Building Boom Set to Vault Toronto Past Chicago in Skyscraper Rankings

[isaidso]

Originally Posted by Gresto

Yeah, no question, unless there's a sudden boom in Chicago. Someone correct me if I'm writing out of my ass, but it's my impression that Toronto already has substantially more "highrises" (namely, buildings of 12+ stories) than Chicago. I thought that was a fact.
On the other hand, Chicago has nicer skyscraper architecture, as mentioned, including some art deco gems (though no comparison to Manhattan's stock), and has, on the whole, taller tall buildings than TO. Because of economics, I guess, few developers here are willing to build much higher than 300m (1000 ft). Toronto's skyscraper architecture is not bad. We have a number of very nice examples of the International style in the financial core. The problem is the sea of homogeneous glass condos that have risen since the turn of the century. Even some of those are attractive in their own right (e.g. ICE Towers), but one looks at something like the ShittyPlace complex and shakes one's head at how dismal and bereft of creativity it is.

We take a degree of comfort in order and things being in their place. When something comes along to disturb that people react in a multitude of ways. Toronto's rapid ascension is no different. It will change the pecking order but this sort of thing has been going on for centuries all over the world. Cities rise, cities fall, etc. What's different here is that it's the first Canadian city to undergo such a huge transformation. It took 200 years to materialize. Americans didn't have to wait nearly that long (New York, Los Angeles). That's really what we're building after all: Canada's first true metropolis.

You're correct that Toronto is already ahead of Chicago by high-rises (12+ floors) and has been for a long time. It's just one of many metrics where Toronto has zoomed ahead. By 100m+ buildings Toronto will move ahead this year or next. Population, metropolitan 'GDP', and skyline are some of the few (albeit notable) metrics where Toronto still trails.

In the past Toronto has been rightly criticized for the quality of its buildings, shoddiness of its public realm, and lack of focus on architecture. What gets lost in the conversation are the gems (which you alluded to) that do exist and how the city has drastically upped its game.... and continues to do so. The latest crop of buildings under construction/proposals are proof of that. Huge swaths of Toronto need a re-do but we're witnessing a re-build on a monumental scale, block by block. That's not going to happen over night or even in 30 years. It will take longer.

Toronto will remain a work in progress for many decades still but it's already quite an impressive place imo. Btw, I hate City Place as well. It's just not good enough.

[dleung]

Originally Posted by hipster duck

Source? You attribute 20,000 extra units in Toronto a year to offshore investors?

And the US is immune from this? You think that Brickell Avenue is middle class Miamians looking for an urban lifestyle and the ability to walk to Miami’s exploding number of downtown jobs?

Chicago will continue to have greater height and quality within any of our lifetimes, but it's impossible to be in denial about facts like:

Toronto has the 2nd highest number of units after NYC (both starts or completions) in a typical year
Toronto has more highrises than Chicago
Toronto has equal # of u/c and built skycrapers (100m+) as Chicago
Toronto is on track to have more u/c and built towers >150m than Chicago at some point in the future (not just "closing the gap", which implies an arbitrary asymptote where Toronto's relative progress can't cross Chicago's on a graph lol)
The typical new highrise in Toronto is more urban than that of any US city besides Manhattan

[craigs]

Originally Posted by dleung

7it's impossible to be in denial about facts like:
The typical new highrise in Toronto is more urban than that of any US city besides Manhattan

How are you defining "typical new highrise" and "urban?"

[kool maudit]

They are similar in some senses but not in others.

What's really on the radar for Toronto is a buildout of the area between Queen, Front, Spadina and York. This will bring Toronto's hyper-dense "core of the core" to a Loop-tier scale and expanse, albeit with a different feel. The successful materialization of long-shot proposals like Mirvish Gehry are needed for this to pan out 100%.

The new towers in Yorkville and south down Yonge to Dundas are analogous to the Streeterville-Oak Street Beach cluster topped by the Hancock tower. Again, if everything gets built, Toronto will have essentially closed the scale gap from a "cluster of towers" perspective.

THE THING IS...

Chicago still has a major mass premium. It is comfortable building enormous, large-floorplate towers at stratospheric heights. Toronto isn't quite there yet, and what happened to the initial, 330 metre YSL proposal is an ever-present risk.

I wouldn't actually mind seeing Toronto build out at a "forest of slim towers" kind of scale. It suits the city, which doesn't have that Midwestern gigantism like Chicago. Toronto is an intimate, narrow Commonwealth city as much as it is a second-wave Great Lakes one. The border mattered in terms of how these places went up. But the height... Toronto seems to get cold feet at 300 metres, and Chicago just doesn't.

Nothing on the table right now can get TO over that Sears/Hancock/Aon/Trump/Vista gap. And Tribune is coming.

