Mountain Man
Senior Member
Read your own posts man, jesus.... The NIMBY is very strong with this one...
ARC 33 | 22m | 6s | RNDSQR | S2 Architecture
- Thread starter Chinese_T
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Mountain Man
Senior Member
Parking is one that developers try to walk a fine line on, they want to be able to market as many stalls as they think they can sell, but the cost / value ratio gets worse with every foot they dig down. Parking concerns by neighbours are not always unfounded, but that's partially because everyone expects to be able to park immediately in front of their house 100% of the time. Visitor parking is also an issue, but in more dense urban areas, people have to be prepared to walk a block or two to get to their car.
Silence&Motion
Senior Member
I get @DougR 's fear in the abstract about the "Star Wars" streetscape. Check out the section King West in Toronto I've attached below (the street car cables even look like a zip line!). Clearly in Marda Loop we'd like to get a lot closer to the image I posted earlier of Gastown than this image of King West. On the other hand, there's a good case to be made that this section of King West is still a lot better than the current state of 33 Ave. Either way, Marda Loop is not getting this type of development. These buildings are 10-12 storeys high and they each occupy an entire block. Thanksfully for Marda Loop, development has occurred in a much more piecemeal way. The lots are smaller, the buildings are shorter, and the architecture is far more diverse.
Urb
Active Member
Good post. I agree - this is very sterile. Developers need to get more creative when dealing with these large podiums, by articulating and breaking up the massing. Unfortunately, this typically means higher costs. Perhaps the City can figure out a way to incentivize it.
UrbanRED
Active Member
DougR
New Member
When I used the term “quirky” I meant “odd”, certainly not “vibrant”. When we first moved to Calgary and lived in the SE I recall hearing about Marda Loop, but never got around to checking it out. When we returned to Calgary after a few years away and decided to look for a house closer to downtown, I recall my initial reaction coming off Crowchild at 33rd AV as being “This is Marda Loop?” I could not understand what all the fuss was about — a couple of blocks of shops, few of note, certainly nothing that I would describe as “vibrant”. What I did see, however, was huge potential. Unlike the 9th AV strip in Inglewood, 33rd AV in Marda Loop did not have the benefit, or the constraint, of existing historical buildings, and at that point had not yet seen any major redevelopment — it was essentially a “blank canvas” that could be redeveloped, using all of our accumulated urban planning and placemaking knowledge, into a quintessential 4-season Main Street. The 2014 Marda Loop ARP was a step in the right direction, but it came years too late (too much low density redevelopment had already taken place on the adjacent residential streets) and was far less visionary than it could have and should have been (the lead City planner described it as an “ARP-lite” as minimal funding had been earmarked for its development). Unfortunately, what vision did make it into the ARP — wide, encroachment-free and tree-lined sidewalks, stepped-back 4-storey buildings, etc., is not coming to fruition. Hopefully the new streetscape plan will be followed and implemented, and will help bring Marda Loop closer to what it could be. I do worry, however, about the building heights that are being approved along 33rd AV, as the vibrant Main Streets I can think of in Canada seem to mostly be lined with 2 to 4-storey buildings.
Mountain Man
Senior Member
It was more in response to your comment that it would more likely kill it than help it. If done right, 6 storeys should do just fine. I definitely agree with your frustrations about the ARP, it's odd to create that document, then let every developer get a relaxation on height. Sadly, when Treo went up, it set the standard that every developer wants to replicate.
Silence&Motion
Senior Member
It's Toronto's traditional culture of Protestant Toryism, which refuses to die no matter how much the city changes in other ways. The cultural tendencies that create streetscapes like this are the same ones that led Toronto to ban tobogganing on Sundays until 1961. Interesting streetscapes would create too many distractions for Torontonians who are expected to proceed straight to their destination at a brisk pace.
haltcatchfire
Senior Member
I don't think the economic potential of 4 storeys was there for many developers. I doubt they want to sink cost into underground parking, main floor retail, upgraded utilities, elevators, mechanical systems, amenity spaces, contributing to community investment fund, etc. and then only get three floors of units to sell. At four the equation doesn't work and redevelopment stagnates, at six there's potential profit and developers take the plunge.
DougR
New Member
Understood — what I meant by “kill it”, and clearly this did not come through, was not destroy something great that is there now, but rather get in the way of it becoming all that it could be.
