Toronto Pace Condos | 146.3m | 42s | Great Gulf | Diamond Schmitt

Adjei said:
Yeah frankly it's embarrassing when you go visit other cities and come back here and you realize how bleak most parts of this city looks. Seems people here don't care. It's the Toronto way.
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Some simply pretend church/dundas is "fine", Spadina/Queen is super urban, some even say our waterfront works better than Chicago's.
I literally couldn't look at our streets for a months after my trip from Barcelona. A trip to backbay or beacon hill, Boston makes me keep wondering where is Toronto's pretty part? Found none in term of quality.

Honest speaking, all these projects will remove some ugly corners, and add density and street life, it's all good but toronto gas little chance of becoming a beautiful city.
 
I honestly don't quite get the negativity here. I mean, Toronto is ugly as sin in spots but other areas are quite beautiful. Conversely I saw some ugly-ass parts of New York and Boston on my last trip down. I can't pretend that a lot of what's nice in New York and Boston is better than what's nice in Toronto but Toronto isn't some horrendous, ugly place either.

On a slightly related note, nothing made me laugh more than seeing people complain about the MBTA not being a "world class system" on the Boston Globe during the massive shutdowns during the February storms. Or people complaining about Staten Island "deserving" a subway despite having none of the density necessary to support one. Toronto's cynicism is hilariously insular at times when we think these problems are only ours.
 
wolfewood said:
I honestly don't quite get the negativity here. I mean, Toronto is ugly as sin in spots but other areas are quite beautiful. Conversely I saw some ugly-ass parts of New York and Boston on my last trip down. I can't pretend that a lot of what's nice in New York and Boston is better than what's nice in Toronto but Toronto isn't some horrendous, ugly place either.

On a slightly related note, nothing made me laugh more than seeing people complain about the MBTA not being a "world class system" on the Boston Globe during the massive shutdowns during the February storms. Or people complaining about Staten Island "deserving" a subway despite having none of the density necessary to support one. Toronto's cynicism is hilariously insular at times when we think these problems are only ours.
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ksun is one of the most negative people on here. I choose to ignore.
 
wolfewood said:
I honestly don't quite get the negativity here. I mean, Toronto is ugly as sin in spots but other areas are quite beautiful. Conversely I saw some ugly-ass parts of New York and Boston on my last trip down. I can't pretend that a lot of what's nice in New York and Boston is better than what's nice in Toronto but Toronto isn't some horrendous, ugly place either.

On a slightly related note, nothing made me laugh more than seeing people complain about the MBTA not being a "world class system" on the Boston Globe during the massive shutdowns during the February storms. Or people complaining about Staten Island "deserving" a subway despite having none of the density necessary to support one. Toronto's cynicism is hilariously insular at times when we think these problems are only ours.
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Sure other cities have ugly parts but they at least know that they have to make prominent locations and touristy areas in their cities look good and stand out. In Toronto our prominent locations and places where tourists are look ordinary and don't stand out and some are even downright ugly with rusted hydro poles, wooden poles, and hydro wires everywhere. Why are there so many rusted hydro poles in this city? It shows that as a city we are not concerned with our upkeep to let parts of the city deteriorate like that. What impression are we trying to give off as a city?
 
Adjei said:
Yeah frankly it's embarrassing when you go visit other cities and come back here and you realize how bleak most parts of this city looks. Seems people here don't care. It's the Toronto way.
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ksun said:
Some simply pretend church/dundas is "fine", Spadina/Queen is super urban, some even say our waterfront works better than Chicago's. I literally couldn't look at our streets for a months after my trip from Barcelona. A trip to backbay or beacon hill, Boston makes me keep wondering where is Toronto's pretty part? Found none in term of quality.
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Interesting points. I agree with a lot of this, and interestingly my insights stem from the fact that the last three years I lived in Boston--right at Mass Ave and Boylston. Boston has a lot wrong with it, but by and large the downtown, by which I mean everything from Little Italy through downtown to Beacon Hill, into Back Bay and over to the South End, is almost immaculately clean, consistent, and pleasant.

Now, over time Boston struck me as a bit too New England posh and manicured. I like some grit, and Toronto has that. But when I moved back home I was dumbfounded at our city. Toronto is my home, so I love it here. But I see it very differently now. It's sad. I want it to be better than it is, and I'm optimistic it can be.

Boston is nice to visit, but living there it can feel like you're walking through a huge doll set.

wolfewood said:
I honestly don't quite get the negativity here. I mean, Toronto is ugly as sin in spots but other areas are quite beautiful. Conversely I saw some ugly-ass parts of New York and Boston on my last trip down. I can't pretend that a lot of what's nice in New York and Boston is better than what's nice in Toronto but Toronto isn't some horrendous, ugly place either.

On a slightly related note, nothing made me laugh more than seeing people complain about the MBTA not being a "world class system" on the Boston Globe during the massive shutdowns during the February storms. Or people complaining about Staten Island "deserving" a subway despite having none of the density necessary to support one. Toronto's cynicism is hilariously insular at times when we think these problems are only ours.
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Yeah, I was talking to a Bostonian yesterday who was freaking out about the T. But, for all its faults, the T is a vastly superior system than the TTC. A small reason why? Fare cards. The magnetic strip reads right through your wallet; so you just take out your wallet, put it against the reader and bam, you're in. Fill-up? Takes less than 15 seconds at an automatic machine using debit or credit.

