06-01-2017, 12:48 PM
(05-31-2017, 09:50 AM)panamaniac Wrote: I've been mulling over the idea of a continuous indoor connection for these four proposed towers and I can't think of any good rationale. Although I could be wrong, it does not appear from the renders that the project will include a shared amenities area, which would be the strongest argument for a link. I suppose a link above ground level might be possible, but anything at grade would reduce the "green space" between the towers (which seems to be intended as publicly accessible space). I just have trouble seeing the link as useful, or even desireable.
So you don’t think anybody will ever want to go from one tower to the other? There is always a good rationale for linking any two buildings. It would be nice if my house were linked to Waterloo Town Square, and on to the University. The only reason not to link is excessive expense, or if there is no way to route the link without conflicting with other needed routes and requirements of the buildings.
For example, to go to an extreme, the houses on my street can’t reasonably be linked. Doing so would probably cost more than the houses themselves. Also, there is a routing problem: if the link ran at ground level, where would the exterior sidewalks and roads go? If below or above ground level, you run into a problem linking to houses that aren’t designed to have entrances other than on the main floor, not to mention even higher costs. Also going above ground level would have an enormous aesthetic impact, but really in comparison to the other problems that is relatively minor.
In this case we have a bunch of buildings built on a common parking base, each of which will have several retail establishments. It is obviously useful to be able to enter the building once and visit multiple locations. For residents, even more so: they don’t even have to bring a coat. Given the whole thing is effectively one big building anyway, there is no credible expense argument against linking.
In general, the larger the buildings the better the links should be. By the time you’re talking about buildings with hundreds of units built on multiple levels of underground parking, every single one should be linked to its neighbours by fully climate-controlled indoor links. Medium sized buildings should have more overhangs and more zero-setback construction with interior connections. Smaller buildings like my house are inherently unlinkable and that’s OK.
However, better planning should be used. In Calgary, some of the bridges are multi-story affairs that really have a major impact on what the street feels like. I think those should have been kept more slender. Also, the links between street level and the bridge system should be extremely easy to use and very obvious, and the interior passageways should be as easy to navigate as the streets themselves.