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25 St Mary St. Toronto redevelopment
#1
Thought it was interesting to read that a 24 storey building at 25 St Mary Street in Toronto (and apparently in decent repair) is going to be demolished and replaced by two larger buildings (59 & 54 storeys).  We have only very recently started to build structures of this size in our region, and they are already taking them down! 

You can find the Article and Forum Thread at Urban Toronto.
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#2
This is to be expected, for a number of reasons. For one, these old buildings were - at times - not constructed to the best of their abilities and have fallen into incredible disrepair...or the owners themselves were just pretty apathetic to the state of the building. Another issue is that we rarely view modernist architecture as having any value, so something like this is just thought of as unsightly. Most of all, though, is that land is scarce with the current boundaries of cities and so it might seem preferable to build a larger contemporary project in its place.

Heck, even more presumably higher end buildings have issues already. A great example is CityPlace in Toronto. They were only built a few years ago (close to 30 towers built between 2000-2008) and are already suffering from everything from black mould, leaks, insect infestations, dog shit all over the streets/sidewalks, flooding, broken elevators and predatory owners that just rent the units out at very cheap prices, driving the entire community down even further. A quick search on DuckDuckGo or Google can provide plenty of links.

This is exactly what I've always assumed will happen to the student buildings in Waterloo. They're virtually all garbage, when viewed from an architectural/engineering point of view. They are honestly the shittiest buildings we've got in this city...even our old apartment blocks made in the 60s and 70s are superior because they tend to have pretty solid construction in them. But all these shitty student buildings - especially those designed by SRM Architects - have a pretty finite life expectancy. I would not be surprised if either they end up really dilapidated/undesirable or just torn down in the next 30-40 years to make room for something better...assuming the City of Waterloo politicians and the residents can ever pulls their heads out of their asses. I won't be surprised this holds true for more "prestigious" condo developments like Duke Tower and Gaslight Condos as well, both of which suffer from issues of the developer forcing the architects to make the cheapest possible choices.
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#3
(06-21-2021, 02:40 PM)ac3r Wrote: Most of all, though, is that land is scarce with the current boundaries of cities and so it might seem preferable to build a larger contemporary project in its place.

Land isn't scarce; government permission to build new homes is scarce.
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#4
(06-21-2021, 07:45 PM)jwilliamson Wrote:
(06-21-2021, 02:40 PM)ac3r Wrote: Most of all, though, is that land is scarce with the current boundaries of cities and so it might seem preferable to build a larger contemporary project in its place.

Land isn't scarce; government permission to build new homes is scarce.

While that is true, land that has adequate services is scarce and should be kind of expensive.
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#5
(06-21-2021, 08:31 PM)plam Wrote:
(06-21-2021, 07:45 PM)jwilliamson Wrote: Land isn't scarce; government permission to build new homes is scarce.

While that is true, land that has adequate services is scarce and should be kind of expensive.

And within the boundaries of the city of Toronto, actual vacant land is also quite scarce: you typically need to tear something down in order to build something new.
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#6
(06-21-2021, 10:18 PM)tomh009 Wrote:
(06-21-2021, 08:31 PM)plam Wrote: While that is true, land that has adequate services is scarce and should be kind of expensive.

And within the boundaries of the city of Toronto, actual vacant land is also quite scarce: you typically need to tear something down in order to build something new.

Sometimes a parking lot!
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