Toronto 66 Wellesley Street East | 101.78m | 31s | ONE Properties | S9

mcornett said:
I'm not sure why this is disturbing. The City's position is that a tower fronting on Church is incompatible with the main-street, neighbourhood character it is trying to preserve. It didn't matter if it was a unbuildable fantasy (like the previous proposal) or a shittier iteration (like the just-rejected proposal), it was never going to work. I am also not sure how the City's rejection of the original proposal forced the developer into a massive quality downgrade -- it's not like the City made them dump a legitimate architect and hire G+C in order to blight another downtown neighbourhood. Unfortunately, design elements are not something the City or OMB can control, except indirectly by approving higher-quality proposals.
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I'm not sure I liked what you said, but I can't deny what you said on the matter. :(
 
mcornett said:
I'm not sure why this is disturbing. The City's position is that a tower fronting on Church is incompatible with the main-street, neighbourhood character it is trying to preserve. It didn't matter if it was a unbuildable fantasy (like the previous proposal) or a shittier iteration (like the just-rejected proposal), it was never going to work. I am also not sure how the City's rejection of the original proposal forced the developer into a massive quality downgrade -- it's not like the City made them dump a legitimate architect and hire G+C in order to blight another downtown neighbourhood. Unfortunately, design elements are not something the City or OMB can control, except indirectly by approving higher-quality proposals.
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I only know one side of the equation but I'm told that the City was really hammering the number of redesigns on this, hence the switch to someone cheaper. If you're getting a star, international, design architect to play patty cakes with the City, the costs are going to add up. Best to get your massing box established, then work on the details. WAM / ONE initially tried the Mirvish Gehry approach of wowing everyone with a stellar design by a famous architect to get around the obvious zoning issues. Once it was clear that that wasn't going to work, they swapped the name-brand cereal for the store brand.
 
C-mac said:
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder I guess, because I like the renderings and the location.
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You need to look at renderings with a very jaundiced eye - all too often the finished product bears little relation to the 'pretty pictures". You also need to assess how a proposed building will fit in with the buildings that are already there; what might be 'perfect' for site A may be ghastly in site B.
 
mcornett said:
I'm not sure why this is disturbing. The City's position is that a tower fronting on Church is incompatible with the main-street, neighbourhood character it is trying to preserve. It didn't matter if it was a unbuildable fantasy (like the previous proposal) or a shittier iteration (like the just-rejected proposal), it was never going to work. I am also not sure how the City's rejection of the original proposal forced the developer into a massive quality downgrade -- it's not like the City made them dump a legitimate architect and hire G+C in order to blight another downtown neighbourhood. Unfortunately, design elements are not something the City or OMB can control, except indirectly by approving higher-quality proposals.
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Beautifully articulated. 👏
 
DSC said:
You need to look at renderings with a very jaundiced eye - all too often the finished product bears little relation to the 'pretty pictures". You also need to assess how a proposed building will fit in with the buildings that are already there; what might be 'perfect' for site A may be ghastly in site B.
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My opinion remains the same. I mean the whole DT core is because skyscrapers, especially all along church so I don't know who they can say say "it doesn't fit right with the street".
 
C-mac said:
My opinion remains the same. I mean the whole DT core is because skyscrapers, especially all along church so I don't know who they can say say "it doesn't fit right with the street".
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Because Church St itself in the Village is a low-rise retail street? It's not like Church between Wood and Isabella (which is the area that is formally designated as the Village) is some sea of towers as you seem to be suggesting. Sure there are towers on Church St, but they are outside of the Village. Anything high-rise in the area is set off on side streets. There's like, one mid-rise building at Alexander St and even that is substantially terraced back beyond the 4th floor or so. So yeah, you can absolutely say it doesn't fit into the street, because you're looking at the part of the street around the site. You can't just be like "well there's a tower somewhere else on this street, therefore every building must be a tower now", local context matters, and this didn't even try and consider the local context.
 
TossYourJacket said:
Because Church St itself in the Village is a low-rise retail street? It's not like Church between Wood and Isabella (which is the area that is formally designated as the Village) is some sea of towers as you seem to be suggesting. Sure there are towers on Church St, but they are outside of the Village. Anything high-rise in the area is set off on side streets. There's like, one mid-rise building at Alexander St and even that is substantially terraced back beyond the 4th floor or so. So yeah, you can absolutely say it doesn't fit into the street, because you're looking at the part of the street around the site. You can't just be like "well there's a tower somewhere else on this street, therefore every building must be a tower now", local context matters, and this didn't even try and consider the local context.
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Church street has the most high rise proposals probably more then any other street in Toronto. So all this all proposals will get the green light except this one?
 
