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  #641  
Old Posted May 16, 2017, 7:02 PM
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Originally Posted by TorontoDrew View Post
I don't think we were talking about the skylines, we were talking about the street grids and pedestrian experience.
my bad. yes, street grids/pedestrian experience i give Burnaby/metrotown the edge
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  #642  
Old Posted May 16, 2017, 9:37 PM
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It's been many years since I've been in Metrotown. Lots of towers in park but, the point towers forms, greenery and, localized streets definitely makes it a much more pleasant experience than the mega block slab arrangements, minimal landscaping and, surface/decked parking lots.
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  #643  
Old Posted May 17, 2017, 4:31 AM
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Metrotown is North York with a mall. Mississauga is basically a larger Coquitlam or Brentwood. Actually both the latter are fast becoming better by virtue of rapid transit. No comparison, even without factoring the bleak desolate landscape
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  #644  
Old Posted May 17, 2017, 8:25 AM
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So North York is worse than Mississauga?
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  #645  
Old Posted Jul 9, 2017, 7:06 AM
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Some shots I got today in Burnaby looking south on Willingdon Avenue. In the foreground is Amazing Brentwood #1 rising on the left, Altus (Solo District phase #2) on the right. Metrotown skyline in the distance.



Burnaby, July 8 '17, my pics






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  #646  
Old Posted Jul 10, 2017, 4:19 AM
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You guys are comparing the walkability of Mississauga, incorporated 1974, to Burnaby, incorporated 1892?

No, you're just comparing their city centres, one 20km from downtown Toronto, the other 10km from downtown Vancouver.

Vancouver city proper is much smaller. The inner city, the pre-war city, extends beyond the city itself into adjcent municipalities including Burnaby. Burnaby had population ~60k in 1951, compared to ~30k for Mississauga. Burnaby is older, more akin to North York and Etobicoke.

Mississauga is more comparable to Surrey. Mississauga is newer and on the fringe of the urban area.

But if you really must compare the walkability of a part of Burnaby to a part of Mississauga, maybe it would make more sense to compare Metrotown to Port Credit instead.
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  #647  
Old Posted Jul 10, 2017, 4:55 AM
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Originally Posted by Doady View Post

But if you really must compare the walkability of a part of Burnaby to a part of Mississauga, maybe it would make more sense to compare Metrotown to Port Credit instead.
Good points and to a smaller extent Streetsville..
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  #648  
Old Posted Jul 10, 2017, 5:02 AM
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Surrey is Mississauga in its dreams. Metrotown was nothing but a big hill on the edge of town in the 80s.

e.g. photo from 82:



Still more built up than Surrey is today.
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  #649  
Old Posted Jul 10, 2017, 2:13 PM
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Originally Posted by Doady View Post
You guys are comparing the walkability of Mississauga, incorporated 1974, to Burnaby, incorporated 1892?

No, you're just comparing their city centres, one 20km from downtown Toronto, the other 10km from downtown Vancouver.

Vancouver city proper is much smaller. The inner city, the pre-war city, extends beyond the city itself into adjcent municipalities including Burnaby. Burnaby had population ~60k in 1951, compared to ~30k for Mississauga. Burnaby is older, more akin to North York and Etobicoke.

Mississauga is more comparable to Surrey. Mississauga is newer and on the fringe of the urban area.

But if you really must compare the walkability of a part of Burnaby to a part of Mississauga, maybe it would make more sense to compare Metrotown to Port Credit instead.
Port Credit is closer to Burnaby in scale and massing which is probably why it feels more enjoyable to walk than the city centre.

https://www.google.ca/maps/@43.59362...7i13312!8i6656

https://www.google.ca/maps/@49.22618...7i13312!8i6656
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  #650  
Old Posted Jul 11, 2017, 4:07 AM
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Surrey will, however, end up more urban than Mississauga. While it's pretty bare at the moment, it has the street grid for urban growth. More streets are planned, and the ones that exist are fairly narrow, as opposed to Mississauga's boulevards. It'll definitely at least appear less car-centric.
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  #651  
Old Posted Jul 13, 2017, 7:09 PM
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I look at Surrey on the map and I see cul-de-sacs everywhere, no grid. Mississauga has very few cul-de-sacs. But otherwise, I don't see any difference fundamental difference in their planning. Looking at satellite image, I see the same TOD features in Surrey that Mississauga has, but noticeably fewer high rises. Concession roads in Surrey closer together, so they didn't need to build new corridors like Mississauga did (Bristol Rd., Glen Erin Dr., Courtneypark Dr., Mavis Rd., etc.).

Quote:
Originally Posted by WhipperSnapper View Post
Port Credit is closer to Burnaby in scale and massing which is probably why it feels more enjoyable to walk than the city centre.

https://www.google.ca/maps/@43.59362...7i13312!8i6656
That's Mississauga Valleys, not Mississauga City Centre. Mississauga Valleys is a subdivision from the 70s. Mississauga's downtown at the time was Cooksville; MCC was not even a concept yet.

