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

You raise some valid points TJ. For me the height is only relevant based on how many units Mirvish needs to sell in order to see his vision through. To pay for this design, a museum and college campus does not come cheap. So I don't know if it has to be 80 storeys or 70 storeys etc. I am assuming that these will have to be very tall in order to fund this.
Back to TIFF for a moment. Vaughn was able to get 157m (way over current zoning in the ED) for this building which the condo portion essentially funded the TIFF podium and theaters. I often wonder had this one been allowed to be 20 storey's higher would we have gotten a much better podium (instead of the neo-brutalist one we got) and would the tower have been more interesting?
 
skyrise said:
You raise some valid points TJ. For me the height is only relevant based on how many units Mirvish needs to sell in order to see his vision through. To pay for this design, a museum and college campus does not come cheap. So I don't know if it has to be 80 storeys or 70 storeys etc. I am assuming that these will have to be very tall in order to fund this.
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I'm happy someone else said that. I've read a lot of posts suggesting that the city lowering the heights is somehow compromising Gehry's artistic vision, distorting the perfectly engineered proportions etc. They're that tall because they have to be that tall to make money. Period. To think otherwise is to be awfully naive.
 
exactly, these people saying "oh, does it have to be so tall? wah wah, can't he just keep those low rise factory buildings?" well, then, guess what? no space for ocad, no spectacular design elements, etc. like, seriously, people comment, they have no idea how tough the industry is. like mirvish isn't some billionaire sinking his fortune into this thing, he's a rich dude, but not rich enough to put these up - he needs to get a lot of different people on board. AS IF you could just go back to them and say, well, i'm going to build this for 1% profit or less. vaughan knows this, i'm sure he'll do right by mirvish but, even on this board the loose talk is absurd, like as if people here don't know what a titanic achievement it would be to get these built, they cheer delays and arbitrary roadblocks. poor form? no: insane form.
 
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It's not like ghost of Leonardo da Vinci appeared and offered Toronto the most perfect building ever and they were too dumb to get what they were being offered.
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Uh...no...I'd say it is kinda is like that.
 
TJ O'Pootertoot said:
That's all fine and good.
But it's not actually a planning argument, the making of which is the job of the planning department and the chief planner of the City of Toronto.

"Why can't we build something amazing and different?" carries zero weight at the OMB, for example. Nor does, "Mr. Chairperson, a 60 storey tower is not iconic but an 82 storey tower totally is!"

I'm all for iconic, big buildings. Again, that doesn't mean the concerns of the planning department are insubstantial, irrelevant or illegitimate. This isn't Mirvish donating the Mona Lisa to the AGO, it's a building that has many levels of impacts both literal (adding residents downtown) and more broadly (setting a precedent for other heights etc.).

I haven't heard anyone say, "This should be replaced with more the same! Let's make it more rectangular!" What they are saying is "Do they have to be quite so tall? Do we know what all those new residents are going to do to the local infrastructure? Do we have to destroy the warehouses?"

I don't see why it's such a bizarre concept that the city wouldn't just accept the Mirvish/Gehry proposal with no changes. When does that ever happen with a development? Why do people think this is so special? It's not like ghost of Leonardo da Vinci appeared and offered Toronto the most perfect building ever and they were too dumb to get what they were being offered. This will get modified and approved and life will go on.
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Great, let’s plan everything into one nice neat project where all the buildings are of even height and similar materials (allowing of course for the extremely necessary tapering from FCP). Then of course we will have true nirvana. We won’t tear down old buildings because every building has a story to tell – we’ll just keep building our new buildings out in the suburbs or beyond the old buildings because, you don’t take down something that’s already built – we’ll just build further and further out into the suburbs so as not to interfere with the existing domain. Then, THEN, we will have really built something.

We can have special school days were we tell the children what these old buildings were used for and that since we don’t build buildings like them anymore, we will keep them forever – be they functional or not. Then we’ll put them on a bus home to their buildings miles away, happy with the knowledge that, yes, we saved some old buildings and prevented some savage developers from haunting our downtown with ridiculous things like condos, schools and art galleries.

Here’s a thought, I’d like to elect the Gardiner expressway as a heritage something or other since it represents a form of highway construction we don’t employ anymore. We’ll make council build the new highway on top of it so we can continue to marvel at the Gardiner’s…whatever… and keep a great sense of history downtown. Yes, I can see it all now… (chest puffed out with pride)
 
Big Daddy said:
Great, let’s plan everything into one nice neat project where all the buildings are of even height and similar materials (allowing of course for the extremely necessary tapering from FCP). Then of course we will have true nirvana. We won’t tear down old buildings because every building has a story to tell – we’ll just keep building our new buildings out in the suburbs or beyond the old buildings because, you don’t take down something that’s already built – we’ll just build further and further out into the suburbs so as not to interfere with the existing domain. Then, THEN, we will have really built something.

We can have special school days were we tell the children what these old buildings were used for and that since we don’t build buildings like them anymore, we will keep them forever – be they functional or not. Then we’ll put them on a bus home to their buildings miles away, happy with the knowledge that, yes, we saved some old buildings and prevented some savage developers from haunting our downtown with ridiculous things like condos, schools and art galleries.

