Future Toronto 3d model

[Midtown Urbanist]

https://twitter.com/jen_keesmaat/status/703984474338533377

Not to hijack your thread @innsertnamehere , but I found this graphic that Keesmaat posted to be really cool.

Supposedly one is coming for Yonge+Eg.

 

[Hanlansboy]

Amazing, but seeing this, as a health care worker, I'm forced to ask, with so many more people living downtown, why are they not building more necessary infrastructure? All of them, including health care, public transit, shopping, schools, etc..are bursting at the seams already. While I'm so excited to see so many new projects grace our skyline, I'm concerned we'll reach a saturation point, and then surpass it. With no additional services for these new residences, I believe people will begin avoiding the city, and unless something is done to improve these essential services, we'll start loosing citizens. I know the TTC and Metrolinks, along with many hospitals, are greatly expanding, but no where near the rate of residential expansion. Eventually, somethings going to give. Would you stay when it takes years just to find a doctor, and have no efficient means of getting round town?

 

[innsertnamehere]

^there are several hospital rebuilds and expansions going on and have been in recent years.. St. Mikes is getting expanded right now.

 

[Hanlansboy]

I know, I work at St Mikes (technically, but been off sick for 3 years). Once completed, we'll have the biggest ER in Canada, so that will help, but even still, my spouse works in our MRI, just for a regular MRI, it's currently over a year wait, strictly due to volume.

 

[ur2thdr]

wow thats cool

 

[isaidso]

Tinkering with colouring again.

What about just using one colour? Very light and opaque for proposals, less light and less opaque for approved, and darker almost solid colour for under construction. That way the ones that are almost done (and a sure thing) stand out more/look permanent. Just using 1 colour would be less jarring. You'd have to make sure the 3 different versions were easy to tell apart though.

 

[shanywany]

Hey innsertnamehere, I know you have mentioned that given the size of the model you havent been able to upload these files. I was just thinking that one of the values of sketchup and Torontos 3d massing files is that they are open source. Have you considered either breaking up the files further or batching by proposed/under construction/ etc to make these more readily available for others to be immersed in the 3d world? Im just curious because Im currently at school for masters of architecture and I know a lot of my undergrad students that I TA for would appreciate this type of visualization of the city.

Tinkering with colouring again. It'll be a lot of work to change colouring, so I want to make sure I get it right before I go and do it. I've been struggling just to keep the model updated, yet alone get the whole model's colours changed. Still not really satisfied, I darkened the red and yellows and changed the blue to a green. What do you think? this or the pastels? maybe something else? Another option would be to drop the colouring entirely and just make things grey, it would come with a bonus of the model being lower maintenance, but wouldn't show the same information.


red = proposed
yellow = sales
green = construction

I also tried the opaque building out, not sure I like it, but thought I would post it anyway.

Also, apologies on the lack of updates. I don't like posting new images unless the model is entirely "current", and I'm constantly in a state of catch up to ensure the thing is keeping up with construction starts and new proposals. Rest assured, its still alive though!

 

[innsertnamehere]

Just letting everyone know this thing is still kicking. I got very lazy with it over the summer, but have had some time to work on it over the christmas break now to see it updated. As it stands now I've done around 30 updates to buildings / created new ones, with about another 30 to go before it is "current". Its been a bit of an uphill climb though as I started the break with around 30 "needed updates", and have added another 30 over the last few weeks as a slurry of new proposals came in.

I'll be done school come spring, so I thinking i'll be scaling back the model in some capacity to make it lower maintenance, as I likely just won't have the time anymore. I'm not entirely sure what that means yet. I may scale it down to buildings under construction only, make it so all buildings are only a single colour, or reduce the "range" of the model perhaps to a more limited view of the direct downtown.

Regardless, there will hopefully be an update soon.

 

[innsertnamehere]

Update time!

First, a general look:

East Harbour is ridiculously massive:

Yonge and Bloor is looking extremely dense. My understanding is that a couple of these towers are set to be "combined" into a single site, but it looks crazy right now:

West Queen West is seeing a lot of growth and I neglected it in previous updates, so here it is in all its glory with the planned CAMH expansion and various condos:

West end of Downtown is always growing quickly, the BIG development on King West was a pain to make, no matter how good it looks:

Finally, a view from the waterfront to show the massive LCBO lands and One Yonge developments:

if you guys want any more angles, let me know!

 

[Midtown Urbanist]

Awesome update!

It would be nice to zoom in around Bathurst and Bloor, in the Honest Ed's site!

 

[Paul Aitken]

Amazing detail. Thanks for putting in so much effort. I wish there was a way to upload the whole model.

 

[smably]

Great work. I'd love to see an east or west view with the financial district and East Harbour both in frame, if that's possible.

 

[innsertnamehere]

Mirvish Village development. Note that they just resubmitted another application and I haven't updated it for those revisions yet, but you can still get an idea:

View with both East Harbour and the downtown:

Thought I would show the changes coming at Yonge - Eglinton - its been nearly 2 years since I provided an update in this part of town, and there is a ton of growth proposed up there. I can't for the life of me find drawings of the second E condo tower that changed once they bought up another site - so its still the old version of the building.

North York Centre doesn't have a whole lot going on these days, though stuff is happening.

Yonge and St Clair has an increasing amount of activity - including one proposal that is significantly taller than anything in the area currently.

Galleria Mall and other Junction area development. The mall development is massive.

Humber Bay is starting to round out development, not much left in the proposal stage any more.

The entire block bounded by Duncan, Adelaide, Pearl, and Simcoe in the entertainment district now has development applications filed. Insane density proposed there, and everywhere else in the entertainment district for that matter. There are a lot of applications in the area, but it appears that few of them are actually progressing to construction. 19 Duncan and 357 King West are both rental proposals so they should move soon, and a couple of condos seem to be preparing to launch, but there are still a lot of red buildings here compared to what the market can likely absorb.

Regent park is slowly marching through its development process. Lots of new buildings here now. The Wyatt has actually started construction and should be blue, but I haven't done that yet.

Bloor East is growing quickly. Jamestown North is finally launching now that Tridel is developing it, need to switch that to yellow soon. The new rental buildings on Sherbourne add a lot of density too. These will make the drive down the DVP much more impressive in a few years.

 

[Paul Aitken]

Does your model extend north of the 401? I would love to see how the Wilson Station neighbourhood is going to fill out.

 

[cd concept]

Does your model extend north of the 401? I would love to see how the Wilson Station neighbourhood is going to fill out.

Also model the 427 corridor, Mississauga and Scarborough Town Center areas when you got the time.

Great stuff thanks !