West Village Towers | 149.95m | 42s | Cidex Group | NORR Dubai Yahya Jan

General rating of the project

  • Great

    Votes: 8 7.2%

  • Very Good

    Votes: 15 13.5%

  • Good

    Votes: 39 35.1%

  • So So

    Votes: 13 11.7%

  • Not Very Good

    Votes: 16 14.4%

  • Terrible

    Votes: 20 18.0%
  • Total voters
    111
I like the towers, don't mind the cladding, but the podium is absolute horse dump. Cold and sterile. At this point a row of medium/large elm trees might save the ground level from being a complete disaster. This generally is a big problem in Calgary, beautiful towers, crappy podiums or street level design. Hopefully projects such Hines' "Park Central" gives other developers a wake up call. In fact something as simple as Strategic's "Upten" podium is a passable.
 
another long term consequence of the city wanting 5 lane one way streets in the inner city.
now you can change the roads but your stuck with sh*t like this for pretty much the rest of our lives.
also the one way loving planners seem to have made the blocks bt 17th ave and 12th ave permanent one way despite the 17th ave construction being complete.

there are so many obstacles to the inner city developing a decent street presence heres one they could do something about but refuse to and in fact are currently making it worse.

as a resident of the inner city im fed up with my tax dollars subsidizing easy transport from 212th ave to downtown or the airport or where ever.
if someone is stuck in traffic on 9th ave or macleod trail bc its 2 way fck em, i just dont care as i see it as a never ending detriment to a vibrant downtown.
 
Blaming a 5-lane main artery road into downtown, is not the cause for the behemoth of this podium. That falls squarely on the developers. Is the civic planning of the roads perfect? Hell no. The roads are not the cause for the lack of vibrancy that you and I want, its the lack of residential density in the core. Higher Density brings more restaurants, shops, hotel, etc that don't close at 5PM. With only 18K living in the core, its far from being robust.
 
No clue what a road has to do with a godawful podium design. Fact is, DT Calgary is still primarily a workplace. Yes, we're getting more residences lately but until the roads arent so heavily relied upon by suburban commuters they will stay as they are. The road being there isn't what made them say "you know what Calgary needs? Another monolithic, bland, value-engineered-the-crap-out-of podium."
 
Calgcouver said:
What an inhospitable public realm for human beings. Can't wait for basically no weather protection for pedestrians, narrow sidewalks and no planting/softscaping to speak of to soften this post-modernist hellscape.

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You must be bathing in caviar with that exorbitant level of outrageous expectations!
 
Meikkhaell said:
No clue what a road has to do with a godawful podium design. Fact is, DT Calgary is still primarily a workplace. Yes, we're getting more residences lately but until the roads arent so heavily relied upon by suburban commuters they will stay as they are. The road being there isn't what made them say "you know what Calgary needs? Another monolithic, bland, value-engineered-the-crap-out-of podium."
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Chicken or egg type scenario in my opinion. Redesign the road network and public realm in the core to be more pedestrian/ retail friendly in hopes of encouraging more mixed use, better designed buildings or wait for the change to occur naturally.
 
Travisty said:
Blaming a 5-lane main artery road into downtown, is not the cause for the behemoth of this podium. That falls squarely on the developers. Is the civic planning of the roads perfect? Hell no. The roads are not the cause for the lack of vibrancy that you and I want, its the lack of residential density in the core. Higher Density brings more restaurants, shops, hotel, etc that don't close at 5PM. With only 18K living in the core, its far from being robust.
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West downtown has the highest residential densities in the city. It is far from vibrant. It's the roads and adjacent public realm. The fast one-way traffic creates a cold, unwelcoming street environment. Now consider McLeod Trail in Victoria Park. Again, a lot of density entering the downtown, but the podiums cannot support retail because there is little incentive for pedestrian traffic. It is inhospitable and people just don't feel comfortable walking/hanging next to zooming cars.
 
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1875 said:
another long term consequence of the city wanting 5 lane one way streets in the inner city.
now you can change the roads but your stuck with sh*t like this for pretty much the rest of our lives.
also the one way loving planners seem to have made the blocks bt 17th ave and 12th ave permanent one way despite the 17th ave construction being complete.
Click to expand...
I believe there is only a 1 year pause in construction, they are still going to do a lot of work starting again next year.
 
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It seems like the glass has ground to a halt again on this project. Looking back at old posts in the thread, I don't think any new tower glass has gone up since early May. The next pieces are for the crown, so I have been eager to see what goes up, but nothing for over a month now.
 
They've been finishing up the last full floor plate level's glass this week, but are taking their time over the last couple weeks. Mostly due to the fact that they're no where near ready on all of the infill wall structure that will be behind the massive amounts of spandrel up top.

There's a bit of glass in on the next level up on the NW corner.
 
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