Toronto Waterlink at Pier 27 | 43.89m | 14s | Cityzen | a—A

I remember going through the model suites. Most of the original units had split level designs. Almost unheard of back then. This was the kind of thing you only saw in architectural magazines or in the movies.
A split level one bedroom with a view of the lake from the living area and a view of the city from the bedroom was going for an astronomical price of around 55,000, if memory is correct.
I was blown away by it. I wanted it!
Finally decided we couldn't be comfortable with the mortgage or the value for the money..haha.
I think that building probably got me thinking of living in the city sometime in the future. I still think of those days every time I gaze at it when I'm on the island ferry. Fork in the road not taken..
 
I remember coming down to the waterfront below Bay Street in 1970 or '71 with a high school friend, who had a Canon and was taking photographs to document the run-down area - very Burtynsky - before both of us went to OCA the next year. It was, indeed, pretty bleak industrial wasteland in those days, Mongo. It wasn't until a couple of years later that Trudeau proposed Harbourfront as an election vote-getting goodie, and some of the the first Harbourfront events were outdoor concerts in parking lots. I believe that planning for Harbour Square began even earlier, in the '60s.

Back in the early '70s, the idea of our central waterfront as a cultural/live/work mecca simply wasn't on anyones' radar, and I'm always amused when people nowadays fume about developers building condominiums south of the Quay as if it represents some sort of evil act.
 
unimaginative2 said:
Absolutely. I think the earliest renderings made that pretty clear. In terms of urban design, this is more or less a repetition of the Harbour Square buildings: large landscaped areas and driveways for the use of the condo building and a token public walkway along the water, hidden behind the buildings. I once thought people believed Harbour Square to be a mistake that shouldn't be repeated...and yet here we are.
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Funny you should say that... the initial concept with the bridge was to get the density off the ground and into the sky, to keep the waterfront accessible. To that end there is a road (with a turnaround at the end of it) through the middle of the development, even though the courtyards between the buildings aren't public. They were originally supposed to be, but developers have strange ideas about what they think their potential buyers want and that often drives the decision-making process.
 
Why is it strange that property owners would want private green space, and that developers would provide it for them? The beauty of generous sites like this is that architects can design buildings that float in the air and provide views of the lake below or between them - for the delight of those who stand to the north of the site and mistake Queen's Quay for the genuine waterfront promenade to the south. Toronto is famously a city by a lake, and the point at which the city meets the lake is a defining space quite different from the Quay.
 
Urban Shocker said:
Why is it strange that property owners would want private green space, and that developers would provide it for them? The beauty of generous sites like this is that architects can design buildings that float in the air and provide views of the lake below or between them - for the delight of those who stand to the north of the site and mistake Queen's Quay for the genuine waterfront promenade to the south. Toronto is famously a city by a lake, and the point at which the city meets the lake is a defining space quite different from the Quay.
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Don't create a straw man - I didn't say that it's strange for people to want private space and it's strange for developers to give it to them.

On many projects that I have worked on, for example, the developers want everything to be accessible indoors. Owners will have to go outside to bring their garbage to the chute? Unconscionable! Needs a glass walkway! Meanwhile, said owners will go outside multiple times throughout the day, even in winter, going about their regular business in the city. You end up creating all sorts of measures to avoid these perceived negatives and the buildings+circulation suffer as a result.

They also assume that if there aren't gates and fences somewhere, a space will automatically become over-run with the freeloading public who don't own the space. Nevermind the fact that if you don't draw people into a courtyard space, they won't actually go there... and nevermind that on a site like Waterlink's, you don't exactly have throngs of people using the site as a shortcut to get to the other side of the site (and therefore since there's no reason to go there, most people won't). Many developments, as a result, end up with segregated "open space" that is under-used because it isn't comfortable... it's surrounded by fences, it's only accessible via a keyed door from inside the building, it's not adjacent to a street, or any other number of situations. You can't just "end up" there, you have to take a very purposeful route... it's "private public" space, rather than "public private" space. there's an important distinction there that I can elaborate on if needed, but the point is that the developers have ideas about how buildings should work that don't necessarily reflect good urban design, and *that* is what creates a lot of the situations we see on the waterfront.

