Westmount Place (50 Westmount N, 9-15 Dietz N, 192-218 Erb W) | 11-25 fl | U/C

[ijmorlan]

Shorter internal corridors? Everyone gets their door near the elevator...

These were all true before...what changed in the 90s which encourages square buildings?

Even upscale condos have changed in this way...

Expected amount of windows? In a large rectangular block, each apartment really only has one exterior wall, except for a few corner apartments. With a design closer to square, more of the apartments are corner units. Also instead of a long corridor you just have a little bit right next to the elevator.

But I have no special insight into the developers’ and designers’ minds. However, I think some support for this idea may come from the fact that many older apartment buildings have no windows on the ends — so even the corner units don’t have anything special.

[danbrotherston]

I do wish active transportation (and transit) were improved in the area however.  This is easily bikeable to Uptown and the University, but both are probably quite unpleasant and downright dangerous right now.

This site is currently served by the 5, 8, 12, 92 and 202. Only the 5 goes towards uptown and it runs every 30 minutes, but every other direction is fairly well served. Dawson is an okay route for biking to Uptown, as is Sunshine-Rec Centre-Laurel Trail. There's a path through Waterloo Park that meets Seagram just short of the main entrance to UW.

I was specifically thinking of service to uptown is very poor.

Additionally, this development does not abut Waterloo Park, it is close, but when one is at the Corner of Westmount and Erb, it is an oppressive environment that is unpleasant by food, and unsafe by bike to proceed towards uptown, the park, or the University.  Possibly there may be connections through this development to Father David Bauer, which might improve access to the park and uptown, but I'm not holding my breath for it to be direct, safe, or well marked--the diagram doesn't even suggest there will be sidewalks.

The point is, Westmount and Erb are in desperate need of safe infrastructure.

[LesPio]

Conceptual drawings released for Waterloo's Westmount Place
Development includes six buildings

https://www.kitchenerpost.ca/news-story/...unt-place/

[KevinL]

How soon do they tear down the houses along Erb? Some have been empty for a decade now.

[jamincan]

Perhaps a square form is more energy efficient due to lower surface area to volume ratio?

[jwilliamson]

Square towers could also be related to zoning rules. If you are allowed to build anything as long as you stay below a certain height, that will encourage long, low buildings that cover much of the property. If the limit is instead an FAR, you can fit the same number of units into a short rectangle or a tall square, and the square will be more prominent and have more windows.

[tomh009]

These were all true before...what changed in the 90s which encourages square buildings?

Even upscale condos have changed in this way...

Expected amount of windows? In a large rectangular block, each apartment really only has one exterior wall, except for a few corner apartments. With a design closer to square, more of the apartments are corner units. Also instead of a long corridor you just have a little bit right next to the elevator.

But I have no special insight into the developers’ and designers’ minds. However, I think some support for this idea may come from the fact that many older apartment buildings have no windows on the ends — so even the corner units don’t have anything special.

The percentage of corner units, or ratio of windows to floor space, isn't hugely different. For example, a 60m x 20m long, narrow footprint -- narrower than most older buildings -- would have a 1200 m2 floorplate with 160m of wall. A square floorplate with 1200 m2 of space would be about 35m per side, with 140m of wall.

Now, as you pointed out, older buildings often have no windows on the ends. You could add those even while keeping the same footprint, but those windows would end up benefiting only the two or four end units. On a square floorplate, with windows all around, all units benefit roughly equally from the added windows. And yet … using my example above, that's an increase of only a little over 15%, from 120m of windowed wall to 140m.

My suspicion is that with a square floorplate you end up spending less of the available space on hallways, which produce no revenue. Possibly the long hallways may also require additional emergency exits (staircases) which also take space and add cost. But that's speculation, I really don't know building design or building codes well enough to confirm this.

[kalis0490]

IMO this project will become the Barrel Yards of the 2020s

I also wish that this project was in the place of Barrel Yards.

[Spokes]

Ugh. I fear you're right

[Coke6pk]

https://www.therecord.com/news-story/935...-waterloo/

Coke

[ijmorlan]

https://www.therecord.com/news-story/935...-waterloo/

Coke

I saw that in the Chronicle. It seems like a strange framing. I mean, it’s an interesting and legitimate human interest story, but the primary news is that hundreds or maybe thousands of people will have new places to live as a result of this development.

I think this gives us the explanation however as to why all those other houses have sat empty these last many years — easier than dealing with blowback from demolishing existing, occupied, residential property.

[danbrotherston]

https://www.therecord.com/news-story/935...-waterloo/

Coke

I saw that in the Chronicle. It seems like a strange framing. I mean, it’s an interesting and legitimate human interest story, but the primary news is that hundreds or maybe thousands of people will have new places to live as a result of this development.

I think this gives us the explanation however as to why all those other houses have sat empty these last many years — easier than dealing with blowback from demolishing existing, occupied, residential property.

Yeah. And this is the difficulty in some of the comment thread.

I'm allowed to have sympathy and feel bad for the people being displaced without thinking that it's the wrong thing to do.

The fact is, if they weren't displaced by the huge new development, they'd still be displaced eventually by the people who might live in the penthouses, and then there'd be six hundred or so other potential tenants to go displace six hundred or so other people in the city.

I'd love to see more affordable housing planned, and I think it's high time we make that part of the development plans, but that doesn't mean that building a large market rate building isn't still a good thing for the housing market.

[Spokes]

Any time there's growth and intensification this happens. The unfortunate reality is that people lose their homes. But many new ones are created

[ac3r]

Large indeed.  I'm curious as to the pedestrian realm.  The picture paint a nice picture, with lots of people about, but reality often does not match renders, and frankly, I'm hoping they just aren't showing sidewalks on the diagram, because there are a bunch missing.

As an unrelated aside, does anyone know why modern buildings are largely square, while older apartment buildings are largely rectangular.

There are many factors as to why buildings are designed this way in contemporary architecture. For commercial and residential property: the design process becomes simplified for architects (in a positive way), cost of materials can drop, the time required to build each floor drops, HVAC becomes more efficient, interior lighting improves, shadows on neighbouring properties improves, there's an increase in flexibility of the interior spaces, the footprint of the structure becomes smaller yet - properly utilizing height - will allow you to fit more a given space. It's just more efficient for certain structures...whereas something like a hospital or school you would want to build more rectangular.

[jeffster]

As an unrelated aside, does anyone know why modern buildings are largely square, while older apartment buildings are largely rectangular.

Smaller parcels of land and/or reduced parking? Some of the older apartments (and some condo's) were much longer and more narrow indeed, with many having 10 units or more per side. Many of these new building might only have 8-10 units per floor, and on all sides.