haltcatchfire
Senior Member
Ditching that heavy useless parapet roof band would help too. Why are architects doing this so often?
WestUrban 37th | 16.5m | 5s | WestUrban | FAAS Architecture
- Thread starter MichaelS
- Start date
Alex_YYC
Senior Member
This doesn’t look like something from FAAS.adamyyc
Active Member
Agreed. Have to believe this will evolve. It’s not the nicest location, but I don’t know if anywhere in the City deserves this kind of treatment.
haltcatchfire
Senior Member
I’d say this area deserves a nice building because they’ve had to live with the ugliest one in the city (behind the Esso at 17th Ave).
MichaelS
Senior Member
A few more renderings, available at the developers site:
Urban Outdoorsman
Active Member
Looks fine besides the random yellow rectangle
CBBarnett
Senior Member
I don't mind it - aesthetically it's reasonable, beyond the typical Calgary critique of not using bricks and having too many materials.
More importantly to looks, its on two solid streets with good transit, excellent cycling connectivity and really is the only multi-family development of a reasonable scale within 1 or 2 kilometres. Our 1950s-1990s burbs have so little diversity in their housing stock they need this kind of thing, particularly in that area of the inner SW which is already pretty expensive.
I can't remember if discussed previously - but this development is a good place to highlight the power of proper cycling facilities in development. With the existing reasonably good connectivity to all major centres nearby and few hills, all you really need is a half-decent bicycle room in the building and good parking facilities at the destination (e.g. Westbrook LRT, MRU, 17th Avenue retail, Marda Loop etc.) The distances are perfect to life a fairly bicycle-heavy lifestyle.
Of course with cycling infrastructure - the devil's in the details. Many bicycle rooms, even in new buildings seem designed by someone who (1) has never ridden a bicycle, (2) can't imagine using a bicycle daily, or (3) hates bicycles. Hopefully not the case here. The other problem is the area's network while being quite good, still has that classic Calgary bicycle problem: it's easy enough to get within a few blocks of where you are trying to go but the infrastructure disappears right as you really needed it to cross the busy car-oriented roads around Westbrook LRT, MRU etc.
Bicycle tangent over. Overall a good development, in a good location and contextually just what the area really needs.
More importantly to looks, its on two solid streets with good transit, excellent cycling connectivity and really is the only multi-family development of a reasonable scale within 1 or 2 kilometres. Our 1950s-1990s burbs have so little diversity in their housing stock they need this kind of thing, particularly in that area of the inner SW which is already pretty expensive.
I can't remember if discussed previously - but this development is a good place to highlight the power of proper cycling facilities in development. With the existing reasonably good connectivity to all major centres nearby and few hills, all you really need is a half-decent bicycle room in the building and good parking facilities at the destination (e.g. Westbrook LRT, MRU, 17th Avenue retail, Marda Loop etc.) The distances are perfect to life a fairly bicycle-heavy lifestyle.
Of course with cycling infrastructure - the devil's in the details. Many bicycle rooms, even in new buildings seem designed by someone who (1) has never ridden a bicycle, (2) can't imagine using a bicycle daily, or (3) hates bicycles. Hopefully not the case here. The other problem is the area's network while being quite good, still has that classic Calgary bicycle problem: it's easy enough to get within a few blocks of where you are trying to go but the infrastructure disappears right as you really needed it to cross the busy car-oriented roads around Westbrook LRT, MRU etc.
Bicycle tangent over. Overall a good development, in a good location and contextually just what the area really needs.
MissingMiddle
Active Member
I'm not a fan.
I'm not a fan of the design, but I've always been more of a function over form kind of person....function over form if it's not in a high profile area, so I'm okay with it.
Mountain Man
Senior Member
That is going to look awful! I get what they were trying to do, but that's a swing and a miss...
BKha
Active Member
The renders don't look great, but I feel the final product won't look too bad. Overall, it'll be a good addition.
HaileyDarling
New Member
It's really too bad they've decided to do strictly residential... (besides possibly one space for retail on the corner?). 37th has the potential to become an amazing pedestrian friendly mixed use Main Street, similar to Marda Loop. Setting this as the building standard to coincide with the recent very successful streetscape updates the city has done is really disappointing. I can't see this building aging well.
adamyyc
Active Member
37th felt like a weird choice to prioritize for the Main Streets. I think it turned out well, and maybe it was prioritized to try to spur development, whereas some of the other areas, development is already occurring and maybe the City thinks some of the costs for the upgrades will be borne by the developers, but yeah, I thought 37th was a weird first choice.
HaileyDarling
New Member
Yeah, I agree... Many other streets, especially more inner city, could have used upgrades before 37th.
Cowtown
Senior Member
Agreed. I think 37th could be a decent corridor. 17th would be better, 37 has some potential. I also agree about the building not aging well. I like the stuff FAAS has been doing, but this one is proof that good firms can have their hand tied by the developer.
Welcome to the forum @HaileyDarling