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Originally Posted by Pinion View Post
Surrey is Mississauga in its dreams. Metrotown was nothing but a big hill on the edge of town in the 80s.

e.g. photo from 82:

...

Still more built up than Surrey is today.
In 1982, Mississauga City Centre and the surrounding area was mostly farmland. There were 4 office buildings built in what is now MCC in the 50s and 60s, the mall was built in the 70s, but everything else was built in the late 80s onward. MCC is all greenfield development, and there are still greenfields. That's why I say walkability of Metrotown is more comparable to a place like Port Credit, or Cooksville (the original downtown of Mississauga), or North York City Centre.

Mississauga City Centre skyline in 2007:


I don't want to diminish how impressive Metrotown is, but keep in mind the difference in history and context when comparing it to MCC.
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  #652  
Old Posted Jul 13, 2017, 7:35 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Doady View Post
I look at Surrey on the map and I see cul-de-sacs everywhere, no grid. Mississauga has very few cul-de-sacs. But otherwise, I don't see any difference fundamental difference in their planning. Looking at satellite image, I see the same TOD features in Surrey that Mississauga has, but noticeably fewer high rises. Concession roads in Surrey closer together, so they didn't need to build new corridors like Mississauga did (Bristol Rd., Glen Erin Dr., Courtneypark Dr., Mavis Rd., etc.).



That's Mississauga Valleys, not Mississauga City Centre. Mississauga Valleys is a subdivision from the 70s. Mississauga's downtown at the time was Cooksville; MCC was not even a concept yet.



In 1982, Mississauga City Centre and the surrounding area was mostly farmland. There were 4 office buildings built in what is now MCC in the 50s and 60s, the mall was built in the 70s, but everything else was built in the late 80s onward. MCC is all greenfield development, and there are still greenfields. That's why I say walkability of Metrotown is more comparable to a place like Port Credit, or Cooksville (the original downtown of Mississauga), or North York City Centre.

Mississauga City Centre skyline in 2007:


I don't want to diminish how impressive Metrotown is, but keep in mind the difference in history and context when comparing it to MCC.
We're in 2017. Few people would distinguish the Valley from MCC if these first residential towers weren't planned in tandem with the city centre (I don't know but, I doubt you) There's also no office buildings from the 1950s in MCC. Square One, Mississauga's first City Hall and one of the office towers were complete in the early 1970s beside the first residential towers in the valley . More were added throughout the rest of the 1970s.

Metrotown started building tower around the same time. It's more recent history and high rise form has mirrored Mississauga City Centre for the past 40 years.
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  #653  
Old Posted Jul 15, 2017, 11:18 PM
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New Westminster’s rising tower power
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The City of New Westminster is averaging more than 50 new building permits every month this year, on a pace to edge out the $189 million in permits issued in 2016, the 10th straight year the Royal City has topped $100 million in permit values.
As of the end of May, permit values had already eclipsed $144.5 million, and housing starts, at 612 units, were far ahead of the 339 starts in the same period last year.

“If the pace holds, [2017] will work out to a 12.7% increase from the previous year,” said Blair Fryer, communications and development manager for the city of 71,000 on the banks of the Fraser River.

There is little doubt the pace will hold up.

This month, New Westminster council approved zoning for the largest tower the city has ever seen: Bosa Development’s 53-storey condominium skyscraper.

The building is part of a project that will include a second 43-storey tower and a three-storey commercial building, all built on the New Westminster riverfront.
https://www.biv.com/article/2017/7/n...g-tower-power/

Nice article on the rising towers of New Westminster! I understand lots is talked out for Metrotown, Brentwood and Lougheed town centers in Burnaby. I think New Westminster sometimes gets overlooked!
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  #654  
Old Posted Jul 16, 2017, 7:26 PM
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Originally Posted by WhipperSnapper View Post
We're in 2017. Few people would distinguish the Valley from MCC if these first residential towers weren't planned in tandem with the city centre (I don't know but, I doubt you)
Why call it MCC, and use it to represent MCC and use it as a basis for critcizing MCC, if it's not MCC, it's a different neighbourhood with different policies? I think it's misleading.

I can do the same:
https://goo.gl/maps/t3JYTtBj4u72

More MCC awfulness?
https://goo.gl/maps/3En1GEp2Hp92

There are already enough reasons to criticize MCC before including the stuff surrounding it.

Quote:
Originally Posted by WhipperSnapper View Post
There's also no office buildings from the 1950s in MCC. Square One, Mississauga's first City Hall and one of the office towers were complete in the early 1970s beside the first residential towers in the valley . More were added throughout the rest of the 1970s.

Metrotown started building tower around the same time. It's more recent history and high rise form has mirrored Mississauga City Centre for the past 40 years.
Point is, there were only 4 office buildings and Square One in MCC in 1982. Everything else was built after, as greenfield development, not redevelopment. I see little in common with Burnaby's Metrotown.

