265 replies to this topic

[aastra]

So what's the verdict looking back? Did Aria inflict some major damage on Victoria's unique atmosphere? Have we been strangling what makes Victoria unique? Or emphasizing it? Or going in a new direction?

 

 

Towers project to be revised after facing slew of criticism
Times-Colonist
December 10, 2004

Alpha Project Developments, headed by developer Bijan Neyestani, has agreed to revise the $50-million plan for a 197-unit condo building at 737 Humboldt St. after council raised concerns about density. The company previously scaled back plans for a 19-storey tower on the site.

The towers' proposed 43-metre height meets zoning regulations for the vacant property next to the 130-year-old Church of Our Lord...

Municipal planning staff had recommended sending the project to a public hearing. A report said the proposal met city goals for more housing downtown and included public art and streetscape improvements.

But Coun. Pamela Madoff said the scale of the towers was out of keeping with nearby heritage buildings, including the Crystal Garden, Church of Our Lord and The Empress hotel.

"We're absolutely strangling what makes Victoria unique," Madoff said.

 

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London (Ontario) Free Press
April 30, 2019

Build 'em beautiful

Regarding the article Core park height fight to worsen: councillor (April 30) I suggest city officials look at what has been done elsewhere.

In Victoria, B.C., for example, during the past 20 years, there has been an incredible number of highrises built, but the city has an open, airy feel. The architecture of Victoria highrises is such that none look like a solid block of concrete, which is how the majority of highrises approved in London look.

Victoria’s buildings have large balconies, are stepped in various ways, with urban gardens at different levels, so the landscape flows. Most also have street-level businesses. And they allow the sun to reach street level almost everywhere.

 

pic from https://duttons.com/rentals/listings/

 

Edited by aastra, 31 October 2019 - 07:25 PM.

[AllseeingEye]

The comment by Madoff - as usual - annoys the hell out of me: at what point in history was it decided, and by whom, that Victoria's "heritage" structures were apparently those exclusively created by white folks of largely British stock, who showed up on this island, uninvited as usual?

 

I've often wondered as the Empress Hotel was being constructed - it was after all the Empire State building of the age in these parts - if some FN elder wasn't quietly watching the proceedings, jaw agape as he watched the monstrous new addition reaching further into the sky - and certainly far higher than anything his people could construct - and thinking to himself:

 

".......WTF is this?!? It's wildly out of scale and utterly out of character with our existing sacred village structures and architecture; moreover it overwhelms the spirit of our home and does not complement in any fashion any of our heritage sweat lodges.....!"

 

At what point did the self-appointed (white) guardians of Victoria's *real* heritage - which as we all know was stolen from underneath the original and first inhabitants of this area - determine that an old hotel, not especially large nor luxurious by global standards, would nonetheless set the standard by which all other downtown buildings to follow would and must be measured, apparently in perpetuity? 

[newbie_01]

I'll give you a hint: it was Masons who founded Victoria, even a Mason who designed the Empress hotel, don't 'cha know?

[AllseeingEye]

/\ ......Highly unlikely, for a number of reasons not least of which Victoria was building tall buildings in the 1920's with another trend towards taller in the 1960's; it was only after that point that "NIMBY" really started entering local lexicon describing that vocal element which was seemingly determined to turn the city into a mausoleum, little more than a monument to the past.

 

Rattenbury, for the record, was never passed or raised after his initiation into masonry, suffice it to say therefore that FM had little impact on him personally or whatever his beliefs regarding architecture or anything else.....

Edited by AllseeingEye, 01 November 2019 - 09:49 PM.

[Mike K.]

There is quite a lot of of Masonic symbolism in Rattenbury’s designs.

[ovovov]

#3xx-751 Fairfield Rd   Vi Downtown $455,000

 

80 1 1 2006 625 0 625 0.01 $262

 

 

 

 

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