C-mac said:
Church street has the most high rise proposals probably more then any other street in Toronto. So all this all proposals will get the green light except this one?
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He was referring specifically to Church St between Wood and Isabella (the Village), not the entire length of Church from Front to north of Bloor. The only other ‘high rise’ proposals on that stretch are 506 (proposed at 15 storeys) and 572 Church (approved at 16 storeys).
 
Rascacielo said:
He was referring specifically to Church St between Wood and Isabella (the Village), not the entire length of Church from Front to north of Bloor. The only other ‘high rise’ proposals on that stretch are 506 (proposed at 15 storeys) and 572 Church (approved at 16 storeys).
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I get that, but my point is, it's not like Church is that long of a street, so if your going to put high-rises it, then put high-rises on it. Literally 750m from Carlton to Isabella. (3 minute walk)

With space in the DT core becoming more important to maximize, this doesn't make a tone of sense to me.
 
C-mac said:
I get that, but my point is, it's not like Church is that long of a street, so if your going to put high-rises it, then put high-rises on it. Literally 750m from Carlton to Isabella. (3 minute walk)

With space in the DT core becoming more important to maximize, this doesn't make a tone of sense to me.
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We get your point, not everyone agrees with it.
 
C-mac said:
I get that, but my point is, it's not like Church is that long of a street, so if your going to put high-rises it, then put high-rises on it. Literally 750m from Carlton to Isabella. (3 minute walk)

With space in the DT core becoming more important to maximize, this doesn't make a tone of sense to me.
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1623551594354.png


Tell me about about all the towers you see directly abutting Church Street in the above pic.

******

Frankly, there's a lot of lacklustre architecture in 'The Village'.............and I'm very open to seeing much of it go............

But not to be another monolith of blue glass, or a six-storey podium.

The area as it is..........for all its architectural flaws, has character and flavour directly attributable to its scale. (scale is not only height, by the way, but massing and overall footprint)

******

Also, when reading the legal decision..............of the OLT/LPAT, its important to note they are taking guidance from the Official Plan, and its component parts, while weighing them against Provincial Policy.

Approved plans have legal weight.

By and large, they are not absolutes..........

Generally, they shouldn't be............not because they're bad.........but because all things require a sense of balance.........and nuance........which legal plans can rarely fully capture.

At any rate........they are nonetheless, strong guides to Planning, to Council..........and to the OLT/LPAT as to what should be permissible.

Without question, the latter sometimes take liberty w/some plans..............but that's a different thread.

Here, they read, and considered them, and decided accordingly.
 
Here's a question though: If UT'ers here where to magically seize this corner from it's current owners, and had the Cadillac Fairview funds to do so...what would you do with this corner? Would you just spruce it up and leave it as is? Or build a missing middle on top of it with heritage structures acting as retail? Turn into a public hang out that embraces The Village? Build a supertall in The Barn colours? I could go on...

...but I am just curious, if everyone had the say as to what goes here, what will it be?
 
UtakataNoAnnex said:
Here's a question though: If UT'ers here where to magically seize this corner from it's current owners, and had the Cadillac Fairview funds to do so...what would you do with this corner? Would you just spruce it up and leave it as is? Or build a missing middle on top of it with heritage structures acting as retail? Turn into a public hang out that embraces The Village? Build a supertall in The Barn colours? I could go on...

...but I am just curious, if everyone had the say as to what goes here, what will it be?
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If financial return were not an issue.................

I don't find any of the existing buildings particularly redeemable.

The scale of the corner property is nice......but its unremarkable.

I'd be inclined to set back the properties from Wellesley to align with the setbacks to the west, and work out a deal w/the City and the adjacent owner to effectively extend Paul Kane Park to the corner, as a promenade with
contiguous treatment.

Then, instead of stairs (the hang out space having been created via the park)......I'd create a 3-storey podium at the park frontage and the Church st. frontage, that mirrored this:

1623553119065.png


But ideally with original colouration on the brick/building and heritage sensitive signage...........

But I would be open to a much taller building set behind the dormer level.............

Given the narrow footprint......maybe 12 floors? I'm negotiable, but that seems like a good balance to me.......at 4x the podium height.

The tower component can be either sympathetic or contrasting, I'm negotiable.

But I think I'd lean contrasting.

No parking, except for onsite carshare at-grade (within the footprint).

Fine-grained retail, no formula players.

******

I freely concede that at the prices paid for these properties, the above would not likely be viable.......

But that is a different conversation.
 
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