salsa
Senior Member
Councillor Mike Layton is the most bike friendly councillor in city hall. He needs to speak out against this insanity.
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Planned Sprawl in the GTA
- Thread starter innsertnamehere
- Start date
Councillor Mike Layton is the most bike friendly councillor in city hall. He needs to speak out against this insanity.
SunriseChampion
Senior Member
Yeah, of course they're planning roads specifically for cars. Smart Centres Leaside anyone? There's a lot of new build in this city that has its head up its 1950s arse.
SunriseChampion
Senior Member
Andres Duany was involved in the design of the NOTL community (as well as Cornell, of course, and I think...North Oakville?). The execution varies but I drove through the NOTL one last year and thought it did the ersatz historical architecture thing nicely, without feeling like Disney or something.
Like I would maybe even live in one of those homes in New Amherst.....if I had reason to live in Cobourg and if they were close enough to the lake and the neighbourhood had a grocer and pub and doctor and bank and bakery and dentist and train station and cafe within 10 minute walking distance of my place. Me. Live in a house.
....it's not a full moon, is it?
W. K. Lis
Superstar
Two articles of interest.
1)
From StreetFilms:
[video=vimeo;119214500]https://vimeo.com/119214500[/video]
2)
From mainstreet.com:
Why Americans Move Closer to Their Jobs or Neighborhoods Where They Can Walk
1)
From StreetFilms:
[video=vimeo;119214500]https://vimeo.com/119214500[/video]
2)
From mainstreet.com:
Why Americans Move Closer to Their Jobs or Neighborhoods Where They Can Walk
See this link for the rest of the story.
DKsan
Active Member
The 15 and 11 do in fact use the GO bus loop, as well as a bunch of other routes (the 92, 13, 16). The 511 and 115 does not. I understand why the 511 doesn't go into the GO station, but I think the 115 should.
Electrify
Senior Member
That image reminds me of University Ave. Think about that for a second... THAT SAID when I was in Montreal when I left a station (don't member which one) the exit led me straight into one of these median parks. The result was that it was actually used, rather than a forgotten set piece like on University.
Memph
Active Member
Yeah but the University Ave median "park's" design is pretty bad. Some parts if you're walking along it you have to walk right next to 4 lanes of traffic and just in general, being surrounded by 4 lanes of traffic on either side makes it kind of inconvenient to get to and unpleasant to be in.
Not to mention crossing from one part of the median to the other is not really intended to be possible, with no crossing signals or cross-walks and sweeping curves which are worsened by the fact that the median is pretty narrow.
https://www.google.ca/maps/@43.6532...ata=!3m4!1e1!3m2!1sDXdMSptW6UFSS7Q00R2eqw!2e0
In the Markham plan, the median is much wider, the adjacent traffic lanes are much narrower, one traffic lane and one parking lane, and only 1 lane (which will also be slower moving) to cross at intersections. It also looks like it would be pretty safe to cross from one part of the median to the next.
44 North
Senior Member
That’s a 6-year-old preliminary render. It’s basically ancient. I doubt anything like that would ever be built in York Region this century, and that amount of roadway allowance would never be squandered on parkland while giving the majority of commuters (i.e – single occupant drivers) one narrow lane of through traffic each way. And if Langstaff is to be the only road in/out of the subdivision, I’m pretty sure what will end up existing is an 8-lane arterial with three left-turn lanes at Yonge. IOW, a far cry from that preposterous Parisian streetscape in the preliminary render that's supposed to exist in 15 years.
I feel there should be no comparisons between a dated doodle and a great city like Montreal (or Toronto). For one, Montreal is 350 years old, with a density greater than TO’s. Not trying to rip on Markham or anything; it’s a fine area and is only improving. But a Sketchup scribble of some scrubland by a toll highway, in a “city†(using that term loosely) with a paltry density of 1,400/km sq should not be compared to a beloved cosmopolitan metropolis like Mtl. Besides, unlike other centres there are no civic buildings planned for Langstaff Gateway (nor at RHC for that matter). As well, there are no plans for a major educational institution (nor at RHC). Even Markham’s bid to house a York U campus is nowhere near this site.
