Skyline Killers

[WhipperSnapper]

Originally Posted by Gresto

One simply cannot compare Toronto's poorest areas to the slums in U.S. cities. Places like Jane-Finch are poor, but there's no discernable decay or widescale abandonment. I do hate those commie blocks that were erected en masse across the city in the '60s. They are eyesores on the cityscape, and CaliNative is right that they needn't have been so cheaply and trashily designed. Toronto should have taken a lesson from a city like Barcelona, though the homogeneity is overwhelming.

There's not going to be widespread abandonment because there isn't overbuilding spurred by cutthroat competition in Canada or has there been a giant exodus southwards with Toronto being on the southern border. There is decay from decades of deferred maintenance and sorrow from gangs taking over these buildings in Toronto. This encompasses both suburban rental and condo towers from the late 1960s and early 1970s.

I wouldn't call the majority of slabs from the era cheaply and trashily designed. These buildings are solid; just old and mismanaged. Grid Condos has the cheapest cladding with a trashy imprinted pattern to look impressive to a less perceptive audience. I can't wait to see how it looks in 50 years with caulking on top of caulking holding it all together.

[WhipperSnapper]

Originally Posted by MonkeyRonin

Yeah, except what I posted was what Barcelona (and every other city) was actually building in the 60s and 70s.

I don't see why Toronto's post-war planners would have instead imitated a 19th century city plan - as nice as that would've been.

These suburban slabs in Toronto were built in farmers fields to keep costs down. Land was cheap unlike today. The days of a high rise with 1 to 3 times coverage over a single level parking garage covering two or more acres is over. (not including supplementary surface parking)

The downtown was slumy which encouraged the City of Toronto to get into the real estate assembling blocks, tearing them down, and selling them to developers creating sapce for giant slab and super blocks. The first was the City Park Co-operative although the developer purchased the block directly from the slumlord, Eaton's. One wonders if urban Toronto may have ended up more like Vancouver's west end if the City Park Co-operative took on the form of high rise blocks there.

[Rico Rommheim]

To corroborate Molson's candidacy of Montreal's Palais de Justice as an OG skyline killer, here it is:

Originally Posted by Martin Mtl

Photo: Andre Pinsonneault on Facebook

[CaliNative]

Originally Posted by MolsonExport

Marseille has some of the widest (longest?) buildings I have ever seen



wikipedia

L.A. could use 100 of these. Just not so cookie cutter massive and Orwellian. Good design can be done without breaking the bank. Anything is better than the horror of being homeless in L.A.

[CaliNative]

Delete

[CaliNative]

Originally Posted by muppet

It has its moments at street level and inside (sky garden), but London's death ray Walkie Talkie is a stunna






But seriously, talk about a blot on the landscape. Is there a city Vinoly hasn't wrecked?:






In its first summer it melted cars and set shops alight before they put sun blades over the windows





Plans are afoot to hide the damn thing:

An eyesore. Odd is not necessarily good. What company would be proud to have offices in a building that looks like it was designed by a drunk? In fact, the building itself looks drunk.

[Urbannizer]

I don’t find it an eyesore but it is quite bulbous. In a way I believe it’s fitting because the whole cluster is awkward, like a master plan of buildings with no cohesive design.

[muppet]

The original building was meant to be taller and sleeker, though still bulbous. This is where it got its nickname from.





However no one liked it, so they demanded a height reduction to make it less imposing. The opposite happened -the developer instead fitted the same amount of floorspace inside a shorter buildings, hatched up some dodgy renders to make it look less wide and sprinkled a public jungle at top. The authorities were of course swayed with the prospect of what could become a major attraction entirely free to enter:








The result was a building the city universally hated, that created death rays and wind tunnels, and set other buildings alight. Though tbf it looks good on approach.








Just not so much from anywhere else. I would personally change its nickname from the Walkie Talkie to the Sore Thumb

It spoils the grand design slowly coalescing, of stepped up building heights and offsets:








The Sky Garden also came under criticism because the renders of a jungle were misleading, with a fraction of the promised greenery. Still a great place to perch though -1.2 million visit each year:






The one good thing is that it's broken the moratorium on building more skyscrapers in the district, a slew have been commissioned that will start to hide the damn thing.

[bilbao58]

Originally Posted by muppet

The original building was meant to be taller and sleeker, though still bulbous. This is where it got its nickname from.

It looks like a happy cartoon building. I can picture it dancing in place.


Also reminds me of my “Crazy Happy San Antonio” image.


