Toronto Lower Don Lands Redevelopment | ?m | ?s | Waterfront Toronto

So no one is posting the bridge designs, LOL

I will do one post for each proponent:

Zeilder/Wilkinson Eyre's effort:

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I honestly like all of them, each one brings a different aspect, style and centre piece.

If I had to rank them it would probably be:
1. Zeilder/Wilkinson Eyre (I love that they try to incorporate the solstices and equinoxes, I wish more architecture did this and its also just a very cool design)
2. RJC/Smoke/MVVA (Looked very simple and plain at first but the night time fish lights and future proofing with rust art really sold me)
3. NDA-NWENDAAGANAG (I really love this design, but its a little too much and I worry they plants wont survive very long knowing the cities track record....)
4. Salmon Run (still very cool but kinda boring and plain compared to the rest)
5. Maamawi Bridge (this was definitely my least favourite, it is nice they integrate with nature, and the bat/bird habitats are cool, but overall very boring)
 
Tunafish13 said:
I honestly like all of them, each one brings a different aspect, style and centre piece.

If I had to rank them it would probably be:
1. Zeilder/Wilkinson Eyre (I love that they try to incorporate the solstices and equinoxes, I wish more architecture did this and its also just a very cool design)
2. RJC/Smoke/MVVA (Looked very simple and plain at first but the night time fish lights and future proofing with rust art really sold me)
3. NDA-NWENDAAGANAG (I really love this design, but its a little too much and I worry they plants wont survive very long knowing the cities track record....)
4. Salmon Run (still very cool but kinda boring and plain compared to the rest)
5. Maamawi Bridge (this was definitely my least favourite, it is nice they integrate with nature, and the bat/bird habitats are cool, but overall very boring)
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I totally agree with your #1 and #2 - I like the 'eye' feature on #2 in particular.

Really a very good set of proposals and it is 'fully funded' so may actually be built pretty much as designed!
 
I'll be disappointed if the Zeidler one is chosen. It looks neat, but it will also be a pain to walk across -- it makes the path much longer to cross the water. It falls victim to the same crappy pedestrian design that's so common here, in that designers think that people only walk/bicycle for pleasure, and not to actually get places. This is potentially the main path for thousands of people to and from downtown, so there should be utility to the bridge too.

With that in mind, I'd nix Zeidler. The other two curving options aren't as bad, since they don't take you far off an ideal straight-line route.
 
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BejewelledCarp said:
I'll be disappointed if the Zeidler one is chosen. It looks neat, but it will also be a pain to walk across -- it makes the path much longer to cross the water. It falls victim to the same crappy pedestrian design that's so common here, in that designers think that people only walk/bicycle for pleasure, and not to actually get places. This is potentially the main path for thousands of people to and from downtown, so there should be utility to the bridge too.

With that in mind, I'd nix Zeidler. The other two curving options aren't as bad, since they don't take you far off an ideal straight-line route.
Click to expand...
This is 'wandering path' to allow for views ertc. Being the fastest route from A to B is really not the aim, in my opinion. (In addition, it is really a rather small bridge crossing a quite narrow channel - I doubt there is much difference in distance between 'wandering route' and a direct one.
 
I like that the Salmon Run design has a distinct modal separation already shown in renderings but I can still see many people stepping into the bike space for photo ops. Ultimately, any one of these is not going to be pleasant for cyclists, who will fair better on the Cherry St bridge or maybe even walking their bike over Keating.

Even with Humber Bay bridge’s width it turns into quite a slow zone in busy hours.
 
I was wondering why the Zeilder/Wilkinson Eyre's and Henning Larsen's effort where using a similar design. Then I noticed Two Row appears to be involved in both of these...perhaps that's the connection.
 
Wow! I love all of the options. On its own, Maamawi Bridge is pretty good, but compared to the other 4, it does seem to be the weakest entry.

BejewelledCarp said:
I'll be disappointed if the Zeidler one is chosen. It looks neat, but it will also be a pain to walk across -- it makes the path much longer to cross the water. It falls victim to the same crappy pedestrian design that's so common here, in that designers think that people only walk/bicycle for pleasure, and not to actually get places. This is potentially the main path for thousands of people to and from downtown, so there should be utility to the bridge too.

With that in mind, I'd nix Zeidler. The other two curving options aren't as bad, since they don't take you far off an ideal straight-line route.
Click to expand...

I don't think it will be that bad, although it would be nice to see distance measurements for each just to compare.

DSC said:
I totally agree with your #1 and #2 - I like the 'eye' feature on #2 in particular.

Really a very good set of proposals and it is 'fully funded' so may actually be built pretty much as designed!
Click to expand...

I really really like the idea of the eye, but I wonder if it'll become a traffic bottleneck? (we can't have nice things).

reinventingthewheel said:
I like that the Salmon Run design has a distinct modal separation already shown in renderings but I can still see many people stepping into the bike space for photo ops. Ultimately, any one of these is not going to be pleasant for cyclists, who will fair better on the Cherry St bridge or maybe even walking their bike over Keating.

Even with Humber Bay bridge’s width it turns into quite a slow zone in busy hours.
Click to expand...

That's the first thing that came to my mind too - I like the bridge, but trying to segregate cyclists from walkers ... probably better to just leave it undesignated and a free for all.

I really like the Nda-Nwendaaganag bridge as well, but my only concern is accessibility for those coming from the east. They'd have to go quite a bit further to get to the ramp, which also looks a bit steep from the provided pictures. I would imagine they'd factor steepness in though.

As such, I'd rank them:
  1. RJC - Harbour Eye
  2. Zeidler - Equinox Bridge
  3. EXP - Nda-Nwendaaganag
  4. Henning Larsen - Salmon run
  5. Entuitive - Maamawi' Bridge
 
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