DougR
New Member
At the time the ARP was being developed I believe the building code limited stick-framed buildings to a maximum of 4 storeys, so there didn’t seem to be a lot of interest in going a bit taller since it would have required going all concrete. Then the building code was changed to allow stick-frame up to 6 storeys and suddenly no one wanted to stop at 4 storeys.
gsunnyg
Senior Member
See from my travelling experiences, I’ve come to the conclusion that there isn’t a set height that guarantees a vibrant main street. The 2-4 storey range is extremely safe yet I’ve seen some buildings fail miserably in that range at creating a vibrant street front. From what I’ve noticed, a big key to creating a vibrant street, alongside of course many other details, is having good overall designed developments. For example, the first pic below is from London and it’s a massive 6 storey block development from the pre war era, yet it’s still very inviting for a pedestrian isn’t it? Why? Because of the effort put into the design that makes it a pleasurable pedestrian experience. Now the the next pic below is a pic of burrard street Vancouver, where I worked, and even though it’s not a very bustling street, this particular high rise building always stood out to me because it did a good job with its design. The tower isn’t too massive and there is a good setback on the podium. The podium itself is broken up quite nicely with a safe colour and material choice. The sidewalk is wide enough and with transparent glass, window shopping would be enjoyable. As well, there are large trees perfectly planted alongside the side walk. The only draw back, the sunlight wasn’t favourable at all hours of the day but then again it’s Vancouver, it’s 6 months of clouds anyways.
Same can be said for cities like Tokyo where in certain districts, the bland towers still create a pleasurable experience for pedestrians, especially during the night. Streets are still able to attract high foot traffic.
My point is, one of the keys to a good vibrant street is that they have a history of good developers that know how to make a good development that is favourable for the residents, workers, shops owners, and pedestrians and tbh, this project ticks off most of those boxes! So I like it!
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adamyyc
Active Member
A lot of opposition from the neighbours to the north on 32nd Ave during tonight’s community engagement session. Mostly standard concerns:
- height (push for 4 stories instead of 6 - one participant claimed RNDSQR promised that they wouldn’t request a height increase for the rest of the block when they requested the height increase for Courtyard 33)
- privacy (related to height)
- shadowing (related to height)
- parking (I agree with the neighbours on this one - the development is outside of the radius from the BRT to allow automatic reduction - I think proposed parking was aggressively low for this area)
- traffic (I don’t think traffic will be impacted that much by the development of this block - but there were accusations that RNDSQR underestimated the number of units in some of the recently completed and under construction developments in their Traffic Report (and claims that traffic counts in June are not representative of traffic in the neighbourhood during the majority of the year)
- Construction impacts (I am sympathetic as the neighbours will be dealing with back-to-back-to-back developments, so it could be 4-6 years of ongoing construction; also one neighbour claimed their vehicle has been hit twice during construction of Courtyard 33)
I think RNDSQR will ultimately increase the on-site parking. Otherwise, I don’t think we’ll see a lot of change, as I think it’s been fairly well planned.
Nothing new was shared that hasn’t already been shared on the project website.
- height (push for 4 stories instead of 6 - one participant claimed RNDSQR promised that they wouldn’t request a height increase for the rest of the block when they requested the height increase for Courtyard 33)
- privacy (related to height)
- shadowing (related to height)
- parking (I agree with the neighbours on this one - the development is outside of the radius from the BRT to allow automatic reduction - I think proposed parking was aggressively low for this area)
- traffic (I don’t think traffic will be impacted that much by the development of this block - but there were accusations that RNDSQR underestimated the number of units in some of the recently completed and under construction developments in their Traffic Report (and claims that traffic counts in June are not representative of traffic in the neighbourhood during the majority of the year)
- Construction impacts (I am sympathetic as the neighbours will be dealing with back-to-back-to-back developments, so it could be 4-6 years of ongoing construction; also one neighbour claimed their vehicle has been hit twice during construction of Courtyard 33)
I think RNDSQR will ultimately increase the on-site parking. Otherwise, I don’t think we’ll see a lot of change, as I think it’s been fairly well planned.
Nothing new was shared that hasn’t already been shared on the project website.
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Silence&Motion
Senior Member
Wait, what? It's literally two blocks from the BRT station. How could it possibly be outside the radius?
Also the neighbours are ridiculous. They're on Nextdoor ranting about how bad all of these developments are making traffic, and then they're trying to force developers to add additional parking?!?
adamyyc
Active Member
I haven’t measured, but even the presenters seemed to acknowledge that the development is technically 30 m outside of the 150 m radius.
Re: the parking, I think the argument is that residents of the building will have 1+ vehicles and RNDSQR is proposing ~0.5 stalls per unit. Concern is that it will result in spillover on street parking on neighbouring streets. Problem is that people seem to think they have the right to park in front of their home (and don’t seem to acknowledge that they are part of the problem by not parking in their own garages).