Here's Mississauga City Centre in 1978. Compare with that 1982 picture of Metrotown that Pinion posted:

http://www.mississauga.ca/portal/res...%3Fstart%3D181
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  #655  
Old Posted Jul 18, 2017, 6:05 AM
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Originally Posted by Doady View Post
I look at Surrey on the map and I see cul-de-sacs everywhere, no grid. Mississauga has very few cul-de-sacs. But otherwise, I don't see any difference fundamental difference in their planning. Looking at satellite image, I see the same TOD features in Surrey that Mississauga has, but noticeably fewer high rises. Concession roads in Surrey closer together, so they didn't need to build new corridors like Mississauga did (Bristol Rd., Glen Erin Dr., Courtneypark Dr., Mavis Rd., etc.).



That's Mississauga Valleys, not Mississauga City Centre. Mississauga Valleys is a subdivision from the 70s. Mississauga's downtown at the time was Cooksville; MCC was not even a concept yet.



In 1982, Mississauga City Centre and the surrounding area was mostly farmland. There were 4 office buildings built in what is now MCC in the 50s and 60s, the mall was built in the 70s, but everything else was built in the late 80s onward. MCC is all greenfield development, and there are still greenfields. That's why I say walkability of Metrotown is more comparable to a place like Port Credit, or Cooksville (the original downtown of Mississauga), or North York City Centre.

Mississauga City Centre skyline in 2007:


I don't want to diminish how impressive Metrotown is, but keep in mind the difference in history and context when comparing it to MCC.
If you can't see Surrey's grid (or Mississauga's cul-de-sacs) then I'm not really sure what to say. Both of them have similar structures of a large grid with typical suburban swirly streets within them, but Surrey's grid utilizes narrower streets with more intersections, whereas Mississauga's is much more heavily reliant on wide boulevards and is more reflective of a typical suburban local-collector-arterial road system. Most of its major streets, which form the grid, have no buildings fronting them.

Street networks are what make places suburban or urban, not the height of their buildings. And while both places have swirly roads within larger grids, Mississauga's grid is clearly just a gridded-version of the large arterials that you find in typical suburbs: wide and without fronting buildings. Surrey may appear heavily suburban at the moment with its low density, but it has a much higher opportunity to urbanize in the future as the bones are already there. Replace the run-down SFHs fronting the main arterials with mid-rise developments and CRUs and all of a sudden its streets are indistinguishable from those in inner-city anywhere. Surrey has an urban skeleton—it is just underdeveloped at the moment. No matter how dense you build Mississauga, it will never be urban.
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  #656  
Old Posted Jul 18, 2017, 1:51 PM
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good to hear about the boom in New West. I used to work in New West for a spell in the early 90s. Things were not so rosy back then (anyone remember "The Paramount"?), although the city was trying with the Quay development. The city had great bones, however.
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  #657  
Old Posted Jul 18, 2017, 2:19 PM
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Originally Posted by GlassCity View Post
If you can't see Surrey's grid (or Mississauga's cul-de-sacs) then I'm not really sure what to say. Both of them have similar structures of a large grid with typical suburban swirly streets within them, but Surrey's grid utilizes narrower streets with more intersections, whereas Mississauga's is much more heavily reliant on wide boulevards and is more reflective of a typical suburban local-collector-arterial road system. Most of its major streets, which form the grid, have no buildings fronting them.

Street networks are what make places suburban or urban, not the height of their buildings. And while both places have swirly roads within larger grids, Mississauga's grid is clearly just a gridded-version of the large arterials that you find in typical suburbs: wide and without fronting buildings. Surrey may appear heavily suburban at the moment with its low density, but it has a much higher opportunity to urbanize in the future as the bones are already there. Replace the run-down SFHs fronting the main arterials with mid-rise developments and CRUs and all of a sudden its streets are indistinguishable from those in inner-city anywhere. Surrey has an urban skeleton—it is just underdeveloped at the moment. No matter how dense you build Mississauga, it will never be urban.
These are excellent observations.
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  #658  
Old Posted Jul 18, 2017, 2:47 PM
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I agree....I live in Mississauga (temporarily) and really, there's no way it'll be truly urban. The "downtown" is going to improve a bit (the city has filed a few documents to extend roads to actually form a more cohesive grid in the area near the highway...just around Confederation) but Mississauga can't be more urban then Surrey, heck I would say Brampton is more urban than Mississauga.

I walk a lot in Mississauga and pretty much it's a mudhole of a place to walk along. Major roadway just suck, with the amount of lanes and people turning into commercial plazas.
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  #659  
Old Posted Jul 18, 2017, 4:36 PM
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Major roadway just suck, with the amount of lanes and people turning into commercial plazas.
yeppers. I feel like I am playing Dodgeball, but with the endless cars that keep whizzing and turning. Absolutely wretched from an urban fabric perspective, and cannot be fixed by tall buildings. Ontario in general is really bad at building walkable commerical districts in the suburbs. I live in London, and outside the core (and the notable exception of Wortley Village) there are no commercial districts suitable for walking. Not just soul-sucking, but downright hazardous.

Wonderland Road is one of London's main commercial arteries. Would you like to walk along it?
https://www.google.ca/maps/@42.98349...7i13312!8i6656
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  #660  
Old Posted Jul 18, 2017, 4:45 PM
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I don't think that's just an Ontario problem.
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