It was those little things that added up. I happily spent more on transit there than here because they made it so easy to give them your money. Coming back to Toronto and losing tokens feels archaic and utterly absurd, and if you don't lose them the token might get stuck in the turnstile and you have to walk to the other station where the attendant is to get let in--if they believe you.

That stuff boils my blood. Or arriving at Pearson and hearing Americans and other foreigners walk onto the Pearson connecting bus and ask, "Uhh, do you accept Euros or $5 American?' Embarrassing and outrageous.

Sorry, very off topic. I know.
 
ProjectEnd said:
I'm left wondering what the shafts running down the east and west sides of the building are. They don't seem to pierce into the retail at grade so it's a bit of a mystery.
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Fire stairs / mechanicals. Where are you seeing that they don't extend through the podium?

I can't imagine a project where the fire stair shaft wouldn't continue to the bottom of the structure; there's no practical reason not to, and it would require expensive transfer beams.
 
Give Toronto another 25 years. It may never have the historical value of the aforementioned cities but you definitely feel a sense of urgency that the city has rested too long on its " Toronto the Good" laurels while American cities have spent the last 20 years reinventing themselves.

Condo towers may be the most dominate structures in the last 5 years but, the boom has been all encompassing including new and renewed quality designed amenities and public spaces with many more planned and expected to start soon.

Chicago's waterfront is also grossly overrated. The scale is just unfriendly and impractical. Their beaches are nicer though helped by much more temperate waters
 
modernizt said:
Fire stairs / mechanicals. Where are you seeing that they don't extend through the podium?

I can't imagine a project where the fire stair shaft wouldn't continue to the bottom of the structure; there's no practical reason not to, and it would require expensive transfer beams.
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I go through the plans of many projects these days, and I would bet that a half or more of them transfer the fire stairs from one location in the tower to another location in podium: there are often winding halls to accomplish the task. It has to do with maximizing usable space at ground level, which isn't always straight out from below its tower location. I am not certain you would necessarily need a transfer slab to accomplish the jog, and a transfer beam or beams would likely be sufficient in many cases. I'd be willing to be that most downtown buildings on tight lots these days employ transfer beams if not full-out slabs.

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interchange42 said:
I go through the plans of many projects these days, and I would bet that a half or more of them transfer the fire stairs from one location in the tower to another location in podium: there are often winding halls to accomplish the task. It has to do with maximizing usable space at ground level, which isn't always straight out from below its tower location. I am not certain you would necessarily need a transfer slab to accomplish the jog, and a transfer beam or beams would likely be sufficient in many cases. I'd be willing to be that most downtown buildings on tight lots these days employ transfer beams if not full-out slabs.

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On that note, shouldn't the Building Code or the Fire Code have something to say about the practice of running fire stairs across the building? Surely getting people out as fast as possible in the event of a fire takes precedence over usable space at ground level
 
I wouldn't say that the transfers are inordinately long. In most cases the tower floor plates are stepped back from the full size of the podium, and you simply must include a hall at some point to get to the outside (usually accomplished where the tower attaches to the podium, but sometimes at ground level). If you want to see an example, check out the plans for 30 Widmer (although what the City has online is already out of date). Click on this link then choose 'Supporting Documentation' then download 'Plans and Drawings'. Go to page 14, which is the Seventh Floor Plan. You'll see that two sets of stairs on that level transfer from the centre of the tower to the edges of the podium via hallways. They take the shortest route possible while maintaining 90° turns where necessary. Compare that with the Ground Floor Plan (page 8) and you'll see that the stairs fit nicely around efficient commercial space.

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My building has insane fire exits with hallways that bend in every direction, and some meet up with other fire exists, and some don't. I've never seen anything like it.
 
I guess it's still economical and necessary on a larger project, as the budget is there to use transfer beams and make the structure work. But even when the fire stairs transfer to a different location in plan (which they usually have to, at some point, in the podium, as you've mentioned), the structure usually continues down in some form (shear wall, etc.). In the case that the shaft ends completely, you would absolutely need some form of transfer beam to accomplish the shift, given that the stair shaft works as a strong vertical component / shear wall in the structure. 30 Widmer is a good example of where the fire stairs transfer in the podium, I believe the seventh floor has a bulked up structure to transfer the loads from the stair shafts in the tower. I'm looking through documentation for other developments to illustrate what I mean but they never really give a very good idea of structure (since that's not what the city is concerned with in these planning submissions).

You're correct though, I was indeed wrong in my assessment about stair shafts not continuing directly down. Many projects here in Toronto are large enough that it's necessary to use transfer beams/ slabs. Admittedly, I never realized just how many projects do this until now. (In school my instructors have made it sound like something to be avoided if at all possible, but I guess that conservative approach applies when you are dealing with smaller-scale projects. Also, having a podium with a much smaller tower leads to this issue, whereas midrise or slab-type buildings don't require complicated stair transfers.)
 
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