adma
Superstar
Somehow, to overaggrandize the desirability of "grandiose and monumental" sounds like a parvenu reflex.
But back to what got me banned, my knock on Peepers' naive knock on Crombie ruining everything...
(a) let's put the shoe on the other foot, huh? If you gotta claim that Crombie ruined Toronto as a place of architectural distinction because he hated skyscrapers, well, remember there's a counter-POV (maybe more common/validly offered 30 yrs ago than now) that the 60s/70s skyline you're worshipping was a far cry from, say, 20s/30s NYC. Like, Empire State vs WTC: no contest. Get the picture? (Which still endures through grousing over glass-and-steel "boxiness" now and again.)
(b) It wasn't just Crombie's Toronto. 1973/74 saw the (to that point) biggest economic slump since the Great Depression--and compounded by the oil crisis, rust-belt economies being battered by competition from Japan and elsewhere, perceptions of urban blight and migration of jobs to the suburbs, to the Sun Belt, to Mexico and elsewhere, office tower construction ground to a virtual halt *everywhere*, most especially in the Great Lakes and US Northeast regions. And much of what *was* completed around this time (most especially the WTC) wound up being a white elephant for years.
(c) Ironically, you *can* blame the Crombie-era stoppage for this: maybe the tendency to worship the 60s/70s skyline has something to do with, well, the fact that its fundamental form remained basically the same (w/Scotia and BCE added for good measure) for two or three decades. Enough for it to settle into being an old-shoe "classic"--OTOH had the building boom continued, we'd in all likelihood have ended up w/simply an earlier version of what we have now, and the "classic" skyline would have gotten lost in the morass much earlier. (Conversely, if anyone deserves political credit for the re-emphasis upon height...well, none other than the Layton/Chow household, for giving the "validating" thumbs-up to Cityplace.)
And (d) if *any* cancelled project can be blamed in part on those "Crombie-esque" forces, it's Metro Centre. But we saved Union Station in the process--and anyone who thinks that was "not worth it" has got to be off their rocker...
But back to what got me banned, my knock on Peepers' naive knock on Crombie ruining everything...
(a) let's put the shoe on the other foot, huh? If you gotta claim that Crombie ruined Toronto as a place of architectural distinction because he hated skyscrapers, well, remember there's a counter-POV (maybe more common/validly offered 30 yrs ago than now) that the 60s/70s skyline you're worshipping was a far cry from, say, 20s/30s NYC. Like, Empire State vs WTC: no contest. Get the picture? (Which still endures through grousing over glass-and-steel "boxiness" now and again.)
(b) It wasn't just Crombie's Toronto. 1973/74 saw the (to that point) biggest economic slump since the Great Depression--and compounded by the oil crisis, rust-belt economies being battered by competition from Japan and elsewhere, perceptions of urban blight and migration of jobs to the suburbs, to the Sun Belt, to Mexico and elsewhere, office tower construction ground to a virtual halt *everywhere*, most especially in the Great Lakes and US Northeast regions. And much of what *was* completed around this time (most especially the WTC) wound up being a white elephant for years.
(c) Ironically, you *can* blame the Crombie-era stoppage for this: maybe the tendency to worship the 60s/70s skyline has something to do with, well, the fact that its fundamental form remained basically the same (w/Scotia and BCE added for good measure) for two or three decades. Enough for it to settle into being an old-shoe "classic"--OTOH had the building boom continued, we'd in all likelihood have ended up w/simply an earlier version of what we have now, and the "classic" skyline would have gotten lost in the morass much earlier. (Conversely, if anyone deserves political credit for the re-emphasis upon height...well, none other than the Layton/Chow household, for giving the "validating" thumbs-up to Cityplace.)
And (d) if *any* cancelled project can be blamed in part on those "Crombie-esque" forces, it's Metro Centre. But we saved Union Station in the process--and anyone who thinks that was "not worth it" has got to be off their rocker...
I'm glad to see this one moving along.