Long and short: these are old plans for a subdivision by a highway. And contrary to what some say, this is not "right on" the subway. For one, some of the site is up to a km from the subway. But also the subway doesn't exist.
I feel there should be no comparisons between a dated doodle and a great city like Montreal (or Toronto). For one, Montreal is 350 years old, with a density greater than TO’s. Not trying to rip on Markham or anything; it’s a fine area and is only improving. But a Sketchup scribble of some scrubland by a toll highway, in a “city†(using that term loosely) with a paltry density of 1,400/km sq should not be compared to a beloved cosmopolitan metropolis like Mtl. Besides, unlike other centres there are no civic buildings planned for Langstaff Gateway (nor at RHC for that matter). As well, there are no plans for a major educational institution (nor at RHC). Even Markham’s bid to house a York U campus is nowhere near this site.
Long and short: these are old plans for a subdivision by a highway. And contrary to what some say, this is not "right on" the subway. For one, some of the site is up to a km from the subway. But also the subway doesn't exist.
innsertnamehere
Superstar
Not only is the only 8 lane arterial in the city University avenue in the downtown, there are also no triple left turn lanes that am I aware of. Certianly not coming out of a small area like the Langstaff Gateway development lands.
Likely access will be a simple 4 lane road with a single left and right hand turn lane.
Markham's density is also far, far above 1,400 people per square km. Roughly half the municipality is rural farmland, its incomparable to the fully built out area that is Montreal. Actual density is quite high, probably in the 3,0000 range, and increasing.
Likely access will be a simple 4 lane road with a single left and right hand turn lane.
Markham's density is also far, far above 1,400 people per square km. Roughly half the municipality is rural farmland, its incomparable to the fully built out area that is Montreal. Actual density is quite high, probably in the 3,0000 range, and increasing.
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W. K. Lis
Superstar
Just try to get to Queens Park from Queens Park Station. There is a median, but there is also a flower bed in the way. People have to navigate to the narrow side See https://www.google.ca/maps/@43.6598...ata=!3m4!1e1!3m2!1shi25S30tZ-nWszz20u1Zvg!2e0 to see how its looks in summer, then look at it for real today with snow windrows.
howl
Active Member
The comparison with University Avenue is not a good one. The proposed linear park in the middle of the Markham Langstaff Gateway development is more like the park in the middle of the St.Lawrence neighbourhood (The Esplanade/Scadding Ave). It is not intended to be an arterial road. It is intended to be a linear park that connects through the neighbourhood for pedestrians and cyclists. It also happens to have some local or minor collector roads running along beside it. The main collector/arterial roads will run around the outside of the development block.
W. K. Lis
Superstar
TJ O'Pootertoot
Senior Member
Before I deal with the most wrongest guy on UT, thanks to those who pointed out how off the University Avenue comparisons are. The width of this ROW must be like 1/2 of what University is. Yeesh.
How can one person be so consistently wrong? The developers already agreed to it (yes, including the street network, which was studied by IBI, company of some repute, and the secondary plan already passed. Either stop commenting or actually read-up. The entirety of what you know about this is what I've chosen to post in the interest of schooling your sorry self. If you understood thing one about this plan (which you still do not) you would understand that THIS COMMUNITY CANNOT EXIST if the majority of commuters are in cars. It's an entirely different paradigm! This is like trying to explain the Apollo mission to someone from the Renaissance. "But sir, I sincerely doubt you'd be able to land one of these devices of which you speak on a surface that we know to be made of cheese!"
*facepalm*
You can be pretty sure but you'll also be pretty wrong. Again, the secondary plan already passed.
