Toronto Forma | 308m | 84s | Great Gulf | Gehry Partners

[greenleaf]

Spacing has some coverage on this, as a response to the Hume-Keesmaat article (of which I thought Hume was really condescending, verging on mansplaining).

http://spacing.ca/toronto/2013/10/09/icon-architecture-land-mirvish-gehry/

 

[buildup]

Right. A 'kid' with the ability to understand and relate this debate to the Stockhausen controversies 11 years ago. As picard notes, adma's comment may be in poor taste (and I don't necessarily think it is), but to label it as 'offensive' only belies your fundamental misunderstanding of his post.

Are you serious?

A photo of a terrorist attack that incinerated 4,000 people morphs into gag material? If it was the TD Centre, it would be less funny...
I was thinking of pasting in a genocide or airstrike on a Palestinian camp for laughs but can't bring myself to do it.

 

[Ramako]

Are you serious?

A photo of a terrorist attack that incinerated 4,000 people morphs into gag material? If it was the TD Centre, it would be less funny...
I was thinking of pasting in a genocide or airstrike on a Palestinian camp for laughs but can't bring myself to do it.

Stockhausen claimed that the 9/11 attacks were, in themselves, a work of art:

Wikipedia

Well, what happened there is, of course—now all of you must adjust your brains—the biggest work of art there has ever been. The fact that spirits achieve with one act something which we in music could never dream of, that people practise ten years madly, fanatically for a concert. And then die. [Hesitantly.] And that is the greatest work of art that exists for the whole Cosmos. Just imagine what happened there. There are people who are so concentrated on this single performance, and then five thousand people are driven to Resurrection. In one moment. I couldn't do that. Compared to that, we are nothing, as composers. [...] It is a crime, you know of course, because the people did not agree to it. They did not come to the "concert". That is obvious. And nobody had told them: "You could be killed in the process."

So, when you asked "what projects in the world exceed the Mirvish/Gehry proposal in scale, originality, and beauty?" adma was essentially answering that the plane smashing into the World Trade Centre represented a project that exceeded M+G in scale, originality and beauty.

It was just a pretentious non-sequitur. Typical fare.

 

[buildup]

Thanks Ramako.

 

[alklay]

diminutive, your post was both probably the most reasoned and articulate post on the lay of the land, thus far in this thread. Thanks.

 

[44 North]

Infrastructure wise, it's ridiculous to act as if 'downtown's full' or there's simply no way existing infrastructure can accommodate M-G. It's especially dishonest for the City's Chief Planner to make the argument that it's an unreasonable burden. The City's official plan calls for the area's population to nearly double over the next two decades (roughly ~70k new residents, plus more jobs)! This isn't some kind of unexpected or unreasonable project; it represents a small fraction of development the City has been encouraging and planning for for years now.

Downtown obviously isn't full, but it's a bit glib to say that this project's contribution of ~4,000 residents to the ~70,000 new residents in all of downtown over the next 20 years is a "a small fraction". It's almost 6% housed in three buildings...again, out of all of downtown. That's an enormous contribution.

Transit wouldn't be impacted terribly. Either residents who would have moved into M-G will move into other surrounding developments (no difference..), or will move further away to a different area and make longer commutes, putting more pressure on infrastructure than would otherwise have been the case.

Again, 6% of all new residents over the next twenty years housed in one small block. Transit downtown is already impacted terribly, and has been for quite some time. King Street and its Streetcar is a joke for a major downtown artery, and it's almost maxed out. Obviously things are going to be impacted terribly, considering it's terrible now. Even if the DRL (the original U-style DRL, not the disjointed Bathurst Yard DRL) will only bring us to a state of adequate. Gauging who's commuting and where doesn't change the fact that all of downtown is a gridlocked nightmare for a large portion of the day.

'Height' doesn't matter, in and of itself. Given tower design, the differences between typical point towers in the area and M-G's towers would be indistinguishable from street level. The podium would be the major impact on street life, which all the evidence suggests is being built to contemporary urban design principles and will frame King St very nicely. Bandying about some warmed over Jane Jacobsian notion of 'human scale' is ridiculous since the street-presence of this project isn't an ~80 story glass wall but 6 storeys, which is highly typical of successful urban streetscapes.

Height is the very reason the densities are too extreme.

