Toronto YC Condos -- Yonge at College | 198.42m | 62s | Canderel | Graziani + Corazza

I popped over to skyrisecities. This development is even more depressing. There's some nice quality stuff going up all over the country. How does Montreal manage to escape spandrel but Toronto has it in abundance? Surely the profit margin is even slimmer in Montreal?
 
I was in Montreal a few weeks ago and noticed a lot of the new building looked very well executed as well, didn't see one new build I didn't like.

Did a quick search of units for new residentials and was surprised at how low some units are going for, making the city seem more appealing to live in then it already was.
 
TheKingEast said:
I popped over to skyrisecities. This development is even more depressing. There's some nice quality stuff going up all over the country. How does Montreal manage to escape spandrel but Toronto has it in abundance? Surely the profit margin is even slimmer in Montreal?
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From what I've seen it's two factors. The lower demand for condos and cheaper rent counter-intuitively forces better quality because selling condos isn't as easy in Montreal. Also materials used in Montreal have to be better suited for a harsher winter so we get less balconies and more contained units.

And I'm not sure I'd go so far as to say Montreal always builds better. Some Griffintown stuff is pretty bad. That said Montreal does seem to build some nice condos.
 
wolfewood said:
From what I've seen it's two factors. The lower demand for condos and cheaper rent counter-intuitively forces better quality because selling condos isn't as easy in Montreal. Also materials used in Montreal have to be better suited for a harsher winter so we get less balconies and more contained units.

And I'm not sure I'd go so far as to say Montreal always builds better. Some Griffintown stuff is pretty bad. That said Montreal does seem to build some nice condos.
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I find Toronto just builds cheaply. Yes, you may get some nice finishes, but the structure is usually cheap. Building code simply not up to snuff especially for allowable sound between units.
 
Just brutal.

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Can clearly see how the alternating black and white sections will play out based on the balcony underside paint.

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Conrad Black said:
Buildings in Toronto are selling so fast they barely need to do any marketing. Spending extra for the look is not necessary.
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Which is why the city needs to enforce the use of curtainwall. The point of the municipal government is to serve the city and its citizens. A more lucrative market should allow us to demand better quality, not worse.

ChesterCopperpot said:
Are they going to give them money?
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I'm pretty sure they make enough money; the margins here are far higher than Montreal, and yet their new residential construction is far far superior to ours. Also, it doesn't even have to be a law that can be taken to OMB. They can simply offer incentives for using curtainwall, at the very least.
 
I don't know if this is true but from what I have heard from friends and acquaintances who work in real estate, Toronto developers have some of the highest profit margins in the world, so why can't we get buildings on par with Montreal? It makes no sense at all! If developers make high profits in Toronto, shouldn't they be expected to build something decent? To me, it's unbelievable the kind of things developers are allowed to get away with that other industries can't. The province and the city should have cracked down on the industry long ago!
 
I have no idea how our margins compare to what developers elsewhere in the world can get, but the posts lately in this thread are pie-in-the-sky, making broad, mostly unprovable claims, which ignore things like land costs in Toronto as compared to Montreal, while also ignoring the fact that (as stated many times before) Toronto has no legal authority to enforce the use of particular exterior elements, eg. curtain wall over window wall. The suggestion that we provide incentives to do it instead is a novel and goofy one: who would pay who much for that? and why would we have to anyway; apparently our developers "have the highest margins in the world"?!

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In Montreal the quality of the projects around the Bell centre is pretty mixed, the use of glass curtain is good but the architecture itself is pretty banal. There wasn't anything in Griffintown that caught my eye, although some projects did at least incorporate some measure of brick in deference to neighbourhood history. Lots of opportunity there though, especially along the canal and its connection to the old port. Perhaps with the new REM station and corresponding growth we might start seeing some better looking buildings in that neighbourhood. In Montreal I'm more excited about conversions and additions- it's the juxtaposition of old and new that the city really shines.

As for Toronto, I definitely agree on the overuse of spandrel and window wall, it just seems to be the go-to material for the majority of projects. Despite the value of the property- the buildings usually end up looking cheap and downmarket to me. Where many developments really fall short though is at street level or ground plane. There's not enough variation in building materials, lack of imagination in design, and generally too many uninteresting and characterless podiums.
 
There is no good reason to be overly skeptical or pessimistic about the possibility of stricter standards, imposed by the city, for quality building materials. Examples of this happen all over the world, especially in Europe where there is a lot of emphasis on new developments blending with historical architecture. Sure, there will always be examples where this has not been done well. But the city does have a role to play here.
 
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