Toronto 64 Prince Arthur | 46.1m | 13s | Forgestone | RAW Design

[buildup]

Wow! Now we're talking. Most exciting proposal last 12 months easily. I hope it doesn't get the Teeple treatment by the planners.

 

[jozl]

Wow, I'm impressed. Perhaps the proposal will survive with fewer floors and at a height that the locals can tolerate and the developer can profit from. A tall order indeed.

 

[maestro]

Let's not be melodramatic considering the number of towers of comparable height within walking distance of this site. If the slab next door didn't wreck the neighbourhood, neither will this. Low rise neighbourhoods don't need to be preserved in this city absent an overriding worth - and no one is proposing the area getting blockbusted and redeveloped carte blanche in any case.

And thank you from bringing up apartment neighbourhoods again - it's a neat little way to dump growth elsewhere - not to preserve it for future generations (because altruism, right?), but to ensure the current one maintaining their way of life. I mean, stuffing another tower in St James Town is "good planning", a shorter tower that doesn't even eat up any existing POPSs is an affront.

AoD

All things considered, this tower is proposed at more than twice the height of the slab next door (56 metres to the main roof) and it's 20 metres taller than One Bedford on Bloor which, for all intents and purposes, is on Bloor. Sound planning would suggest something much lower as long as we are to maintain any semblance of the lowrise Annex community. I don't think your being your usual rational self from a planning perspective because you happen to really like the design. ( it's not even that good for what it is)

 

[greenleaf]

There are plenty of places for tall buildings in the city. Perhaps infinite places. The Annex. Is not. One of them.

This proposal is ridiculous and conforms to nothing that city planners or residents would desire on this street. You can love the building, just some drawings really, from a quality architectural firm and a laughably inexperiened developer all you want. Put it downtown. Put it at Yonge and Eglinton, put in anywhere close to Yonge really.

But this is a mid rise block if ever there called out for one. Get this garbage out of here.

This is fear mongering and just pure lashing out in a literal not in my backyard fashion.

Why should the Annex be preserved? WHY?

You are insinuating the Annex is not downtown. It is downtown.

You are insinuating that my voice as a resident in the neighbourhood should not be listened to. I will speak: I desire this building on this street.

Some criticisms that you could have said that would have made me respect your posts or opinions are that this building is currently designed at 130m and that it would become the tallest in the nearby vicinity. For reference, One Bedford is 109m, Exhibit condo is 100m, Cumberland Tower is 125m, and 33 Avenue (as proposed) is 127m. The developer is shooting high here and the city has expressed a wish, for better or worse (pssst, I think it is for worse) to taper skyline height on Bloor from Yonge to Walmer Road.

Another issue is that the current building has office space in it. What the sq footage of commercial space is currently there, I would like to see this amount of commercial space maintained.

 

[AlvinofDiaspar]

All things considered, this tower is proposed at more than twice the height of the slab next door (56 metres to the main roof) and it's 20 metres taller than One Bedford on Bloor which, for all intents and purposes, is on Bloor. Sound planning would suggest something much lower as long as we are to maintain any semblance of the lowrise Annex community. I don't think your being your usual rational self from a planning perspective because you happen to really like the design. ( it's not even that good for what it is)

On the contrary - I have to ask myself, is it sound planning to demand an unreasonable amount of protection to lowirse communities at the edge of a growing downtown served by multiple mass transit routes - one that already has a significant amount of high rise development proximate? This proposal doesn't involve wholescale destruction of the existing Annex fabric; nor is it all that outrageous when compared to what, towers that were built half a century ago. We need to stop busying ourselves ground planes and 20 metres taller than the building next door - but go macro and ask oneself - is what we are doing in Toronto placing lowrise communities at the apex of the pecking order "sound planning"? That's our generational orthodoxy.

AoD

 

[LMVDR]

Let's not be melodramatic considering the number of towers of comparable height within walking distance of this site. If the slab next door didn't wreck the neighbourhood, neither will this.

AoD

The mistakes of another era should not be hot tub time machine teleported into this one recklessly.

Walking distance is a loaded term when you're close to Bloor Street. Boundaries need to persist, absent them chaos.

Soho is Soho for a reason. If you inserted shiny sliver towers down West Broadway or Mercer Street no big deal right? I mean look at all the big towers, "within walking distance".

What does this proposal come down to really?

Good planning? No.
Appropriate design? No.
Continuity of a neighbourhood streetscape? No.
A rookie developer who grossly overpaid for a site? Yes.

 

[LMVDR]

On the contrary - I have to ask myself, is it sound planning to demand an unreasonable amount of protection to We need to stop busying ourselves ground planes and 20 metres taller than the building next door -

AoD

This is fear mongering and just pure lashing out in a literal not in my backyard fashion.

Why should the Annex be preserved? WHY?

You are insinuating the Annex is not downtown. It is downtown.

You are insinuating that my voice as a resident in the neighbourhood should not be listened to. I will speak: I desire this building on this street.

Some criticisms that you could have said that would have made me respect your posts or opinions are that this building is currently designed at 130m and that it would become the tallest in the nearby vicinity. For reference, One Bedford is 109m, Exhibit condo is 100m, Cumberland Tower is 125m, and 33 Avenue (as proposed) is 127m. The developer is shooting high here and the city has expressed a wish, for better or worse (pssst, I think it is for worse) to taper skyline height on Bloor from Yonge to Walmer Road.

Another issue is that the current building has office space in it. What the sq footage of commercial space is currently there, I would like to see this amount of commercial space maintained.

Annex is not downtown.

Proposal doesn't fit the fabric of your neighbourhood (if you actually live there) by a long shot.

