This is essentially a declaration that a solution has been found, but we better dig up some problems justify it…The government regulates almost everything. It can regulate cladding materials as well. There should be a justification and evidence beyond something flimsy like subjective aesthetic concerns that can't be measured scientifically. It could be that the city finds evidence that higher-quality buildings with better cladding promote long-term investment and vitality in an area, requiring less public investment in revitalization and renewal schemes over time. Perhaps spandrel is less durable than precast or brick and will contribute to waste when it has to be replaced.
Basically, the cladding issue needs to be linked to some public policy concern that's rooted in evidence and data.
and that's the kind of thinking that keeps me "left-of-centre" and not a full leftist: this would be hopeless over-regulation.
I agree with @ProjectEnd here fully in that the degree of description that would need to be written into the regulation would be so cumbersome as to be unrealistically restrictive and architecturally stifling. The regulation would constantly need to be rewritten to take into account advances in materials, and as that rewriting simply wouldn't happen on a timely basis, we would fall (even further) behind technologically (than we already are when it comes to cladding materials, if you want to compare us with modern European architecture).
Fair enough, but that doesn't really respond to the issue I was raising. Toronto might not have been given authority to so compel, but I was asking whether there is good reason to believe it could be given such authority. ProjectEnd's post responded directly to this concern, and I think the Junctionist's post moves the debate forward meaningfully in my direction.
Sorry if I didn't respond more fully to your post, but this has been addressed so many times in so many threads, that it becomes tiresome expressing it all again and again and again. Essentially I think more regulation of this type is a hopeless cause, and that the best way to effect change to cladding beyond what happens because of occasional updates to the Ontario Building Code, etc., is to keep up the social pressure when you see things you don't like. It's tough to make a big impact in a market where virtually everything sells, but make developers regret cheaping out on finishes with bad reviews, or reward them with praise when you see good work, and slowly but surely you'll affect change.
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