Glenmore Landing | 115m | 35s | RioCan | NORR

Riocan is in the business of distribution to shareholders to maintain share value while selling more shares. This won't be planned as low income housing. These high rise complexes do have a poor history in retaining their value as they age. I don't get all the excitement for towers here and up to 35 storeys. The site, IMO, is suitable for intensification. Some in the form that blends in with the surrounding than stick out like a sore thumb would be preferred. This is what Toronto would built and Toronto is the last place to copy.

High rise neighbourhoods subsidizing single family home neighbourhoods is not exactly true either. Revenues are higher per square kilometre in high rise neighbourhoods. The upfront costs to build the necessary infrastructure to provide a high standard of living is much higher too. For example, a in traffic bus route is sufficient in a single family home neighbourhood. A higher density neighborhood will need grade separation for transit
 
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Olaf said:
I don’t like this project at all. Sky rises , low income housing, more office and shopping centres….. There are lots of people who don’t agree with that .
People choose to live here because they like it as it is. Construction noise for the next 15 years??? I’m completely against this project.
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You don't like that there will be more retail? Usually NIMBYs want more retail lol.
 
maestro said:
High rise neighbourhoods subsidizing single family home neighbourhoods is not exactly true either. Revenues are higher per square kilometre in high rise neighbourhoods. The upfront costs to build the necessary infrastructure to provide a high standard of living is much higher too. For example, a in traffic bus route is sufficient in a single family home neighbourhood. A higher density neighborhood will need grade separation for transit
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Here's the neat thing; it's already done.
 
maestro said:
Riocan is in the business of distribution to shareholders to maintain share value while selling more shares. This won't be planned as low income housing. These high rise complexes do have a poor history in retaining their value as they age. I don't get all the excitement for towers here and up to 35 storeys. The site, IMO, is suitable for intensification. Some in the form that blends in with the surrounding than stick out like a sore thumb would be preferred. This is what Toronto would built and Toronto is the last place to copy.
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I am not convinced that we will see 35 storeys here regardless of what's approved, economics being what they are for tower development - while the SW is development restricted thanks to the ring road and T'suu Tina boundary, south of Glenmore isn't particularly popular or populated. Perhaps this site can change that or find a latent demand, but more likely I would assume some modest towers are the eventual outcome.

As for integration into the surroundings - what surroundings exactly? There's no development within 80 - 150m in all directions from the edges of the site. The site's current conditions are of an auto-centric strip mall are hardly contextually sensitive to being located so close to a major park and recreation amenity. I mean come on, we have a McDonald's drive-thru literally blocking direct access to the park and the whole pathway system and amenity that makes this location pretty good:

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The high level of access to the regions transit and road network, plus high-quality active mobility networks already established here make this a pretty good location for serious intensification. Design and aesthetics should be sensitive to context, but that's mostly in reducing the ground-floor impact of too many auto-centric uses and having poor pedestrian circulation.

maestro said:
High rise neighbourhoods subsidizing single family home neighbourhoods is not exactly true either. Revenues are higher per square kilometre in high rise neighbourhoods. The upfront costs to build the necessary infrastructure to provide a high standard of living is much higher too. For example, a in traffic bus route is sufficient in a single family home neighbourhood. A higher density neighborhood will need grade separation for transit
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There are break-points in development scale where splitting land/shared costs reduces per unit costs until the next infrastructure trigger. Fortunately in this context, we have already built the mostly-separated BRT infrastructure so it's appropriate to add density. Assuming you time it so you don't have to wait (headways are terrible currently) the transit trip time from MAX Yellow from Glenmore Landing to destinations are as follows:
  • Heritage Park - 1 minute (the walk from the BRT station across the parking lot at Heritage Park is much longer than the bus travel time)
  • Rockyview Hospital - 3 minutes
  • Mount Royal University - 11 minutes
  • Marda Loop - 15 minutes
  • Downtown @ 7th Avenue LRT - 25 minutes
 
The McDonald's drive through doesn't block access to the path. You can walk or bike from World Bier Haus to the path without crossing the drive thru, for example. (I've done it a bunch of times)
 
badc0ffee said:
The McDonald's drive through doesn't block access to the path. You can walk or bike from World Bier Haus to the path without crossing the drive thru, for example. (I've done it a bunch of times)
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Correct - the 1600 Patio tucked back there is a nice pit stop when you're doing a lap around the reservoir.
 
maestro said:
Riocan is in the business of distribution to shareholders to maintain share value while selling more shares. This won't be planned as low income housing. These high rise complexes do have a poor history in retaining their value as they age. I don't get all the excitement for towers here and up to 35 storeys. The site, IMO, is suitable for intensification. Some in the form that blends in with the surrounding than stick out like a sore thumb would be preferred. This is what Toronto would built and Toronto is the last place to copy.