(There will also be an extension of one of the north-south streets beneath the 407 but that's a very minor access.) An 8-lane arterial would eat up so much land as to render the rest of the site undevelopable. It only makes sense (in terms of planning and economics) if they can build out to the maximum densities.
I'll type this extra slow so you will understand:
This. Community. Is. Not. Designed. To Handle. Car. Traffic.
It. Is. Different.
Like. How. An Orange. Is. Different. From. An apple.
Not that this is following some ancient site plan but try to think of Old Quebec or Rome or some other old place with narrow streets that, yes, can handle a few cars but which, by design, can only function when people travel by other modes. Get it?
Now we're comparing doodles to cities? Are you equally disdainful of this New York City roadmap I got from AAA, since it fails to capture the awesomeness of the actual city? Do you even understand what we're talking about? But you keep fighting the good fight of Doodles vs. Cities. Keep on keepin on, sir.
If you think 6 years is "dated" you understand even less about planning than I thought, and that's going one. And it's not, for the 10th time, an architectural rendering; it's merely a massing model showing the building heights in relation to the streetscape.
Oh, and it happens to be by arguably the pre-eminent urban design firm on the continent if not the world, but we know such things don't impress you. Of course, again, that's because you can't understand the difference between a rendering of an actual building, a conceptual drawing/massing model and a real city so there's only so much evidence I can bring to bear that will be absorbed at your end. I'm sure you could scratch out something better in Illustrator than those useless bozos at Calthorpe Associates. Yeesh.
First, what do you mean by "Civic Buildings"? Because there will most definitely be schools, libraries, community centres, fire stations and, you know, pretty much every kind of CIVIC BUILDING I can name that isn't city hall. So, once again, you're dead wrong.
And to clarify, Markham indeed submitted their Markham Centre site to York U but it's worth noting that Richmond Hill did submit the RHC site. It was York U that made the decision there. Given the land that would be required even by a satellite campus, it's not surprising Markham didn't feel they had any to spare within Langstaff but, by all means, slam them for it.
How can one fool make so many mistakes in a single sentence!!??
-not old plans, you bozo. 2008 plans; secondary plan passed in 2010/11. Please learn thing one about planning before coming back here. Old plans. Crikey.
-it's BY a highway but it doesn't access the highway so it's as dumb as pointing out that some other subdivision is beside a forest or lake. The highway, indeed, is an OBSTACLE, not a plus here. But you've already demonstrated you don't understand even the most basic concepts that underlie the planning here, despite repeated attempts to explain it.
-Shocker, you're also wrong about the subway. The Longbridge station will be at the west end of the site. The RHC site is something like 250m from the centre of Langstaff. Only the far east end of Langstaff, close to Bayview, will be anything remotely resembling a real distance from either of the TWO subway stops.
SOME of the site will be up to 1 km away? How lost are you? That means almost the entire site will be within 1km of one of the biggest transit hubs in the region. Do you even read what you're typing? Do you know what a mobility hub is? Is any of this getting through? SOME of downtown Toronto is also 1 km (sometimes more!!) from a subway station and so what?
So, long and short, your posts are full of misunderstandings, misinformation and wrongheadedness. I can't speak for everyone, but many of us would like you to cease and desist til you get wise.
EDIT TO ADD: I know none of this gets through to you and none of it ever will but, for the record, this is the Powerpoint presentation Peter Calthorpe gave to Markham council, presenting the master plan for Langstaff. Maybe you'll learn something - probably not - but maybe others will at least find it interesting to see...
http://www.markham.ca/markham/ccbs/...t Services/pl090519/Langstaff Master Plan.pdf
How can one person be so consistently wrong? The developers already agreed to it (yes, including the street network, which was studied by IBI, company of some repute, and the secondary plan already passed. Either stop commenting or actually read-up. The entirety of what you know about this is what I've chosen to post in the interest of schooling your sorry self. If you understood thing one about this plan (which you still do not) you would understand that THIS COMMUNITY CANNOT EXIST if the majority of commuters are in cars. It's an entirely different paradigm! This is like trying to explain the Apollo mission to someone from the Renaissance. "But sir, I sincerely doubt you'd be able to land one of these devices of which you speak on a surface that we know to be made of cheese!"
