Toronto Ten York Street Condos | 224.02m | 65s | Tridel | Wallman Architects

Wednesday from the PATH:
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In no time all those new developments E of Yonge near the lake will create a wall of scrapers to the R of 10 Y in the above picture.
 
Its too bad some of the nicest looking condos are being built out side the downtown core with better facade materials. The land value downtown so expensive forcing the developers to go cheap on the facades. As a result with the exception of some new buildings downtown, it's starting to look cheap. I don't understand why city hall doesn't create a bylaw that permits buildings to have the same coloured facade up against each other for esthetics purposes.
 
cd concept said:
Its too bad some of the nicest looking condos are being built out side the downtown core with better facade materials. The land value downtown so expensive forcing the developers to go cheap on the facades. As a result with the exception of some new buildings downtown, it's starting to look cheap. I don't understand why city hall doesn't create a bylaw that permits buildings to have the same coloured facade up against each other for esthetics purposes.
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Downtown has the highest concentration of towers clad in high-quality curtainwall vs. window wall and spandrels.
 
cd concept said:
Its too bad some of the nicest looking condos are being built out side the downtown core with better facade materials. The land value downtown so expensive forcing the developers to go cheap on the facades. As a result with the exception of some new buildings downtown, it's starting to look cheap. I don't understand why city hall doesn't create a bylaw that permits buildings to have the same coloured facade up against each other for esthetics purposes.
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The Province has not given the City the power to pass bylaws based entirely on aesthetic concerns. Yet.

Maybe not ever.

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interchange42 said:
The Province has not given the City the power to pass bylaws based entirely on aesthetic concerns. Yet.

Maybe not ever.

42
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Sure, but bylaws favouring, or even mandating curtainwall over window wall or limitations on the total balcony space etc. are not only aesthetic, so why doesn't the city approach it from that angle?
 
An allowed materials list wouldn't work. As new tech appeared, would architects or the OAA have to apply to a regulatory body, and then spend a couple of years arguing for the addition of cementitious tile for example? And you can't really ban window wall outright, as curtain wall doesn't work behind balconies… although hybrids do, so do you have to define certain hybrids that are acceptable where others might not be? Would every manufacturer have to submit their latest designs for scrutiny?

And why try to limit balcony space? There's no magic number between 100% and 0% balcony frontage that looks better or worse than any other percentage (although 1 or 2 or 3%, etc., aren't going to work). But why try to limit that anyway?

The only way to address aesthetics that occurs to me is to have everything go past a Design Review Panel, one that has more scope, and more power to reject substandard design. It would be tricky getting the new balance of power right, and you end up with more bloated bureaucracy… but we need something to stop the true crap that's still occasionally going up.

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interchange42 said:
An allowed materials list wouldn't work. As new tech appeared, would architects or the OAA have to apply to a regulatory body, and then spend a couple of years arguing for the addition of cementitious tile for example? And you can't really ban window wall outright, as curtain wall doesn't work behind balconies… although hybrids do, so do you have to define certain hybrids that are acceptable where others might not be? Would every manufacturer have to submit their latest designs for scrutiny?

And why try to limit balcony space? There's no magic number between 100% and 0% balcony frontage that looks better or worse than any other percentage (although 1 or 2 or 3%, etc., aren't going to work). But why try to limit that anyway?

The only way to address aesthetics that occurs to me is to have everything go past a Design Review Panel, one that has more scope, and more power to reject substandard design. It would be tricky getting the new balance of power right, and you end up with more bloated bureaucracy… but we need something to stop the true crap that's still occasionally going up.

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Yeah, I have to agree, because some developers have window wall in all of their developments. If there was a ban on window wall, those developers may either go out of business or pull out of the local market into a settlement where window wall was permitted. Urban Toronto can critique a development that looks bad to them all they want, but I highly doubt the developers will be convinced to change the design because they typically praise their own developments.
interchange42 said:
The Province has not given the City the power to pass bylaws based entirely on aesthetic concerns. Yet.

Maybe not ever.

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I have to agree with @interchange42, because they have different opinions regarding developments when compared to Urban Toronto. We need to get back on topic though.
 
You're not getting my point @Consilium. I'm saying a list won't work because we'd be forever having to define new technologies to add them to the list, and debating the finer points of just what's (for example) window wall, and what's a hybrid, etc. It would be a regulatory nightmare.

In regards to the question of whether or not complaints on UrbanToronto can result in developers and architects making changes, it has been known to happen. Don't like something? Then post about why you don't, and if the building is early enough along, you might be able to drive change if those in charge agree with you.

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