Toronto Biblio Lofts | 28.91m | 7s | NVSBLE | BDP Quadrangle

Good Lord it’s looking good day over day!

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Chunky brick!

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I love the Riverside portion of Queen East, it's one of my favourite main streets in the city. I just want to go there to experience the buzz and theatre of the street, overhear snippets of conversations, grab a coffee or drink or whatever. It's distinct and has it's own vibe and character. It's all season and I'm happy walking here in January or June, day or night. It's a walkable street which you can tell by the people. Who are walking.

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This is "downtown" Markham, which feels like a spooky, techno-dystopian nightmare. There are some patios and people are trying to occupy them, but this is an awful place to be. They're tried to introduce some detail (which looks desperately insincere) to the upper levels but the ground level is a monotone expanse of glass.

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It looks and feels much the same as this barren streetscape at Don Mills and Eglinton at the foot of a really fun building.

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Which is a lot like the buildings on the Eastern Waterfront, which all have blank, street level walls of glass at the feet of fancy buildings that can only be appreciated from across the street. Waterfront Toronto's aspirations to create a great place forgot to include the "place".

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If the goal is to get people out of their cars to address things like congestion and climate change and accessibility, we need to create walkable areas. You can pack in all the density you like into a place, but an area isn't walkable if nobody wants to walk there. On this front, the people making new buildings are completely failing.

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...yep, these places are designed for those who are expected to drive to or by. They don't need no stinkin' pedestrians. /sigh
 

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