Toronto Waterlink at Pier 27 | 43.89m | 14s | Cityzen | a—A

Actually, I'm not as interested in the commercial, residential mix as the ownership division. I think this is the essence of the Jacob-ian (sorry) argument. Architects and Planners think they can out-smart the difficiencies of mega-block or master planned zones through smart ideas and good design. What they are missing fundamentally is that it is the ownership structure that matters. Design, sorry to say is highly secondary. In my opinion the bigger the lot, the larger the zone master-planned, the more likely it will be to fail in the future. This will be as true for the top international designers as the worst suburban development hacks. While you will be able to find individual examples to refute this opinion, as a general trend I still believe it to be true.
 
Tewder said:
Rote dogma is never good, agreed, but mixed usage buildings with residential on top of commercial is the basic set-up that characterizes urban streetscapes the world over.
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So the fact that there is some crap retail in the base of the Toronto Star building must make it a good building then, is that what you're saying?
 
Urban Shocker said:
Jane Jacobs said next to nothing about design or aesthetics, and Pier 27's as much a design solution that uses shape, form, space and symbolism to give us a fine group of buildings that will make the waterfront sing as anything else. If the teachings of the saintly old biddy have been reduced to rote dogma - in this case a paean to endless consumerism being inserted into the ground floor of other peoples' apartment buildings - something has gone terribly wrong.
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I'm sure if Jane Jacobs learned that it was Peter Clewes designing the single-use, towers-in-the-park superblock exclusively for wealthy homeowners, she'd put aside her condemnation of such developments in this special case.

There's nothing to engage the public even though I am on record in liking the architecure of at least the one building on stilts. The site plan, however, is suburban, and does not belong at the foot of Yonge.
 
The residential above commerical planning is applicable for main streets/commercial streets only. Urban streetscapes consist of commercial streets, residential streets, institutional districts, parks, among others, many of which appropriately lack retail.
The architecture of this project is beautiful on its own, and the fact that there is a commerce-free promenade that the public can enjoy (and will be heavily used despite the absence of a Second Cup) is very promising.
 
The key to Jacob's arguement was that vitality in a neighbourhood or even a block was determined by the uses (and to some extent, the ownership) and the extent to which they were mixed and different. Having commercial, residential and work places all mixed up and close to each other meant that the block/neighbourhood was more busy than if there was only one or two uses...and a busy lively block attracts more people and businesses etc and on it goes.

Give more people reasons to be in an area (like the waterfront) and you will end up with more people, more often. This is the way to make the waterfront 'sing'.
 
alklay said:
The key to Jacob's arguement was that vitality in a neighbourhood or even a block was determined by the uses (and to some extent, the ownership) and the extent to which they were mixed and different. Having commercial, residential and work places all mixed up and close to each other meant that the block/neighbourhood was more busy than if there was only one or two uses...and a busy lively block attracts more people and businesses etc and on it goes.

Give more people reasons to be in an area (like the waterfront) and you will end up with more people, more often. This is the way to make the waterfront 'sing'.
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Then this project fits her bill. There will be residential (now sorely lacking), work places right across the street, and commerical a short walk in either direction. Not to mention an extended public amenity in the boardwalk that gives access to a section of the waterfront from which the public would be excluded but for this building.
 
The boardwalk public amenity is mandated by the City/WaterfrontToronto, so the boardwalk and public sliver of land would be there no matter what the development turned out to be.
 
Jacobs' fiercest opposition was to superblock development. She was horrified by mega-projects which developed all at once several blocks of the city with large buildings having little relationship to the historic grid of the city as a whole. It is even worse if such a large complex is exclusively or almost exclusively devoted to a single use. All of this describes Pier 27 perfectly. This Regent Park for the rich will be a much-regretted failure for all the reasons that 50s and 60s style planning has been discredited, most notably by Jacobs herself.
 
But there is no grid, historic or otherwise, on this site. There never has been, since the fill was dumped there not so very long ago. It will not devoted to one use exclusively. It will be housing, and public space, and a marina. What it won't be is a Rabba, or a dry cleaner, or a Quiznos. Hardly a tragedy.
 
The historic street grid of our city was never a extended into the industrial wharfs of the waterfont. Clewes has based his strongly directional and evocative design on the piers, wharves and large shipping containers that were a part of that environment. A solution based on this approach, rather than applying a formula based on the teachings of someone who appeared to hatch most of her theories in a design-free zone, is perhaps a more relevant method of reviving the space at the foot of Yonge Street, surely?
 
Yes, but there is a historical grid in the City of Toronto, the city to which we are trying to join our waterfront.

This shipping container business just shows how ridiculous all this "evocation" really is. Container shipping was developed quite recently, long after that part of the port was mostly abandoned. Moreover, Toronto was never a container port of any significance.

I'd much rather have Jacobs' formulas in a "design-free" zone (why does that have to be either/or?) than Clewes' designs in a city-free zone.
 
I'd much rather have Jacobs' formulas in a "design-free" zone (why does that have to be either/or?) than Clewes' designs in a city-free zone.
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Unimaginative, you'll never win no matter how solid your argument may be. After all, it's a Clewes development, some people will say anything to defend it. One of the easiest ways to defend something is to use an either/or, black/white, good/evil frame.
 
SeanTrans said:
Unimaginative, you'll never win no matter how solid your argument may be. After all, it's a Clewes development, some people will say anything to defend it.
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The funny thing is that no one is against the actual development...just want it entails (or doesn't entail).
 
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