Stephen Avenue Quarter | 241m | 66s | Triovest | Gibbs Gage

[outoftheice]

To refresh people's minds on what could be possible for this block, I came across the old promo video for the robo-parkade that was proposed for the site. Some key takeaways:

- All the heritage buildings were going to be completely restored and activated. The idea was to move the arts and cultural groups from Arts Central (scheduled at the time to be demoed for Telus Sky construction) into these spaces.

- The alley was meant to be a shared space between pedestrians and cars accessing the parkade with efforts made to activate the space.

- No impact to the heritage buildings along Stephen Ave

- Phase 2 involved the construction of a high rise office tower above the parkade podium.

This was all being proposed by Heritage Propery Corporation which was a small time player. It's evident from the production quality of the video they had a limited budget. And yet, if HPC could come up with a way to save and restore every single heritage property on that block and still build an office tower and a parkade podium surely Triovest, with their massive resources and budget, could come up with a better design that doesn't involve bulldozing the entire block and slapping up some facades?

 

[YourBoy007]

To refresh people's minds on what could be possible for this block, I came across the old promo video for the robo-parkade that was proposed for the site. Some key takeaways:

- All the heritage buildings were going to be completely restored and activated. The idea was to move the arts and cultural groups from Arts Central (scheduled at the time to be demoed for Telus Sky construction) into these spaces.

- The alley was meant to be a shared space between pedestrians and cars accessing the parkade with efforts made to activate the space.

- No impact to the heritage buildings along Stephen Ave

- Phase 2 involved the construction of a high rise office tower above the parkade podium.

This was all being proposed by Heritage Propery Corporation which was a small time player. It's evident from the production quality of the video they had a limited budget. And yet, if HPC could come up with a way to save and restore every single heritage property on that block and still build an office tower and a parkade podium surely Triovest, with their massive resources and budget, could come up with a better design that doesn't involve bulldozing the entire block and slapping up some facades?

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Sorry but you have to be naive to buy this crap.

1. More cars and parking downtown: Sweet! /s
2. An office building: Already proposed with most objecting to it.
3. The 7th Ave buildings get to survive at least another few decades with arts and cultural groups occupying them: The area will remain dead, trust me. And even they admit businesses can't survive along 7th Ave in this location.
4. The creation of a Heritage Alley: There'd be no store fronts. Like what??

Overall, this was a pathetic and naive attempt to save those precious no-value heritage buildings and prolong that areas' suffering.

 

[haltcatchfire]

The Autopark should have received the funding that went to the Platform parkade. This could have housed the Platform office as well.

 

[outoftheice]

Sorry but you have to be naive to buy this crap.

1. More cars and parking downtown: Sweet! /s
2. An office building: Already proposed with most objecting to it.
3. The 7th Ave buildings get to survive at least another few decades with arts and cultural groups occupying them: The area will remain dead, trust me. And even they admit businesses can't survive along 7th Ave in this location.
4. The creation of a Heritage Alley: There'd be no store fronts. Like what??

Overall, this was a pathetic and naive attempt to save those precious no-value heritage buildings and prolong that areas' suffering.

Let's see....

60 years of tearing down heritage buildings in YYC to build skyscrapers which has lead to an entire downtown core that is a ghost town after 5pm, lacks any sort of street vibrancy and has City Council wanting to spend up to a billion dollars of taxpayer dollars to try and save it.

Versus

A $4.5 million investment by City Council to restore heritage buildings along Stephen Avenue which helped to create the only 2 blocks in the entire downtown core that draw people and offer any sort of vibrancy outside of the 9-5.

You may think it's naive to think that restoring the heritage buildings along 7th will lead to any sort of revitalization of that block but the one time we've done it so far in Calgary's recent history it has paid off in spades. The one thing we absolutely know from 60 years of development is that tearing down these buildings to slap up another skyscraper will absolutely prolong the areas suffering as you put it and permanently cement another deadzone into our city's core while quite possibly killing one of the few blocks that isn't dead in the process.

What I would call truly naive is falling for a developer's fancy renderings and slick promises of activation when we have 60 years of evidence in Calgary that it never works.

 

[YourBoy007]

slap up another skyscraper

You sound like my grandma. The proposal you showed was for 7th Avenue. Not an existing party street. I'm aware developers love blowing smoke up everyones asses but saving the heritage buildings and convincing people that the space would become vibrant is also blowing smoke up our asses. These buildings are just old wood and bricks. At 100 years old they're hardly cool. This little proposal wasn't gonna bring any vibrancy to that area. The current proposal (full proposal) will would bring residential.