 

[diminutive]

Downtown obviously isn't full, but it's a bit glib to say that this project's contribution of ~4,000 residents to the ~70,000 new residents in all of downtown over the next 20 years is a "a small fraction". It's almost 6% housed in three buildings...again, out of all of downtown. That's an enormous contribution.

It's 70k new residents plus another ~100k new jobs, and the jobs are what really stresses transit infrastructure since they result in heavily peaked transit patterns. So, yeah, I'd maintain that M-G isn't such a major impact.

Again, 6% of all new residents over the next twenty years housed in one small block. Transit downtown is already impacted terribly, and has been for quite some time. The King Street and its Streetcar is a joke for a major downtown artery, and it's almost maxed out. Obviously things are going to be impacted terribly, considering it's terrible now. Even if the DRL (the original U-style DRL, not the disjointed Bathurst Yard DRL) will only bring us to a state of adequate. Gauging who's commuting and where doesn't change the fact that all of downtown is a gridlocked nightmare for a large portion of the day.

You're not getting the fundamental issue here. Mirvish-Gehry isn't making new people out of thin air. The people will exist and use heavily strained transit regardless of whether they live in Mirvish-Gehry, Yonge and Eglinton or Mississauga.

Where will these people be more likely to use bikes or walk, at King and John or somewhere else?

Height is the very reason the densities are too extreme.

How are they extreme? We're talking about a couple thousand people in the middle of the biggest city in the country. Even after M-G and dozens of other condos are built decades from now the core will still be less dense than many cities.

 

[buildup]

Transit downtown is already impacted terribly, and has been for quite some time. King Street and its Streetcar is a joke for a major downtown artery, and it's almost maxed out. Obviously things are going to be impacted terribly, considering it's terrible now. Even if the DRL (the original U-style DRL, not the disjointed Bathurst Yard DRL) will only bring us to a state of adequate..

I don't see how 1/10 of 1% of Greater Toronto's population can further strain our "terrible, terrible, terrible" transit situation. As Diminutive said, these folks are walking or commuting against the flow. If they are TTC'ing against the flow that's more transit revenue.

No doubt the city has some infrastructure work to do. I suggest they get started - who's stopping them?

 

[44 North]

It's 70k new residents plus another ~100k new jobs, and the jobs are what really stresses transit infrastructure since they result in heavily peaked transit patterns. So, yeah, I'd maintain that M-G isn't such a major impact.

At least you agree that it's a "major impact" nonetheless.

You're not getting the fundamental issue here. Mirvish-Gehry isn't making new people out of thin air. The people will exist and use heavily strained transit regardless of whether they live in Mirvish-Gehry, Yonge and Eglinton or Mississauga.

It's creating housing for part of 6% of the 30,000 new residents downtown. Whether it's all "new people" or all long-time downtown residents moving from a block away doesn't make a difference...it's still 4,000 residents existing where some warehouses-turned-businesses and a theatre existed.

Where will these people be more likely to use bikes or walk, at King and John or somewhere else?

Honestly, I'd say somewhere else. King at John isn't exactly a leafy boulevard with ample bike lanes. It's in the thick of downtown traffic mayhem. I used to be an avid cyclist, and it's through the core that I'd find the most cumbersome and borderline dangerous ride. If you follow all the rules and want to be safe/seen, it can be a slow trek. Even something as simple as finding an empty ring/pole to lock up a bike has gotten quite difficult in recent years. Regardless, the parking garage isn't going to be full of bicycles and a couple of 60's era VW vans. These aren't exactly broke hippies moving downtown.

How are they extreme? We're talking about a couple thousand people in the middle of the biggest city in the country. Even after M-G and dozens of other condos are built decades from now the core will still be less dense than many cities.

What's the estimate? Less than 5k, but more than 3k? Regardless, it's more than a couple thousand. And it isn't the "middle of the biggest city", it's on one block...added in with the other 66k hopefully spread with a better thought process.

And @buildup. Obviously the issue isn't just a population increase in light of our shite transit system. I'm not arguing with the growth plan. It's this 1/10 of 1% - the equivalent of a town - lumped into one small block, in an area that isn't exactly a tumbleweed-strewn barrenland.