*facepalm*
You can be pretty sure but you'll also be pretty wrong. Again, the secondary plan already passed.
(There will also be an extension of one of the north-south streets beneath the 407 but that's a very minor access.) An 8-lane arterial would eat up so much land as to render the rest of the site undevelopable. It only makes sense (in terms of planning and economics) if they can build out to the maximum densities.
I'll type this extra slow so you will understand:
This. Community. Is. Not. Designed. To Handle. Car. Traffic.
It. Is. Different.
Like. How. An Orange. Is. Different. From. An apple.
Not that this is following some ancient site plan but try to think of Old Quebec or Rome or some other old place with narrow streets that, yes, can handle a few cars but which, by design, can only function when people travel by other modes. Get it?
Now we're comparing doodles to cities? Are you equally disdainful of this New York City roadmap I got from AAA, since it fails to capture the awesomeness of the actual city? Do you even understand what we're talking about? But you keep fighting the good fight of Doodles vs. Cities. Keep on keepin on, sir.
If you think 6 years is "dated" you understand even less about planning than I thought, and that's going one. And it's not, for the 10th time, an architectural rendering; it's merely a massing model showing the building heights in relation to the streetscape.
Oh, and it happens to be by arguably the pre-eminent urban design firm on the continent if not the world, but we know such things don't impress you. Of course, again, that's because you can't understand the difference between a rendering of an actual building, a conceptual drawing/massing model and a real city so there's only so much evidence I can bring to bear that will be absorbed at your end. I'm sure you could scratch out something better in Illustrator than those useless bozos at Calthorpe Associates. Yeesh.
First, what do you mean by "Civic Buildings"? Because there will most definitely be schools, libraries, community centres, fire stations and, you know, pretty much every kind of CIVIC BUILDING I can name that isn't city hall. So, once again, you're dead wrong.
And to clarify, Markham indeed submitted their Markham Centre site to York U but it's worth noting that Richmond Hill did submit the RHC site. It was York U that made the decision there. Given the land that would be required even by a satellite campus, it's not surprising Markham didn't feel they had any to spare within Langstaff but, by all means, slam them for it.
How can one fool make so many mistakes in a single sentence!!??
-not old plans, you bozo. 2008 plans; secondary plan passed in 2010/11. Please learn thing one about planning before coming back here. Old plans. Crikey.
-it's BY a highway but it doesn't access the highway so it's as dumb as pointing out that some other subdivision is beside a forest or lake. The highway, indeed, is an OBSTACLE, not a plus here. But you've already demonstrated you don't understand even the most basic concepts that underlie the planning here, despite repeated attempts to explain it.
-Shocker, you're also wrong about the subway. The Longbridge station will be at the west end of the site. The RHC site is something like 250m from the centre of Langstaff. Only the far east end of Langstaff, close to Bayview, will be anything remotely resembling a real distance from either of the TWO subway stops.
SOME of the site will be up to 1 km away? How lost are you? That means almost the entire site will be within 1km of one of the biggest transit hubs in the region. Do you even read what you're typing? Do you know what a mobility hub is? Is any of this getting through? SOME of downtown Toronto is also 1 km (sometimes more!!) from a subway station and so what?
So, long and short, your posts are full of misunderstandings, misinformation and wrongheadedness. I can't speak for everyone, but many of us would like you to cease and desist til you get wise.
EDIT TO ADD: I know none of this gets through to you and none of it ever will but, for the record, this is the Powerpoint presentation Peter Calthorpe gave to Markham council, presenting the master plan for Langstaff. Maybe you'll learn something - probably not - but maybe others will at least find it interesting to see...
http://www.markham.ca/markham/ccbs/...t Services/pl090519/Langstaff Master Plan.pdf
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44 North
Senior Member
It’s not “right on” the subway
Secondary plan said the subway was supposed to finish sometime soon. A shovel has yet to hit the ground. This throttles development phasing, population maximums, and numerous other issues.
