It's definitely better than the empty lot that's there now, though it is a bit on the monolithic side. If this and Stampede Station were to be built the area would be an absolute highrise forest.
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- Thread starter Surrealplaces
- Start date
FCC1982
Senior Member
That last rendering is weird - Stampede Park is all dug up and the Big 4 has been replaced by …. something.
whatchyyc
Active Member
It looks like for the background they used AI upscaling that just redraws the image
FCC1982
Senior Member
Yeah I figured AI was involved.
Cowtown
Senior Member
It’s a pretty good commentary, I think the points about Calgary were spot on and very fair. Some of the dude’s comments about Banff, not being a utopia and needing a car, etc. were kind of funny.
Sometimes I get the feeling that people from Colorado are jealous of Banff lol
Cowtown
Senior Member
I posted this pic in the skyline photos thread, but I’m posting it here also. As much as we complain about Calgary and empty parking lots, this photo gives me hope. Seeing how many new buildings of risen up in this photo over the last 20 years, makes me excited for the next 20 years.
DougB
Senior Member
Those things are very fixable. Converting 9th, 6th, 5th and 4th Avenues to 4 lane, 2 way streets with widened sidewalks would be very easy as would reconfiguring the west side of dt to reduce road footprint. I'd also like to see the section of Memorial between the flyover and Deerfoot shrunk to 4 lanes. It bottlenecks at the bridges so the extra lanes are pointless
Red Star
Active Member
Even adding bus only lanes on 5th, 6th and 9th Ave. would do wonders for traffic management.
It would be nice if the city made significant streetscape improvements to the sidewalks in DT, but I get the impression that there are a ton of utilities under the sidewalk which would make it challenging.
Looks like this is called Parkdale Home.
Mountain Man
Senior Member
Did he mean you need a car in the town of Banff, or in the National Park? When I go to Banff (town) I park my car and walk everywhere, even if it's -20! Never taken the bus to any of the ski hills or attractions in Banff, just the Moraine shuttle.
I always like seeing these aerial pics, it let's us take stock of what's happening with the core. In the green are buildings built in the last 20 years, and aside from the sheer amount of builds, it's encouraging to see that most of the development has been radiating away from the dense office core and filling up the areas around it. Also so much more residential compared to office, and more residential to come in the form of new towers and conversions. For a city this size, it's been an amazing run.
Calgcouver
Senior Member
I was surprised by the lack of density/intensity selected and the site design i saw for this site, especially considering the location. 24 units for folks with developmental disabilities with high support needs in a 2-storey complex. When i saw the Site Plan, it had the two stories buildings closer to 3 Ave/Bowness Rd and the entire northern half of the lot was surface parking, definitely had a lot more than 24 parking stalls. Measuring the parcel on DMAP, it's about 9,255sm, so the gross floor area is 2,517sm (that is ~0.27FAR).
I get they wanted on-site parking for support staff, that surface parking is cheaper to build and that they may have a budget that is too low to more intensively development the site. But 0.27FAR is extremely low, it may be the lowest density development currently going in the City that isn't a gas station. Even this car dealership and CRU development in Royal Vista is about a 0.44FAR site:
To make a residential care centre ~38-39% less dense than a car dealership in the suburbs takes a concerted effort to waste land and the Province is treating valuable infill land like it is free. A single-family house in the suburbs is probably around a 0.6FAR, so this development is approx. half the density of a single-family home.
This lot is identified as Low (up to six stories) and Neighbourhood Flex in the SSLAP. This development is far below the minimum allowable density of a townhome site in the suburbs (minimum is 35uph, this development is ~26uph) and is using the land at about 10% of it's described density that would probably achieve between 2.5 and 3.0FAR based on the LAP. I would've expected something like 1.5FAR (13,883sm GFA) on the lower side but 0.27FAR (2,517sm GFA) is not even trying to use the land in an efficient way.
The demographic they are catering to is unlikely to drive so the parking is far oversized and driving serious site inefficiency. This approach to the development lacks intensity to such a degree that it would be underutilizing land in a place like Vulcan or High River, it is very out of context in an inner-city neighbourhood like Parkdale. I'm all for providing this type of supportive housing, but maybe this isn't the right parcel of land for such an inefficient land use if the design is driven by budget constraints and they can't use the land anywhere near its highest and best use.
Albertasaurus
Senior Member
that is amazing! Also there are a lot of other buildings - especially the highrises in the West End - that were built in the late '90s and early 2000s. A couple minor additions - Chocolate was finished in 2006, and Sasso and Vetro were finished in 2006 and 2008. And don't forget the BMO Centre
MichaelS
Senior Member
Also that office building in the SW corner of 8th Street and 8th Avenue SW, that was built within the past 20 years or so I think (want to say 2008ish).
YYCALGARY
New Member
Sasso and Vetro were 2008 and 2010, no?