High rise neighbourhoods subsidizing single family home neighbourhoods is not exactly true either. Revenues are higher per square kilometre in high rise neighbourhoods. The upfront costs to build the necessary infrastructure to provide a high standard of living is much higher too. For example, a in traffic bus route is sufficient in a single family home neighbourhood. A higher density neighborhood will need grade separation for transit
Click to expand...
I don't think we'll end up with 35 storey towers. It appears the max height was put in as up to 35 storeys, but that might be for one tower. At 1248 proposed units they can build a group of lowrises and still easily get that many. I'm not a huge fan of the high towers either, but would be happy with a couple of towers in the low 20's and another in the teens, with some lowrise scattered through the development.

I generally prefer the highrise towers to be downtown/beltline or adjacent to an LRT station, but this location is on a BRT route and can handle some extra density.
 
maestro said:
Riocan is in the business of distribution to shareholders to maintain share value while selling more shares. This won't be planned as low income housing. These high rise complexes do have a poor history in retaining their value as they age. I don't get all the excitement for towers here and up to 35 storeys. The site, IMO, is suitable for intensification. Some in the form that blends in with the surrounding than stick out like a sore thumb would be preferred. This is what Toronto would built and Toronto is the last place to copy.

High rise neighbourhoods subsidizing single family home neighbourhoods is not exactly true either. Revenues are higher per square kilometre in high rise neighbourhoods. The upfront costs to build the necessary infrastructure to provide a high standard of living is much higher too. For example, a in traffic bus route is sufficient in a single family home neighbourhood. A higher density neighborhood will need grade separation for transit
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High-rise complexes can always be re-claded with newer material after a few decades, as seen in our downtown core. As long as the street-level design isn't utter garbage, concrete towers can be relevant for decades, unlike wood builds which need to be eventually torn down. I mean one of the sexiest towers in our city, MacKimmie Tower, was redeveloped.

Secondly, based on these initial plans, there seems to be a good street-level layout, something essential for a TOD. So the city I would prefer to align this sort of development proposal with is Vancouver rather than Toronto, which I think is a huge plus given their suburban towers generally represent good urban planning.
 
I was not referring to structural soundness when I was referring to these building having a poor history of retaining their value. Deferred maintenance within these under performing complexes is however commonplace.

Reclads are a last resort for property owners when there are no other alternatives and generally go with the cheapest options. It's wishful thinking these cheap window wall towers will be reclad with curtain wall 30 years from now. MacKimmie was developed by a non profit institution. Paliiser Square or the few office conversions is representative of what to expect from a reclad by a private owner

There are thousands of wood framed structures in Canada with a date of completion starting with 18. Wood is a resilient material. What we build today are composite wood structure that are susceptible to damage from water. They'll stand the test of time providing leaks get contained. The plywood buildings in Burnaby being demolished for high rises are not end of life.

This development follows Toronto more than Vancouver because it's a one off highrise complex in the middle of a low rise community. Vancouver does better planning larger cluster of high rises with the potential for a broader range of walkable services or gated towers in a park.. Evenso, Vancouver's suburban towers are a product of the high prices which reflects that a concrete tower is not cheap to build. That contradicts the point of suburbia being cheaper with more living space. The concept of suburbia isn't the problem. Pre war suburbia are the most sought out communities in Canada. It's how it was implemented in the auto centric post war boom era. The urban form here in the broader sense doesn't matter. It's not going to change how people live in the neighbourhood. It could raise prices making things less attainable.

Transit is a utility to get to and from other places. It's not the centrepiece being sold in Toronto to build a densely populated complex around. A Walmart superstore is more of a centrepiece..

Imagine a 50 storey tower in the middle of the University District. Would it add, subtract, or not change a thing from the pedestrian realm.
 
Here is a reclad of a 40 year old wood building, including a full structural rebuild of the patios, windows, etc:
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Structures can be well maintained or not. In general, purpose built rentals should be better maintained if they are owned by more than a small group of partners.
 

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StratosCityDweller said:
Before Glenmore Landing was built there were several attempts by Campeau in the late 1970s to build high density on this site. Lots of news articles on it, but I couldn't find an image.
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Amazing - had those 658 townhomes or the 1,200+ units of the later proposal been approved in the 1970s or 1980s, all those buildings would now represent the more accessible price point to live in the neighbourhood. That would have been a substantial boost in housing supply for the area.

As the expression goes, the best time to plant a tree was 50 years ago, second best time is today. Same strategy works for keeping housing supply attainable.
 
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