Here’s a thought, I’d like to elect the Gardiner expressway as a heritage something or other since it represents a form of highway construction we don’t employ anymore. We’ll make council build the new highway on top of it so we can continue to marvel at the Gardiner’s…whatever… and keep a great sense of history downtown. Yes, I can see it all now… (chest puffed out with pride)
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You've got more straw men in there than at a Wizard of Oz cast reunion party.
I didn't say anything about having similar heights and materials (which are also not PLANNING decisions) and we have laws that set out how and why certain buildings receive heritage designation and they're not exactly famous the world over for their stringency. You want to designate the Gardiner to make your case? Well, good luck with that.

(Though, FWIW, it's funny that your description of a city "where all the buildings are of even height and similar materials," and where we don't tear down old buildings evokes terrible hellholes like Paris and Jerusalem. Shiver!)

You want a city your children can't afford to live in, but they can still visit to see the art galleries? That's fine too.
Keep working on that imaginary future in your head, HG Wells.
 
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"You want a city your children can't afford to live in, but they can still visit to see the art galleries? That's fine too.
Keep working on that imaginary future in your head..."


There it is again, folks do not underestimate the politics of envy (towards potential residents) as well as tall poppy syndrome (towards the architect & developer).
Its official M-G is responsible for the high cost of living in Toronto...
Lets drop the Art Gallery and replace it with a day care or Youth Drop in centre.
3rd building should be social housing, and all materials locally sourced.
 
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buildup said:
"You want a city your children can't afford to live in, but they can still visit to see the art galleries? That's fine too.
Keep working on that imaginary future in your head..."


There it is again, folks do not underestimate the politics of envy (towards potential residents) as well as tall poppy syndrome (towards the architect & developer).
Its official M-G is responsible for the high cost of living in Toronto...
Lets drop the Art Gallery and replace it with a day care or Youth Drop in centre.
3rd building should be social housing, and all materials locally sourced.
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Don't be putting words in my mouth or offering your Dr. Phil-level pysch evaluations, man.
These aren't going to be affordable condos; that's just a fact.
If you keep advocating the tearing down of old buildings to make way for Architectural Masterpieces, that's not going to improve things. The idea that old buildings provide affordable housing (among other things) isn't some wild theory, it's Jane Jacobs 101.

But I didn't say, "M-G is responsible for the high cost of living in Toronto," so get your eyes checked or read more closely before gloriously expounding upon the points I make.

I'm making logical points based on the actual project. It's people like you and Big Daddy making ridiculous extremist arguments. So when I made the art galleries comment, I was commenting on his ridiculous Gardiner metaphor and its extremism.
"It's official," indeed.

Geeze, Mr. Mirvish, I know you have a lot invested in this but relax.
 
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About 20 years ago I had a conversation with a NYC cabbie from Russia. In the course of our chat he mentioned that while he lived in a very tiny unit, he took joy in knowing he could walk the same streets as any millionaire. Obviously he was saying that while poor, he had the good fortune (as HE saw it) of experiencing a great city, rather than bemoaning the fact he couldn't own a fancy co-op. To this day I've recalled his generosity of spirit.

Anyone who is objective knows that most objections to M/G are motivated by tall poppy or envy. It slips out from time to time, but is normally veiled behind stock objections no matter how often they are discredited. As an aside, most people living in M-G won't be plutocrats, rather hard working, mortgaged, ambitious singles or couples willing to pay a premium or accept a smaller square footage to live in a work of art.
 
That is a rather naive theory. Perhaps your definition of a plutocracy is somewhat different from mine. I doubt the average canadian earning $ 39,000 could afford a unit in m-g.
 
"These aren't going to be affordable condos; that's just a fact."

It was the second time you'd complained about the galleries, bro. The condos will be affordable, no one's going to construct 2,000 unaffordable condos for heaven's sake. They wont be taxpayer subsidized, if that's your point.

"If you keep advocating the tearing down of old buildings to make way for Architectural Masterpieces, that's not going to improve things."

Case by case, it will improve things. Our fundamental disagreement.

"The idea that old buildings provide affordable housing (among other things) isn't some wild theory, it's Jane Jacobs 101."

Now perhaps you've made a valid point, I wasn't aware people lived in these warehouses. Or is this a straw man argument?
 
nrb said:
That is a rather naive theory. Perhaps your definition of a plutocracy is somewhat different from mine. I doubt the average canadian earning $ 39,000 could afford a unit in m-g.
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I never said average - read carefully: I said hard working, mortgaged, ambitious singles or couples willing to pay a premium or accept a smaller square footage to live in a work of art. Keep it coming let's surface these objections...
 
nrb said:
That is a rather naive theory. Perhaps your definition of a plutocracy is somewhat different from mine. I doubt the average canadian earning $ 39,000 could afford a unit in m-g.
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For the record salaries are slightly higher in the CBD than in Thunder Bay. Not saying its right, just that it is true.
 
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