And who's stopping the city from getting to work on more infrastructure? There are many answers, but I'm sure you were being rhetorical. But a DRL - which may or may not even run near this project, nor has it reached its planning stage - will not bring us back to 1950-era TO.

 

[freshcutgrass]

~4,000 residents to the ~70,000 new residents in all of downtown over the next 20 years is a "a small fraction". It's almost 6% housed in three buildings...again, out of all of downtown. That's an enormous contribution.

Forget your flawed/invented numbers.

It's 2700 condo units...spread over numerous years. Any way you calculate it, it isn't 6% of anything. Total condo units under construction in Toronto hit a record high of 56,866 in 2012. Downtown usually accounts for 30-40% of condo sales.

2700 condo units in the grand scheme of things is simply not very significant.

The city needs to worry about supplying the necessary infrastructure to meet growth. That's their job.

 

[buildup]

North 44, how does this effect public transit?

Most people typically walk to work if its under 20 minutes. That's about a 1 mile radius, and I'll assume most of those living in M-G will work downtown - ie not using public transit during peak hours (if at all). If they are using transit in the morning they will walk south to Union Station to board the empty trains, or walk to St Andrews to head North on nearly empty trains. Travelling against the flow is much better use of built capacity.

By my estimate there would be about 1/2 the number of people living in M-G as work in FCP.

I haven't heard about anyone objecting to office building proposals which do put pressure on transit.

 

[adma]

Stockhausen claimed that the 9/11 attacks were, in themselves, a work of art:

Wikipedia


So, when you asked "what projects in the world exceed the Mirvish/Gehry proposal in scale, originality, and beauty?" adma was essentially answering that the plane smashing into the World Trade Centre represented a project that exceeded M+G in scale, originality and beauty.

It was just a pretentious non-sequitur. Typical fare.

Actually, while my bored/offhanded Stockhausen ref gave it a flippantly blase context, I'm actually more prone to backing away from the more purely Stockhausenesque "scale, originality, and beauty" matter to the more abstract, less rawly work-of-arttish (and hence less inherently pretentious) notion of 9/11 being the most important aesthetic experience of our time. And it isn't just about a plane smashing (hey, a picture can only convey so much): it's 9/11 in its entirety--its effect on everything from the Lower Manhattan geography to our psyches. Evil or not, it transfixed us in a way that, well, effectively surpasses "art" while nullifying it. That's why I don't--can't--refer to it as "art". Merely as an "aesthetic experience".

But on top of that, and very apropos to this thread and to this forum, it was a very intensely urban experience, the way it drew the urban-lovers among us into that very node of urban geography, constantly curious and wondering what it affected and how--for a while there, in a circumstance totally without precedent, we were all Lower Manhattanites, wondering whither Verizon or One Liberty Plaza or that Cass Gilbert confection on West Street, or even the minor stuff in between that we'd taken for granted previously. And, this was nothing to do with newfangled starchitecture. This was pre-existing stuff--however presently traumatized, this was all "heritage" of a sort, even if one of September 10th. And it's like through all the chaos, the inherent, centuries-old richness of it all was highlighted in some bizarre otherworldly way. I went there, trusty White/Willensky in hand, for Xmas that year, attended Xmas eve services at St. Paul's Chapel, and words fail--it's like it left an eerie humanizing cosmic mark upon *all* of NYC, and I felt it even when taking local transit from LaGuardia through Jackson Heights and over Queens and under to Grand Central. Yes, "humanizing"--almost as if it were some necessary but not-to-be-repeated "shock treatment".
And that moment of "9/11 greatness" really encompasses those (now sadly forgotten) early months of shellshock, taking-stock, and clearance--that is, before it all came to be grotesquely jingoistically kitschified within the larger cultural sphere. And, I'll betcha that the hyperengagement that it triggered helped nurture a whole slew of urbanists out there, almost in that "everyone who bought the first Velvets record formed a band" way.

So it isn't about endorsing destruction. It's about comprehending enormity--including the rich enormity of our present world, inhabiting and making sense of the ruins. And it might be argued that by being of "a" past, everything around us is a metaphorical "ruin" of sorts.

And as an "aesthetic event", 9/11 did it. Did it in such a way that renders fixating upon future starchitecture as a be-all and end-all to be insipid piffle by comparison.

And I'd feel the same way, even if I lost loved ones on 9/11.