Precinct Plan hasn’t been finalized.
I meant major civic centre building (e.g courthouse, city hall, regional offices).
A secondary plan doesn’t mean written in stone. Amendments, appeals, re-phasing, re-examinations, and modifications can (and possibly will) occur. This is the point I was trying to make about how a rendering of a median park can’t be compared to anything tangible/currently existing: it’s not guaranteed (particularly in this instance). If there’s unused roadway allowance, and traffic demand warrants its use, there’s a chance it will be used.
Didn’t Calthorpe also say the site should have personal rapid transit? Why would ‘the greatest design firm in the world’ suggest such an idea as pods to get around? If anyone wants to know about how ludicrous such an idea is, go to page 24 of TJ’s link. Seems more like a idea from 1968 than 2008.
Continuing to bandy about 6yo renderings is not proof that the linear park will exist as shown, nor is it proof that +60% of people will take transit. Master and secondary plans change all the time. Certain EA’s haven’t been completed, and over time there will be issues requiring resolution – the lack of a subway (although major) being just one of them.
Here are some points that back this up; found in the reports that you're supposedly familiar with:
Many more points in the reports. Some can't be copied/pasted, and don't care enough to do the work. But what's clear is that the median parks - as portrayed in the dated renderings - are not guaranteed.
Edit: And after rereading your post, I'm noting a lot of personal attacks. That's not fair. If you read the reports, you'll see that things are not as guaranteed as you claim, and that what I've stated here and on the Yonge North thread seems to be reinforced to some extent. Clearly I'm not the only one that has concerns and doubts about this development.
Secondary plan said the subway was supposed to finish sometime soon. A shovel has yet to hit the ground. This throttles development phasing, population maximums, and numerous other issues.
Precinct Plan hasn’t been finalized.
I meant major civic centre building (e.g courthouse, city hall, regional offices).
A secondary plan doesn’t mean written in stone. Amendments, appeals, re-phasing, re-examinations, and modifications can (and possibly will) occur. This is the point I was trying to make about how a rendering of a median park can’t be compared to anything tangible/currently existing: it’s not guaranteed (particularly in this instance). If there’s unused roadway allowance, and traffic demand warrants its use, there’s a chance it will be used.
Didn’t Calthorpe also say the site should have personal rapid transit? Why would ‘the greatest design firm in the world’ suggest such an idea as pods to get around? If anyone wants to know about how ludicrous such an idea is, go to page 24 of TJ’s link. Seems more like a idea from 1968 than 2008.
Continuing to bandy about 6yo renderings is not proof that the linear park will exist as shown, nor is it proof that +60% of people will take transit. Master and secondary plans change all the time. Certain EA’s haven’t been completed, and over time there will be issues requiring resolution – the lack of a subway (although major) being just one of them.
Here are some points that back this up; found in the reports that you're supposedly familiar with:
Many more points in the reports. Some can't be copied/pasted, and don't care enough to do the work. But what's clear is that the median parks - as portrayed in the dated renderings - are not guaranteed.
Edit: And after rereading your post, I'm noting a lot of personal attacks. That's not fair. If you read the reports, you'll see that things are not as guaranteed as you claim, and that what I've stated here and on the Yonge North thread seems to be reinforced to some extent. Clearly I'm not the only one that has concerns and doubts about this development.
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howl
Active Member
Of course nothing is guaranteed until it is built. But every plan for the area shows a linear park through the middle of a pedestrian-friendly neighbourhood centred on a GO/Subway station. Remember where this discussion came from - someone said planners are continuing to plan automobile-oriented communities and held up this very plan as an example of that. This plan shows that planners are very much aware of the health and transportation issues and are doing everything within the parameters they can influence to create the best neighbourhoods they can.