You're comparing Prince Arthur to Bloor and Avenue Road near Bloor. You should be comparing it to Lowther, Elgin, Boswell, Madison, Huron, etc.

 

[AlvinofDiaspar]

The mistakes of another era should not be teleported into this one recklessly.

Walking distance is a loaded term when you're close to Bloor Street. Boundaries need to persist, absent them chaos.

Soho is Soho for a reason. If you inserted shiny sliver towers down West Broadway or Mercer Street no big deal right? I mean look at all the big towers, "within walking distance".

What does this proposal come down to really?

Good planning? No.
Appropriate design? No.
Continuity of a neighbourhood streetscape? No.
A rookie developer who grossly overpaid for a site? Yes.

Chaos? Perhaps that's exactly what we need - instead of stasis. That "mistake" of another era turns out to be a redeeming value (i.e. increased density, affordability, access - nevermind one should ask themselves how those sites for densification became available) - whereas the virtues of this one may yet prove to be of harm.

And if you want to compare the following to SoHo, be my guest:

https://goo.gl/maps/d3BLzYpzrcR2

Odd that you have such a slab next door and the Annex didn't die. At least we had "continuity of streetscape", I think.

AoD

 

[LMVDR]

The slab next door was a mistake. It did negatively impact the street. It didn't destroy the area because the density didn't creep north. Further density on Prince Arthur would contribute further erosion of the low rise/mid rise character of this desirable neighbourhood.

The Soho example was meant to give an example of where boundaries are hard and have preserved a neighbourhood. In your world I'm sure it's acceptable to put high rises on Lowther too because it's only a block away and look how close to Bloor it is! WALKING DISTANCE. And those unrich homeowners on Lowther shouldn't be the only ones entitled to live in the area right?

That is very relevant to Prince Arthur. If you allow a wall of tall buildings you might as well be in Liberty Village.

 

[AlvinofDiaspar]

The slab next door was a mistake. It did negatively impact the street. It didn't destroy the area because the density didn't creep north. Further density on Prince Arthur would contribute further erosion of the low rise/mid rise character of this desirable neighbourhood.

The Soho example was meant to give an example of where boundaries are hard and have preserved a neighbourhood. In your world I'm sure it's acceptable to put high rises on Lowther too because it's only a block away and look how close to Bloor it is! WALKING DISTANCE. And those unrich homeowners on Lowther shouldn't be the only ones entitled to live in the area right?

That is very relevant to Prince Arthur. If you allow a wall of tall buildings you might as well be in Liberty Village.

What further erosion? That portion of the street is already of a tower character - adding one on the site in question merely completes the transition. The fact of the matter is even if I were to propose a boundary this site wouldn't and shouldn't have fallen within it. Typing in all caps won't change that.

And yes, keep putting words in my mouth - I am not the one trying to bring up SoHo, attempt to make a direct comparison to this site, fail at it and then have to default to accusing others of wanting to put highrises on Lowther. That is patently bizarre.

AoD

 

[LMVDR]

What further erosion? That portion of the street is already of a tower character - adding one on the site in question merely completes the transition. The fact of the matter is even if I were to propose a boundary this site wouldn't and shouldn't have fallen within it. Typing in all caps won't change that.

And yes, keep putting words in my mouth - I am not the one trying to bring up SoHo, attempt to make a direct comparison to this site, fail at it and then have to default to accusing me of wanting to put highrise on Lowther.

AoD

Further erosion to the low and mid rise character of this neighbourhood. Adding here further erodes that NEGATIVE feeling.

Soho is a great example because it's a area worth preserving and one that does a good job of it. Annex should follow examples like Soho.

I have failed at nothing here except thinking it possible to cogently convince someone with a closed mind to consider opening it. You have your position and you will not be swayed.

Good thing you don't work in the planning department either.

 

[AlvinofDiaspar]

Annex is not SoHo - it is already interspersed with non-contemporaneous, built-form incoherent development -both at the core and at the periphery.

SoHo:

AoD

 

[Brother Jonathan]

It's always weird hearing from other people what "The Annex" means to them. I used to live on Walmer, south of Lowther. I had friends on St. George. For me, the Annex is and always will be beautiful Uno Prii towers, ugly slab apartment blocks, and the busy Bloor streetscape west of Spadina. But I've talked to Annex residents for whom the Annex is shady side streets, detached houses and St. George's College. Not that one is right and the other wrong, necessarily, but hearing about that other Annex always seems weird to me. Which is a long-winded way of saying that maybe we need to chill out a bit and not assume that any one of us is able to define the character or meaning of a neighbourhood for all of its residents.

 

[greenleaf]

Annex is not downtown.

Proposal doesn't fit the fabric of your neighbourhood (if you actually live there) by a long shot.

You're comparing Prince Arthur to Bloor and Avenue Road near Bloor. You should be comparing it to Lowther, Elgin, Boswell, Madison, Huron, etc.

I appreciate engagement in discussion but your attempts to discredit me by questioning if I actually live in the neighbourhood only discredit yourself and your arguments.

To @Brother Jonathan : brilliant insight. The tales of the two Annexes.

 

[buildup]

It's not a super luxury condo area. I know I'm repeating myself but you're clearly not listening. It's a wonderful neighborhood and yes very desirable, in many respects the best area in Toronto, but nowhere near as as expensive as Forest Hill or the BP at the upper end for single family homes.

Museum House? Prince Arthur? Exhibit? One Bedford? Nice buildings all of them I agree but not super luxe or in the price range you've quoted.

I'm laughing if you don't think the Four Seasons, The Hazelton, and 155 Cumberland aren't in another league. Maybe 100 Yorkville too?

If that's the case you need a lesson in luxury.

Prince Arthur is absolutely super luxe.