current funding. A project on the scale of the Olympics allows for multiple needs to be addressed at once: soil remediation, transforming the Gardner, providing accessible, elite athletic facilities, shoring up transit, creating a design presence beyond a few curved roofs or skybridges, and then there's the matter of bike lanes and downtown parks. Toronto has no Central Park or Mt. Royal Park -- please don't cite High Park, which might as well be in Mississauga.
diminutive
Active Member
This is just a bunch of non-sequiturs. What do Michigan Ave/Millenium Park/Big Dig have to do with the Olympics? These things aren't even mutually compatible: if QQ was Michigan Avenues, the waterfront wouldn't look like Millenium Park by definition.
This also defies logic. The issue with the Portlands, as you note, is that it will cost a ton of money.
Your solution isn't to reduce that cost or come up with new sources of revenue. It's to ADD more costs (through empty and soul-less starchitecture) and REDUCE revenue (through less 'condos' aka people aka long term residents). In what world does it make sense that making something more expensive will make it more likely to happen?
It's not even like the Gardiner situation is a product of lack of funds. We've literally picked the MOST expensive option to appease motorists. You're delusional if you think the councillors that thought the Gardiner was essential a few months ago will suddenly change their minds so that someone can have an unimpeded view of the City off our 600,000,000$ high dive board.
Olympic supporters need to reckon with the fact that Toronto is not starved for infrastructure cash. We consistently opt for the most expensive options (SSE, Gardiner East, YSSE). The issue is how we prioritize spending, and a two week party won't induce better long term planning from our leaders.
Euphoria
Active Member
Lord love a duck. If you know the layout of Boston and Chicago, you know that TO's orientation to the water is similar to Chicago's, and they did their waterfront right. There are even beaches right downtown with water you can swim in, like in Barcelona. If we didn’t have the wall of condos or the Gardner, Chicago would be a great model to follow. My point about Boston's burial of its expressway was that it reconnected key parts of the downtown. We won't get our Gardner buried as a stand alone project, but we might as part of a larger project. That was the 2008 Olympic bid plan. As for revenue streams, see my previous post about building over the train tracks and an underground toll route. Also, bring on the soulless starchitecture. Gotta love Gehry's 'jellybean' in Millennium Park.
animatronic
Senior Member
You do realize that burying the Gardiner wouldn't be finished in time for 2024? Neither would the DRL.