On Pier 27 specifically, they are no longer public because the developer wanted these long enclosed walkways connecting the lobbies of the building... a simple move that has all kinds of bad consequences, including cutting off the siteline to the water. You can give people terraces, put a public space between them, and come back later to mitigate through-traffic if it is a problem. But most developers imagine the problems that may never come to fruition, and force the architects to design the solution in advance.
 
I was under the impression that the public would be able to walk to the lake between these buildings. So that's not the case? So will the only public access to the water be on the west side, near Yonge Street? If that's the case, it's not a good plan. So one can't walk from west to east and then continue to Sugar beach, along Queen's Quay? Will you have to walk east and then walk back along the same path and exit where you entered? That would be completely impractical and useless for most people. In that case, I think people will just avoid walking here and stick to Queen's Quay but I seriously cannot believe that is the plan. It's just too stupid, even for our politicians.
 
Torontovibe said:
I was under the impression that the public would be able to walk to the lake between these buildings. So that's not the case? So will the only public access to the water be on the west side, near Yonge Street? If that's the case, it's not a good plan. So one can't walk from west to east and then continue to Sugar beach, along Queen's Quay? Will you have to walk east and then walk back along the same path and exit where you entered? That would be completely impractical and useless for most people. In that case, I think people will just avoid walking here and stick to Queen's Quay but I seriously cannot believe that is the plan. It's just too stupid, even for our politicians.
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This is what I said a couple of posts above - "... there is a road (with a turnaround at the end of it) through the middle of the development, even though the courtyards between the buildings aren't public."

The easiest way to explain it is, you can access the waterfront between the bridges (where they don't connect), but you can't go directly underneath them.
 
guitarchitect said:
They also assume that if there aren't gates and fences somewhere, a space will automatically become over-run with the freeloading public who don't own the space. Nevermind the fact that if you don't draw people into a courtyard space, they won't actually go there... and nevermind that on a site like Waterlink's, you don't exactly have throngs of people using the site as a shortcut to get to the other side of the site (and therefore since there's no reason to go there, most people won't).
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Well, it seems to me, based on the comments on this site, that there's a significant contingent who want to traipse across the private land at Pier 27 to get to the waterfront promenade from Queen's Quay. We all do such things now and then, don't we? Even in obscure locations, people will tresspass - one of my favourite private townhouse developments, circa 1980, is on the north side of Walker Avenue just west of Yonge ( designed by Ernest Annau, I think ... ) and when first built the general public could wander through it, and I loved wandering in there and admiring the houses, but it is now fenced off, and quite sensibly so.
 
Well, what is the point of building a public promenade if it's hard to get to or if it's so badly designed that it prevents people from going there? We need to have access both on the east and west sides of the site or else it won't work as a way to get from A to B along the waterfront. This will turn out to be a bigger blunder than Harbour Square, which at least has east and west access points. You guys have to be wrong. I cannot believe the city would make a waterfront path that does not give us the option to continue east/north to Queen's Quay and then over to Sugar Beach. It's just inconceivable to me.
 
They're not building a pedestrian promenade south of the Quay and around Redpath, that's for sure, nor does one loop around the south of the Police Marine Unit at 259 Queen's Quay West ... yet somehow life still goes on. To a certain degree, this is still a working port, y'know.
 
No, I realize the path would not go south around the refinery but I just assumed that we could head back up to Queen's Quay, on the east side, just west of the condo's eastern most building. Doesn't it just make sense to have an eastern access point not only for convenience but for public safety. Let's say there is ever a bomb threat or a shooting on the west access point. Doesn't the public need another access point out of the confined waterfront promenade? I thought all the spaces between the buildings would be lined with sidewalks for the public to enter and exit.
 
To put it all into context - here is the site plan (see last page of the PDF): http://www.toronto.ca/legdocs/mmis/2007/te/bgrd/backgroundfile-5995.pdf

If I am interpreting this correctly, you can go all the way to the eastern edge of the property (against Redpath) along the public promenade but there will be no publicly accessible N-S route beyond Freeland St. on the map.

AoD
 
^^ OK, so at least there will be a north/south access point through the middle of the complex. It's not as good as I thought but it's better than nothing.
 
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