 

[outoftheice]

You sound like my grandma. The proposal you showed was for 7th Avenue. Not an existing party street. I'm aware developers love blowing smoke up everyones asses but saving the heritage buildings and convincing people that the space would become vibrant is also blowing smoke up our asses. These buildings are just old wood and bricks. At 100 years old they're hardly cool. This little proposal wasn't gonna bring any vibrancy to that area. The current proposal (full proposal) will would bring residential.

I'm definitely not your grandma but I am old enough to remember Stephen Ave in the 90s. It wasn't an existing party street... mainly bong stores, empty buildings and shops selling crappy tourist items. The buildings were all run down... just old wood and bricks, no different than the buildings on 7th Ave. They weren't quite 100 years old back then but they were hardly cool. I have no doubt that when Council first proposed spending $4.5 million to restore the buildings on Stephen Ave and pursue heritage protection there were all kinds of Calgarians who thought such a little proposal wouldn't bring any vibrancy to the area and was a waste of taxpayer money. And yet, 20 years later Stephen Ave is the only vibrant street in the entire downtown core, can actually be described as a party street on weekends and is a tourist draw. I don't think saying the same could be done for that one block of 7th Ave heritage buildings is blowing smoke up anyone's ass. Calgary's history shows it works. On the flip side, Eau Claire is full of premium residential. I don't think any street there can be described as vibrant and all those residents still weren't enough to save Eau Claire market from being anything other than an oversized food court.

 

[maestro]

Sorry but you have to be naive to buy this crap.

1. More cars and parking downtown: Sweet! /s
2. An office building: Already proposed with most objecting to it.
3. The 7th Ave buildings get to survive at least another few decades with arts and cultural groups occupying them: The area will remain dead, trust me. And even they admit businesses can't survive along 7th Ave in this location.
4. The creation of a Heritage Alley: There'd be no store fronts. Like what??

Overall, this was a pathetic and naive attempt to save those precious no-value heritage buildings and prolong that areas' suffering.

I find this conversation is less about the historical merit of rebuilding and incorporating one storey retail facades than it is over the block long glass podium ass proposed as part of this development. I believe even a modern interpretation of a main street (relegating the current buildings to the history books) with individually styled retail units and high ceilings would be unanimously endorsed.

 

[lemongrab]

Sorry but you have to be naive to buy this crap.

1. More cars and parking downtown: Sweet! /s
2. An office building: Already proposed with most objecting to it.
3. The 7th Ave buildings get to survive at least another few decades with arts and cultural groups occupying them: The area will remain dead, trust me. And even they admit businesses can't survive along 7th Ave in this location.
4. The creation of a Heritage Alley: There'd be no store fronts. Like what??

Overall, this was a pathetic and naive attempt to save those precious no-value heritage buildings and prolong that areas' suffering.

Don't think OP was suggesting the previous proposal was perfect...but rather illustrating that a better compromise is absolutely possible.

Moreover, that proposal was 9 years ago. There were valid criticisms then, but it's silly to retroactively apply even more criticism based on current conditions.

 

[O-tac]

Kinda mind boggling that some still embrace this outdated and sterile form of development. It's depressing actually.

 

[O-tac]

I wonder how much feedback the city received since I think the deadline passed?

 

[JoeUrban]

I wonder how much feedback the city received since I think the deadline passed?

Deadline has not passed. There has been a lot of confusion about deadlines but from what I can tell May 30 was the deadline for circulated stakeholders, so probably Downtown Assoc, Heritage Calgary, etc. For public comments DMAP currently says June 10 for the Land Use and no deadline for the Development Permit.
Public notice signage hasn't even gone up yet.

That said, I was told by the file manager that the earlier your comments get in the better as that might mean the difference between your comments influencing admin as they formulate a recommendation vs just being tacked onto the councillor's package as addendums.

Personally I would aim for before June 10th.

 

[O-tac]

I wrote an e-mail to the file manager but never received any response. Hopefully it's because he's slammed with concerned e-mails .

 

[Mountain Man]

I doubt you will get a response, however your objection make make it on the file.

 

[O-tac]

Hopefully. One of my comments was cited back when they were redesigning St. Patrick's island. I mentioned not wanting it to be perfectly manicured like Prince's Island park.

 

[Surrealplaces]

I had one of my comments cited once as well. Can't recall which proposal it was, but I was surprised to see it mentioned.