12 Stirling Ave. (Odawa Native Friendship Centre | ?m | 19 fl | Proposed

[rocketphish]

Development docs:
http://app01.ottawa.ca/postingplans/...appId=__9JK1EW

Promised nine-storey zoning, Hintonburg site developer wants 19

By David Reevely, OTTAWA CITIZEN April 23, 2013 7:07 PM

OTTAWA — A builder wants to construct a 19-storey tower on the site of the Odawa Native Friendship Centre in Hintonburg, a site the city’s planning department has previously said was suitable for a building less than half that tall.

Discussions about the future of the property at Stirling Avenue and Scott Street have already been controversial. As the Odawa centre considered moving out about two years ago, it hired planning consultants from the private firm FoTenn to help it get the best price for its property. The site is zoned for an institution with a maximum height of about four storeys. After a “pre-consultation” about the possibilities in late 2011, city planner Kersten Nitsche wrote to FoTenn that the city would back a rezoning that would allow a nine-storey building on the property if the new owner met particular conditions about parking and setbacks and preserving the former school the Odawa centre occupies.

At the time, planning general manager John Moser acknowledged that the promise was a little too definitive, though the point of a pre-consultation is to give builders an idea of what planning rules could allow.

“We’re giving them a box to play in,” Coun. Peter Hume, the chairman of city council’s planning committee, said at the time. “We’re saying, ‘We’d look at nine storeys. If you want to come back and give us a 15-storey building, don’t bother.’”

Now the actual application is in from developer Morley Hoppner and architect Barry Hobin — and different planning consultants, Lloyd Phillips and Jill Stewart of Lloyd Phillips & Associates. It proposes the 19-storey tower, a renovation of the Odawa building into luxury condos with two extra floors added for penthouse units and some townhouses facing Carruthers Avenue, the next street west. The whole thing would be called “Hintonburg Station.”

The Citizen couldn’t immediately reach Hume to find out what he thinks of the gap between the planning department’s views and the application.

The site is just a couple of short blocks from Tunney’s Pasture with its transit station and thousands of government jobs, and it’s right on Scott Street, a major artery, the application says. Putting commercial uses on the ground floor, probably stores, would add some life to a pedestrian dead zone, too.

The city is working on a plan for such a revitalization, having hired urban design guru George Dark to come up with a plan for Scott Street and much of nearby Mechanicsville. He just started, though, and the city will likely have to decide on Morley Hoppner’s proposal before he’s finished.

No date is set for a planning committee vote; the city’s planners are working on an assessment of the proposal.

The Odawa Centre announced in late March that it’s moving to City Centre, near the O-Train tracks south of Albert Street.

http://www.ottawacitizen.com/busines...437/story.html

[J.OT13]

Originally Posted by rocketphish

Development docs:
http://app01.ottawa.ca/postingplans/...appId=__9JK1EW



http://www.ottawacitizen.com/busines...437/story.html

Preserves a nice old building, mix of brick and glass and on the mid-way point between Tunney's and Bayview. I'm good with it.

[kevinbottawa]

I like everything except for the design of the tower facing north and how wide it looks. Couldn't they break that up into two towers?

[McC]

Hey, it's my old friend, Slabby McSlabberson!

[Harley613]

the view is going to be amazing if it gets built, but isn't the design a little bit 70's??

[rocketphish]

Map:




More renderings:

[McC]

somebody goofed this one:

Originally Posted by rocketphish

the Soho is shown on part of the site of 159 Parkdale, and then they don't show any of the approved future highrises! Frankly, I'm surprised they didn't use an angle with 159, 111 and 99 Parkdale shown as approved, to make it look like a more high-density, high--rise oriented context than currently. Strange. Especially since all of Hobin's drawings for 99 Parkdale assumed that there would be a similar highrise building next door at 111 (this was before Tega submitted their proposal, so it was shown as a "twin tower" for simplicity's sake).

The courtyard and repurposed school look nice, although if someone asked me what use should be made of an old school, with a gym, etc, in a core area of the city that's being planned to add tens of thousands of new residents over the decade, my answer would be "well, uhm, how about we use it as school?"

But I don't understand this tower at all. Why the square and the slab? why take up so much space? The shadows cast northward over Scott and the Transitway won't impact much of anyone, but the late afternoon and summer evening shadows which are cast to the southeast across Stirling, Pinhey, etc. will be much worse because of that L-shape (the orientation of the grid in this part of town is off nearly 45 degrees from the cardinal directions; so at the summer solstice, sunset is almost in the "north" on the street grid).

[Luker]

I concur. Great summary and critiques.

Originally Posted by McC

somebody goofed this one:

the Soho is shown on part of the site of 159 Parkdale, and then they don't show any of the approved future highrises! Frankly, I'm surprised they didn't use an angle with 159, 111 and 99 Parkdale shown as approved, to make it look like a more high-density, high--rise oriented context than currently. Strange. Especially since all of Hobin's drawings for 99 Parkdale assumed that there would be a similar highrise building next door at 111 (this was before Tega submitted their proposal, so it was shown as a "twin tower" for simplicity's sake).

The courtyard and repurposed school look nice, although if someone asked me what use should be made of an old school, with a gym, etc, in a core area of the city that's being planned to add tens of thousands of new residents over the decade, my answer would be "well, uhm, how about we use it as school?"

But I don't understand this tower at all. Why the square and the slab? why take up so much space? The shadows cast northward over Scott and the Transitway won't impact much of anyone, but the late afternoon and summer evening shadows which are cast to the southeast across Stirling, Pinhey, etc. will be much worse because of that L-shape (the orientation of the grid in this part of town is off nearly 45 degrees from the cardinal directions; so at the summer solstice, sunset is almost in the "north" on the street grid).

[S-Man]

Nice that the old school is being re-used (although overcrowding is starting to become a problem in H-burg) but the tower is too wide/tall for the houses south of it, and looks awkward being so close to Scott.

Massive density has already been approved for areas closer to Tunney's station than this (Parkdale), so the justification to go this much higher than then 9 already allowed seems questionable.

The Parkdale towers are also buffered by the fact they'll be bordered by blocky and butt-ugly mid-rises that have been there for decades, which isn't the case here.