Mirvish/Gehry? Hey, whatever happens. But if it doesn't happen or something gets messed up in the process, don't go bawling your eyes out; as 9/11-as-I-described-it proves, urbanity is far, far richer than that...

 

[44 North]

North 44, how does this effect public transit?

Most people typically walk to work if its under 20 minutes. That's about a 1 mile radius, and I'll assume most of those living in M-G will work downtown - ie not using public transit during peak hours (if at all). If they are using transit in the morning they will walk south to Union Station to board the empty trains, or walk to St Andrews to head North on nearly empty trains. Travelling against the flow is much better use of built capacity.

By my estimate there would be about 1/2 the number of people living in M-G as work in FCP.

I haven't heard about anyone objecting to office building proposals which do put pressure on transit.

Well your assumption about most M-G residents walking to work downtown is just that, an assumption. I don't think it'll be most. But with that, I don't know what it will be. The fact is, a good percentage of those leaving this block will be leaving in cars, or hopping on transit. Since the only transit line this condo site is on is plagued by slow speeds and terrible service, the fact that hundreds of single-occupant vehicles will be leaving this block every morning/arriving every evening will only slow things down some more. Both immediately adjacent to the site, and amplified in a several block radius.

And as for the FCP connection. I don't know what it is exactly, but I'd probably feel a lot better about this proposal if it was an office development. When I see office building proposals, it makes me think that a company wants to make its mark, and believes in this city's future, economic prowess, and is making a net positive. When I see condos - especially very large ones - I just see vertical subdivisions...a cash-cow being milked at the expense of other city dwellers because the right housing market conditions have allowed for it, and the City and the OMB have caused poor planning to reign supreme.

FCP and the surrounding CBD did cause damage in its size and scope, especially as it pertains to our transit-deficient, four-lane arterial core. But it also spawned an underworld (literally, PATH) that made up for the loss of restaurants and local businesses. Although it went against the Jane Jacobs ideal, a remedy for the impact and loss of human-scale mixed use development was ultimately provided/returned. I can't say the same thing about mega-condo projects.

 

[syn]

Well your assumption about most M-G residents walking to work downtown is just that, an assumption. I don't think it'll be most. But with that, I don't know what it will be. The fact is, a good percentage of those leaving this block will be leaving in cars, or hopping on transit. Since the only transit line this condo site is on is plagued by slow speeds and terrible service, the fact that hundreds of single-occupant vehicles will be leaving this block every morning/arriving every evening will only slow things down some more. Both immediately adjacent to the site, and amplified in a several block radius.

And as for the FCP connection. I don't know what it is exactly, but I'd probably feel a lot better about this proposal if it was an office development. When I see office building proposals, it makes me think that a company wants to make its mark, and believes in this city's future, economic prowess, and is making a net positive. When I see condos - especially very large ones - I just see vertical subdivisions...a cash-cow being milked at the expense of other city dwellers because the right housing market conditions have allowed for it, and the City and the OMB have caused poor planning to reign supreme.

FCP and the surrounding CBD did cause damage in its size and scope, especially as it pertains to our transit-deficient, four-lane arterial core. But it also spawned an underworld (literally, PATH) that made up for the loss of restaurants and local businesses. Although it went against the Jane Jacobs ideal, a remedy for the impact and loss of human-scale mixed use development was ultimately provided/returned. I can't say the same thing about mega-condo projects.

Your reasoning is rather bizarre.

If you're against this development (in part) due to transit infrastructure issues, they why would you accept an office tower? The stress on the transit system would be even greater.

Regarding transit access, you're completely wrong. While the King Streetcar is the only transit vehicle that passes directly in front of the building, St. Andrews Subway station is only a few minutes away by walking. Union Station is probably a 10 minute walk, at most.

For residents of these buildings, this is almost a perfect location to leave your car at home (or get rid of it altogther).

 

[Lansdude]

Don't really get the congestion argument against this that 44 is advancing.

The concentration of people in this single project is too much? Would he be opposed to 6 towers spaced 150 m apart from each other in the same district, housing the same number of people? Is it really a much more acute load on transportation infrastructure if that same number of people are concentrated on this small stretch? As was pointed out previously, downtown is being groomed to house 70k more people. Going beyond uniformity on this one project is not going to significantly distort the flow of traffic and transit all else being equal.