Bluestone | 78m | 18s | Amble Ventures | NORR
- Thread starter Albertasaurus
- Start date
1875
Senior Member
nice > good
fugly > bad
fugly > bad
Roaring Flames
Senior Member
Every city has ugly towers. Just be happy this one is only an 18 floor filler development
The Familia
Senior Member
My appologies for having high standards and wanting Calgary to be an amazing city. We all know not every proposal will get built, as that is not realistic. If that’s true, then I would rather the ugly ones be the ones to get cut. Give me more Lincoln’s and Imperia’s. For the lower cost option, the AHC complex that finished on 6th Ave is way more attractive and human scaled than this fugly building. I don’t need a Picasso for every building, but I do expect a certain degree of effort and aesthetics. If they duplicated Yellowstone or Redstone but made it blue I would be happier.
Albertasaurus
Active Member
Im not saying I don't want it to get built. I'm saying that there are much better proposed and approved buildings I'd rather see built than this one. With the sheer volume of proposals we know not all of the projects now proposed or approved are likely to be built.
Ultimately its still better than a vacant lot, so I certainly won't be upset if it does get built. That makes me anything but a NIMBY (especially since I live 2 or 3 km away, meaning it is certainly not my backyard). Frankly the only project I really would prefer does not get built is Sentinel, although it looks like that ship has sailed, which is very unfortunate. That site is too important to be taken up by a crap project that looks like it belongs in Skyview Ranch or Walden.
Ultimately its still better than a vacant lot, so I certainly won't be upset if it does get built. That makes me anything but a NIMBY (especially since I live 2 or 3 km away, meaning it is certainly not my backyard). Frankly the only project I really would prefer does not get built is Sentinel, although it looks like that ship has sailed, which is very unfortunate. That site is too important to be taken up by a crap project that looks like it belongs in Skyview Ranch or Walden.
BKha
Active Member
I don’t love the design, but I happy to see it get built. I’d rather have an empty lot filled with a mediocre building than have it empty.
CallmeCatbread
Active Member
There's a spectrum between hardcore neoliberal YIMBYs and BANANAs. I'd consider myself a YIMBY but that doesn't mean I have to roll over and be happy with literally anything gets built. At some point we have to get serious and ask ourselves what kind of city we're actually trying to build, and it's perfectly valid to critically engage with the quality of what gets built.
Calling anyone who objects to the quality of buildings (aesthetic or otherwise) a nimby and therefore not valid is necessarily antagonistic. Let's not forget that much (of course not all) of the nimby problem stems from the fact that much of what gets built looks like dogshit.
Edit: and I'm not saying this doesn't deserve to get built or whatever. A building would have to be offensively, loudly, horrendously ugly to deserve to not get built. There's only a small handful of buildings in the city that fit that criteria imo.
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Urban4Lyfe
New Member
I'm currently in the West End of Vancouver staying with friends and there's ugly buildings everywhere - but the street scape/public realm, foliage and trees, walkability, smattering of very nice buildings all create an urban fabric wherein you don't ever really focus on single ugly buildings when your in it - they don't really "stick out" given the context they are in.
So yes build it.
So yes build it.
haltcatchfire
Senior Member
Can we get some of that "street scape/public realm, foliage and trees, walkability, smattering of very nice buildings".
Woosh
New Member
Density promotes walkability and streetscape.
You need to have a critical mass of engaged residents in the area to promote good design.
Most calgarians sole interactions with a built environment is through a car. So they're less concerned about the small details of the sidewalk.
Business owners think parking and fast moving traffic is more important than safety or comfort for pedestrians.
This cycle has been going for 60 years, and it's why Calgary has a cheaper real estate market than Toronto or Vancouver.
It's shitty to walk around here, so fewer people want to move or visit.
You need to have a critical mass of engaged residents in the area to promote good design.
Most calgarians sole interactions with a built environment is through a car. So they're less concerned about the small details of the sidewalk.
Business owners think parking and fast moving traffic is more important than safety or comfort for pedestrians.
This cycle has been going for 60 years, and it's why Calgary has a cheaper real estate market than Toronto or Vancouver.
It's shitty to walk around here, so fewer people want to move or visit.
Golfing guy
Active Member
What?? Guess Calgary being the fastest growing municipality in Canada proves your point??
Woosh
New Member
It's the fastest growing municipality in relative terms. Not absolute numbers. Below is Stats Canada figures.
It's easy for smaller populations to experience relative growth.
Don't conflate relative short term growth with absolute. The latter is of course a better measure of popular preference.
I'm not saying anything controversial here.
It's well established that walkability is one of the best indicators for property value.
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trtcttc
Senior Member
I don’t actually disagree with your point that walkability makes properties expensive, it’s why the inner city has experienced greater price gains. But it’s more on a relative basis within a city. Inner city Calgary versus deep suburbs Calgary. But it absolutely matters what the relative growth is. I’m not sure if this includes births, but that alone would be a huge difference. People also move where they have family, friends, etc. The other main drivers of population are employment and potentially school enrollment capacity. This is all on a relative to population basis. The only time places grow significantly faster is because of some form of resource or sudden surge of employment. Calgary growing faster on a relative basis means the economy is doing well and likely real estate being cheaper.It's the fastest growing municipality in relative terms. Not absolute numbers. Below is Stats Canada figures.
It's easy for smaller populations to experience relative growth.
Don't conflate relative short term growth with absolute. The latter is of course a better measure of popular preference.
I'm not saying anything controversial here.
It's well established that walkability is one of the best indicators for property value.
Calgary having cheaper real estate is almost entirely a function of our capacity to scale building with demand, whereas Toronto and Vancouver do not. Montreal is perhaps the most urban major city in Canada, yet have property prices more similar to Calgary than Vancouver and Toronto.
Always_Biking
Senior Member
I agree. I was recently in NYC for a couple of weeks. I spent a lot of time in Manhattan, Queens and Brooklyn and I would estimate about 90% of buildings built from the 60’s onward are mediocre or plain ugly, but with the walkable streets and business you don’t really notice the buildings themselves.
crisp
Active Member
Getting rid of that parking lot is the biggest bonus. My own experience when I lived in the area and often walked to Safeway is that it was one of the worst parking lots with homeless crackheads tweaking and just lying out on the ground completely passed out in broad daylight. They're always hiding in the trees/bushes there, shooting up.