Crazy Happy San Antonio on Flickr

[hughfb3]

Detroit has one of the biggest skyline killers in my opinion. The pre 1970's skyline looks more gothic and somewhat futuristic. The Renaissance Center's scale completely throws the context of the rest of the skyline. If other building joined in on the scale, it could be okay, but those buildings have sat on their own for over 40 years and still nothing to bring it into a common context in the skyline

Pre RenCen


RenCen land cleared for construction


Completed RenCen

[CaliNative]

Originally Posted by hughfb3

Detroit has one of the biggest skyline killers in my opinion. The pre 1970's skyline looks more gothic and somewhat futuristic. The Renaissance Center's scale completely throws the context of the rest of the skyline. If other building joined in on the scale, it could be okay, but those buildings have sat on their own for over 40 years and still nothing to bring it into a common context in the skyline

Pre RenCen


RenCen land cleared for construction


Completed RenCen

RenCen has to be in contention for #1, or at least in the top 5 in the U.S. and perhaps worldwide. Throws the whole skyline off balance. The cluster of the central hotel and the 4 shorter towers linked to it are ugly. In Nashville, I don't like the tower with the two antennas that look like horns. In NYC, most of the super tall condo buildings look ugly, especially the light colored one that is just a big skinny box. Every floor looks the same. Not a big fan of most of Hudson Yards, although some like it. Philadelphia, don't care for the two Comcasts, especially the latest one with the big pole spire. I am grumpy today. Toronto: never cared for the Sky Tower, although it is quite the attraction I guess. Don't care for many of the Toronto condo towers, although there are some good and distinctive ones. Same with Vancouver and Miami. Like the shorter Space Needle better. Doesn't overwhelm the Seattle Skyline.

Love/Like in U.S.: Carew Tower, Terminal Tower, L.A. City Hall, Philadelphia City Hall, Buffalo City Hall, Empire State, Chrysler, Seagram, Lipstick Building, Salesforce, L.C. Smith Tower (Seattle), Tower Life (San Antonio), John Hancock (Chicago, not Boston), Foshay Tower, Penobscott and Guardian (Detroit), Louisiana State Capital, N.D. State Capital, Nebraska State Capital, Gateway Arch, Washington Monument, Central Square in Indianapolis with the monument and tall buildings around, Lincoln Leveque Tower (Columbus).

World Best: Eiffel Tower

[Gresto]

Originally Posted by WhipperSnapper

I wouldn't call the majority of slabs from the era cheaply and trashily designed. These buildings are solid; just old and mismanaged.

I agree that the buildings are solidly built, but architecturally they couldn't be less distinguished, and the hundreds of these 10-20-storey brick banalities constitute a blight on the Toronto cityscape. Renters deserve better, too.

[Steely Dan]

I'm probably biased by childhood nostalgia, but I've always loved the RenCen.

At the moment I first laid my 9 year old eyes on it back in the mid-80s on a family visit to Detroit, it looked like the physical embodiment of the "The Future" to me.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I've heard all of the criticisms of it, but I still can't help but think "but it's so damn cool!!!" whenever I see it.

[Mister F]

Originally Posted by CaliNative

RToronto: never cared for the Sky Tower, although it is quite the attraction I guess. Don't care for many of the Toronto condo towers, although there are some good and distinctive ones. Same with Vancouver and Miami. Like the shorter Space Needle better. Doesn't overwhelm the Seattle Skyline.

lol! Why do Americans have so much trouble with the name of the CN Tower? At least I think that's what you're referring to.

Toronto does have a Sky Tower, but it's barely begun construction.

[dc_denizen]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

I'm probably biased by childhood nostalgia, but I've always loved the RenCen.

At the moment I first laid my 9 year old eyes on it back in the mid-80s on a family visit to Detroit, it looked like the physical embodiment of the "The Future" to me.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I've heard all of the criticisms of it, but I still can't help but think "but it's so damn cool!!!" whenever I see it.

It’s too bad that postmodernism won out over Portman style futurism in the American skyline in the 1970s and 80s (outside of Atlanta )

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by hughfb3

Detroit has one of the biggest skyline killers in my opinion. The pre 1970's skyline looks more gothic and somewhat futuristic. The Renaissance Center's scale completely throws the context of the rest of the skyline. If other building joined in on the scale, it could be okay, but those buildings have sat on their own for over 40 years and still nothing to bring it into a common context in the skyline

Aesthetically, a major problem with the RenCen, IMO, is that there was never any tower infill built nearby to compliment it. There should be more towers built going east along the waterfront to balance it out. It would also help if more towers were built north of it, along Beaubien. Both of those areas still have tons of space to infill with towers, so it's not completely a lost cause.

[PhillyRising]

Originally Posted by PhilliesPhan

For Philadelphia, it's definitely 2400 Chestnut:



https://www.skyscrapercenter.com/bui...artments/12454

Luckily...it's not much of a focal point any more...you almost don't even notice it's there with so much more around it to look at and admire.

This is what gets built in a city not in a good place like Philadelphia was in the late 1970's...anything new then was welcomed no matter how dreadful it was...

[MolsonExport]

I agree with the RenCen. Besides being disconnected from the main skyline, and being completely wretched from a pedestrian perspective. it is too dominating, and as a dominating cluster, too banal. That center tower by itself, ensconced within the main Detroit skyline would have been a contributing rather than a detracting component. Towers in a park are bad enough in the suburbs.

[Wigs]

I like the cluster of RenCen despite its drawbacks, if purely for the RoboCop 80s vibes it gives

[Wigs]

muppet, I'd really like to visit the "stubbed toe" for those sky garden views!