From the national post:
http://www.nationalpost.com/homes/story.html?id=2163588
River City Condo roars
Alex Newman, National Post
Published: Friday, October 30, 2009
River City condos will be curved, rather than boxy, to mimic the Gardiner.
Long as the shadows were that the economy cast this year, none could obliterate the bright future of Toronto's West Don Lands project.
"Within the long life of this project, we expected cycles, including recessions," says John Campbell, chair of Waterfront Toronto Corp., which created the master plan for the 90-acre site. "It turned out this one came last year, though it doesn't change the scope, just the rate you put it out."
Originally set up in 2001 by the federal, provincial and Toronto city governments, Waterfront Toronto also worked closely with the public to hear what people had to say, and help "iron out" any potential problems, Mr. Campbell says.
Located next to the Distillery District, West Don Lands is a rejuvenation project that includes 23 acres of parks and public spaces, including an expanded Martin Goodman Trail and the 18-acre Don River Park, more transit routes, one million square feet of employment space, an elementary school, recreation centre and a new campus for George Brown College.
By the time the project is built out in 10 to 15 years, it will also see the construction of several residential projects offering about 6,000 units. The first of those, River City, (tentative occupancy, 2012; see rivercitytoronto.com) on a 3.8-acre site fronting the Don River, has just launched after a several months' delay due to the economy.
Response has been so great, though, that developer Urban Capital has rolled the first two phases together to avoid "several thousand pre-registered buyers having to line up for one building with about 100 units," says David Wex, a partner.
What's drawing buyers is the same thing that attracted Urban Capital to enter the rigorous proposal competition in the first place.
"The site is an amazing combination of hard and soft infrastructure - the DVP ramp and vast green space," Mr. Wex says. "And as a gateway to the city, what it offered in the way of design is hard to resist for a developer."
They hired Saucier + Perrotte, a Montreal architecture firm that has quietly built a solid reputation - garnering a Best Firm in Canada award from the Royal Architecture Institute, plus five Governor General's awards.
As Gilles Saucier, the design arm of Saucier + Perrotte, explains his approach, "every city has a memory. In this part of Toronto, the way the Gardiner curves to become parallel to the lake, is already a sign that exists in the imagination of people. Our concept is built upon that continuous element of the ramp."
Instead of placing "boxes of housing side by side" Mr. Saucier chose to create "a continuous image" to reflect that curve. The Gardiner, and especially that ramp, is an end point in the city.
In any city, he explains, those end-point references are sometimes geographical - the river, the lake - sometimes built, like the east and west axis, because a city is "not the surface you build, but the elements you bring together."
As Toronto grows, he adds, it will become "necessary to create new references and boundaries."
Now, River City will add a further image to that end point, with its cluster of iconic buildings, dark panels and transparent glass with sculpted facades and rooflines. A two-storey lounge and party room becomes a "lightbox" cantilevered on the south end of the phase one building. Several of the buildings will convene in a landscaped courtyard with a heated outdoor pool resting on a floating deck.
Interiors, too, promise cutting-edge design: kitchens by Saucier + Perrotte with stone counters, baths with glass showers, rooms with nine-foot ceilings and views from balconies.
With the first launch, buyers can choose from 100 suites in the five-storey building, and 230 units in the 14-storey building that's connected to the first via a three-storey industrial-looking glass bridge. Those suites include 1,000- to 1,600-sq.-ft. townhomes, 400- to 900-sq.-ft lofts, and 515- to 1,600-sq.-ft. penthouses, all ranging from $179,900 to $769,900.
Two later phases will include an 11-storey, 200-unit building designed as four glass mini-towers, followed by 24- and 10-storey buildings with 400 suites. Eventually, there will be about 900 residential units overall.
And while some units will be large enough for families, with ground-level access and mudrooms, Mr. Wex believes the first two phases will have more appeal to a traditional condo buyer - singles and couples.
The amenities package includes exercise rooms, a furnished guest suite and a double-storey lounge.
Part of the deal that Waterfront Toronto is cutting with developers is that all buildings must be LEED gold. At River City, the enviro features are legion, including a parking garage pre-wired for an electric car-charging station, energy-efficient building envelope, Energy Star appliances, heat-recovery ventilators, as well as a district energy system to provide all the energy used in the West Don Lands.
Instead of itemizing all the "thousands of things in a LEED standard," Mr. Wex simplifies the list to four principles: "We want to reduce as much as possible what it takes to build these buildings, create healthy environments in them, reduce what we throw out, and offset whatever carbon footprint is left over. And we want these four pillars operating in every aspect of the building."
