General Suburban Updates and Rumours

[bravado]

I'll take 8000 more of these but without the setbacks...I hate those. I wish we would build like old North American cities did, with the buildings butting right up to the sidewalks. You save space and and it just looks nicer. There's no reason to set the building back a few meters just to have a bit of grass.

They seem really indefensible, moreso than other arbitrary planning requirements.

If setbacks were so crucial, why do we all go visit places that don't have them?

[tomh009]

I like the building. I don’t like the excess of exterior stairs and complete lack of any shelter around the doors.

That's pretty much what a stacked townhouse ends up being, though.

[tomh009]

I was out and about driving in suburbia and almost caused a crash craning my neck to spot this beauty in the middle of a sea of shitty beige siding and SUVs that don't fit in driveways.

What do we have to do to make city planning policy make 8000 more of these?

On a similar theme, I give you 555 King St E in Kitchener. Not new, but I don't recall when it was built. Maybe 20 years ago?

   

[ijmorlan]

On a similar theme, I give you 555 King St E in Kitchener. Not new, but I don't recall when it was built. Maybe 20 years ago?

Significantly better. Each set of stairs serves 4 units, and you don’t get rained on while trying to open the front door. The stairs really ought to be covered (shovelling snow off stairs should not be necessary) but much better than the other design. They don’t dominate the front of the building.

[SF22]

I was out and about driving in suburbia and almost caused a crash craning my neck to spot this beauty in the middle of a sea of shitty beige siding and SUVs that don't fit in driveways.

What do we have to do to make city planning policy make 8000 more of these?

On a similar theme, I give you 555 King St E in Kitchener. Not new, but I don't recall when it was built. Maybe 20 years ago?

I've always wondered who had the foresight to build these units. We briefly looked at these units back in about 2012 or so, because they were visually appealing and in a central location, but I think they were a little out of our price range at that time. It's a shame that whoever developed them didn't build 20 more blocks just like it.

[ac3r]

On a similar theme, I give you 555 King St E in Kitchener. Not new, but I don't recall when it was built. Maybe 20 years ago?

I've always wondered who had the foresight to build these units. We briefly looked at these units back in about 2012 or so, because they were visually appealing and in a central location, but I think they were a little out of our price range at that time. It's a shame that whoever developed them didn't build 20 more blocks just like it.

One development I like is Victoria Commons development. It's not perfect and the architecture of it is just like any suburb but they managed to squeeze in nearly 200 contemporary rowhouses into an extremely small space in that one. They could have easily built them in actual continuous rows and fit more housing in, rather than like most townhouse or rowhouse blocks these days where they're always broken up into blocks of XX units but even in spite of that but even if you ignore that it's real cool that they even dared to do this project with that degree of density. Often these days when a developer does townhouses or rowhouses it's just a building or two and has an incredible amount of wasted space in the form of useless yards, driveways that don't need to be so long or wide or outright parking lots.

[SF22]

I've always wondered who had the foresight to build these units. We briefly looked at these units back in about 2012 or so, because they were visually appealing and in a central location, but I think they were a little out of our price range at that time. It's a shame that whoever developed them didn't build 20 more blocks just like it.

One development I like is Victoria Commons development. It's not perfect and the architecture of it is just like any suburb but they managed to squeeze in nearly 200 contemporary rowhouses into an extremely small space in that one. They could have easily built them in actual continuous rows and fit more housing in, rather than like most townhouse or rowhouse blocks these days where they're always broken up into blocks of XX units but even in spite of that but even if you ignore that it's real cool that they even dared to do this project with that degree of density. Often these days when a developer does townhouses or rowhouses it's just a building or two and has an incredible amount of wasted space in the form of useless yards, driveways that don't need to be so long or wide or outright parking lots.

Victoria Commons is great for density and a bit of that European feel to housing, but geographically it's in kind of a desert. Giant Tiger is probably the closest store that you might use on a regular basis, and it's 500m away from the nearest home in that development, and a full kilometre for the folks living at Louisa/St Leger. Minimum 500m walk to Mei King/A1 Pizza on Victoria, but that stretch of Victoria is so unpleasant to walk on. No pedestrian connection to the southeast (Adam St), which always confused me. Nice and close to Breithaupt Centre though, which is nice. If, say, Victoria St between Margaret and Lancaster saw some redevelopment and the introduction of a variety of shops and restaurants, Victoria Commons would feel a lot more convenient.

[ijmorlan]

No pedestrian connection to the southeast (Adam St), which always confused me. 

My recollection is that it was originally marketed as 5 Adam, but they couldn’t reach a deal with the New Apostolic Church to buy their overflow parking lot at the end of Adam St., nor to provide access. It’s obvious that it would be better for the City as a whole if Victoria Marie Ct. was an extension of Adam St. rather than being separate, especially with no pedestrian connection.

I could also be quite wrong in my memory.

[SF22]

No pedestrian connection to the southeast (Adam St), which always confused me. 

My recollection is that it was originally marketed as 5 Adam, but they couldn’t reach a deal with the New Apostolic Church to buy their overflow parking lot at the end of Adam St., nor to provide access. It’s obvious that it would be better for the City as a whole if Victoria Marie Ct. was an extension of Adam St. rather than being separate, especially with no pedestrian connection.

I could also be quite wrong in my memory.

That would certainly explain it. It's a shame, because it would certainly improve access to the #4 bus that runs down Margaret. I hope we see more willingness from private entities to string their properties together with pedestrian pathways to create internal networks within a single block.

[Acitta]

Three new housing developments proposed in Doon

Local residents claim that it is a sign of the apocalypse. (I might be exaggerating a bit).

[ac3r]

Complaining about townhouses and a 3 floor building...lol.

[Bytor]

Which ones of these are historic?</sarcasm>

[Chris]

Which ones of these are historic?</sarcasm>

I think they were referring to the pavement?

I can't wait for that road to require rebuilding and they have to get sidewalks installed. Those would be some fun council meetings to attend.

[SF22]

New stacked townhouse development proposed for 135-161 Jackson St, Kitchener. This is just inside the highway ring, but I've added it to Suburban updates just because it's in a very residential area that's not particularly close to any current density.

This is currently one big house that is hidden in the middle of a block, behind all the surrounding houses. The house and its pond will be removed, as well as 5-ish surrounding homes, to make space for 120 units, most of which will be 2 bed+den. They are also including their own little playground for kids, so definitely encouraging families with one or two kids to live here. They will be three storeys tall plus basement units.

Full reports are here: https://app2.kitchener.ca/AppDocs/OpenDa...701880.pdf

[the_conestoga_guy]

New stacked townhouse development proposed for 135-161 Jackson St, Kitchener. This is just inside the highway ring, but I've added it to Suburban updates just because it's in a very residential area that's not particularly close to any current density.

This is currently one big house that is hidden in the middle of a block, behind all the surrounding houses. The house and its pond will be removed, as well as 5-ish surrounding homes, to make space for 120 units, most of which will be 2 bed+den. They are also including their own little playground for kids, so definitely encouraging families with one or two kids to live here. They will be three storeys tall plus basement units.

Full reports are here: https://app2.kitchener.ca/AppDocs/OpenDa...701880.pdf

I feel like the proposed stacked townhomes actually suit this neighbourhood better than a single gated mansion. It hurts to look at all that parking, but it seems like an easy win otherwise.