Toronto 930 Albion | 22m | 7s | Thistledown Residential | Gabriel Fain Architects

[DHX]

Trolls because we want an opinion on where WE LIVE and what will impact our community and environment? Bullying 101
I get this is obviously lining peoples pockets with vested interest but that doesnt sit well with me regardless of your opinions either. Dont gaslight the coversation about morals and support for those less fortunate, leave that for the communities that dont have any, ours has enough.
And yes, as a Community member, active tax payer, I speak for myself and the community.
Also noting the design, I am within the design industry, and I can assure you this is not appealing but by all means if you wish for your home to look like this contact the company for yourself leave our community alone.
A perfect thing for this corner is a Chapters/Indigo with a starbucks inside enough with the substandard we are all just supposed to take over and over again. While the government makes their quotas and agendas off the backs of our community memebers.
Just like the shelter put in without any consulation or regard for our community. You cant just do whatever you want regardless of the ipact to those in the community because it doesnt affect you negatively.

 

[Northern Light]

Trolls because we want an opinion on where WE LIVE and what will impact our community and environment?

We all live in Toronto.

Most of us have shelters, or public housing within 1km of where we live; though this project is neither, for the record. Its normative rental housing, in the private-market sense, where a portion of the units will be a bit cheaper, because that was made possible by government support.

Trolling is not a word I used; however, it generally references people who arrive on a forum or discussion thread to hijack the discussion, and to do so in a disruptive way that does not lead to quality discussion.
There has been a sudden out-of-the-ordinary arrival of new members/posters, who all seem to be on about the same issue; and many are using highly inflammatory language. I can understand how some might think there was trolling involved.

Bullying 101

No one engaged in any bullying, can we please dial-back the melodrama.

I get this is obviously lining peoples pockets with vested interest but that doesnt sit well with me regardless of your opinions either.

I'm not sure whose pockets are uniquely being lined here. All development pays professionals (planners, architects, engineers etc.), most developments are oriented to earning a profit of some kind, including those that contain Indigo bookstores.
Are you expecting all development in your community to be non-profit? That seems at odds w/the thrust of your comments here.

Dont gaslight the coversation about morals and support for those less fortunate, leave that for the communities that dont have any, ours has enough.

Putting aside the tone of the above; may I again note, this is not a shelter, nor is it government or rent-geared-to-income housing. It's market-rent apartments, with a portion of those having lower rents, due to government support. The target rents would not be affordable by anyone on Social Assistance, these units are targeted at those with full-time employment.

And yes, as a Community member, active tax payer, I speak for myself and the community.

Every member of the community pays taxes. Renters pay property tax through their rents. You are welcome to your opinions, but your tax-paying status being anything but unique does not change their value.

Also noting the design, I am within the design industry, and I can assure you this is not appealing but by all means if you wish for your home to look like this contact the company for yourself leave our community alone.

If you want your critique to be taken seriously, perhaps you could share what do you do not like about the design? It is the colour-scheme? The style of windows? What's not working for you?
I mean, you just advocated for a 1-storey Chapters/Indigo here. They look like this:

I'm being serious, and not meaning any offense in asking whether that's better in your mind that the proposal from an appearance point of view?

A perfect thing for this corner is a Chapters/Indigo with a starbucks inside enough with the substandard we are all just supposed to take over and over again

See above, I quite like bookstores, but on aesthetic grounds, I can't see it as an improvement. I hasten to add, Starbucks makes awful coffee, but I digress.

. While the government makes their quotas and agendas off the backs of our community memebers.

How is this project the result of any quota, please explain?

Just like the shelter put in without any consulation or regard for our community. You cant just do whatever you want regardless of the ipact to those in the community because it doesnt affect you negatively.

I have a shelter not far from me; while I would rather see those folks get permanent housing instead of being in a shelter; for some reason, there are neighbourhoods where there is opposition to constructing apartments that might house them.
In the meantime, shelters are surely preferable to cardboard boxes, no?

 

[concrete_and_light]

I really don't see the issue — what specifically is the problem with the design? If this building was built near me I'd be pretty happy with the good luck to get a pretty well designed building with nice warm and textured materiality and some nice geometry, built at a non-overpowering scale, some new storefronts for stores or potentially neighbourhood amenities, and with some relatively affordable rent. What exactly is wrong with it @DHX? Specifically. I'm hearing a lot of anger and lashing out and saying you know best and speak for everyone, but not a lot of actual points about why this building is so "atrocious".

Your appeal to authority about being in the design industry doesn't really answer that either. I also do design in my work — you don't have a particular unassailable authority on what is or isn't good design. And it's fine to have different opinions, but yours aren't backed up by any particular reasons and are also expressed in an extremely exaggerated way. I can see someone not loving this building, but it is not so exceedingly bad as you paint it to be. Your response does not seem proportionate at all and seems motivated by anti-densification "defend the neighbourhood!" fervour combined with completely unapologetic anti-poor people rhetoric more than there being anything actually wrong with the building — which is at worst an average alright building that is being built on a site that currently is a run down paved over empty lot.

As for this stuff about "vested interests", well, I certainly don't have any. I rent, and will likely never be able to afford to buy anything — even though I have what people would consider a "good job". Because our way of doing housing in this country favours ever-increasing property wealth for existing property owners, at the expense of a future for everyone else. Many people in my generation (I'm 35, so not even especially "young" or just starting out anymore, being frozen out of home/condo ownership is just the reality of my life at this point) feel utter despair at the complete inability to be able to afford to live and build a life and a future.

If you own a house nearby to this apparently horrible development you are tremendously lucky and have a much more vested interest in maintaining the current housing status quo. I would just like to have relatively affordable places to rent in this city for me and others like me and especially so for those who can afford less than I can. We are in a crisis right now and people barely can afford to have housing or can't afford to at all.

And painting this building as bad because it's for poor people and you have "enough" of them in the neighbourhood is so offensive and inhumane, I can't even begin to conceive how you think that's an appropriate way to speak of people who aren't so lucky as you are, but it's not even correct framing! This building isn't all low-income housing or a shelter or something (and we need those too!), but will be for average people with jobs who can't afford to live in this city while the property owners compound more and more ever-increasing property wealth. I think you should get in touch with the seriousness of the housing crisis many are facing and how lucky you are that the problem you're facing is that this apparently horrible (but actually decently nice and an upgrade on what's there now) building is going to be built near you.

 

[Edward Skira]

I find it quite attractive actually.