[Centropolis]

not surprising watching commonwealth metropoleis eat our lunch. not every commonwealth city is doing everything perfect (see vancouver vs auckland imo) but by and large they are generally doing things much better than most american cities, which are absolutely squandering their oftentimes greater economic horsepower...often simply because they cannot get it together on a regional level.

[kool maudit]

Maybe Toronto should build a second observation tower in Yorkville. Seven hundred metres or so with wild lighting. And like a Tokyo Tower out by Regent Park/the Don Valley.

All those slim tall condos and then these sort of media minarets towering over it all.

That would be a weird new kind of skyline.

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by Gresto

Yeah, no question, unless there's a sudden boom in Chicago. Someone correct me if I'm writing out of my ass, but it's my impression that Toronto already has substantially more "highrises" (namely, buildings of 12+ stories) than Chicago. I thought that was a fact.

Toronto has far more 12+ floor buildings than Chicago. But this isn't really a "skyline" issue, it's that the entire GTA has tons of midrise multifamily, while this is very rare in Chicagoland outside the core. I don't think anyone would dispute that the GTA is much more apartment-oriented than Chicagoland.

Originally Posted by Gresto

The problem is the sea of homogeneous glass condos that have risen since the turn of the century. Even some of those are attractive in their own right (e.g. ICE Towers), but one looks at something like the ShittyPlace complex and shakes one's head at how dismal and bereft of creativity it is.

Architectually, yeah, there's a huge legacy gap, but I don't think the current stuff in Toronto is worse than in Chicago. Both cities mostly build anonymous blue-green glass residentials. Toronto's new construction may even be a bit better at street level, because the garage podiums aren't as ubiquitous.

Chicago's formative boom decade was the 1920's and Toronto's formative boom decade was the 1970's. So huge difference in legacy architecture.

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by dleung

The typical new highrise in Toronto is more urban than that of any US city besides Manhattan

Putting NYC aside, which rarely allows parking, DC, Boston, SF and Seattle don't build parking podiums, and tend to have restricted parking allowances. So I don't think it can be argued that Toronto's recent urban form is more urban than those cities.

Philly, surprisingly, has lots of parking podiums. Really looks bad considering the overall quality of the core.

Toronto has silly cheap parking. I'm not why that is, but I always notice it has really affordable core parking. There aren't giant garages everywhere, which makes it surprising.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by Centropolis

not surprising watching commonwealth metropoleis eat our lunch.

with regards to the two skylines being compared in this thread, "eating our lunch" might be a bit strong.

yes, toronto is currently going through an absolutely tremendous skyscraper building boom.

yes, toronto will certainly soon surpass chicago in the number of >150m towers. it's currently 99 in toronto vs. 133 in chicago according to CTBUH stats, of which 32 are U/C in toronto, and 8 are U/C in chicago.

that said, chicago is hardly resting on its laurels in the skyline building department. the city is currently going through one of its most significant skyscraper building booms ever! the total number of >150m towers that are U/C in chicago pales in comparison to toronto, but of the >150m towers chicago does build, they tend to be pretty damn tall. once salesforce tower kicks off in the next month or two, this current building boom in chicago will have produced 7 new towers over 800'! that's never happened before in the entire history of chicago. chicago will soon have a total of 20 towers over 800' tall.

to put that number into perspective, here are the total number of towers over 800' that currently exist in north america's cities (including U/C):

new york - 43
chicago - 20
toronto - 8
philadelphia - 4
san francisco - 4
atlanta - 3
los angeles - 3
houston - 3
seattle - 2
dallas - 2
miami - 2
cleveland - 1
jersey city - 1
charlotte - 1
oklahoma city -1
pittsburgh - 1
edmonton -1
calgary - 1

source: CTBUH


so yes, toronto's skyscraper building boom has been, and continues to be, truly epic, AND it's also been an extremely fun time to be a skyscraper construction fan in chicago as well.

these two cities know how to build 'em tall.

it's gotta be the water.

[Centropolis]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

with regards to the two skylines being compared in this thread, "eating our lunch" might be a bit strong.

i'm not speaking just about large skyscrapers, but about urban development patterns in general.

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by Centropolis

i'm not speaking just about large skyscrapers, but about urban development patterns in general.

Toronto is growing like Dallas, Chicago's population is flat. So it makes sense that Toronto has more robust overall metropolitan growth. But Chicago's core is probably changing more than all but a handful of North American cores.

And the building typologies seem pretty similar, overall. To me, this cluster of new construction Chicago highrises looks the same as the newer stuff in Toronto:

https://www.google.com/maps/@41.8676...7i16384!8i8192

[C.]

Originally Posted by Crawford

In NYC, there is no such thing as a "planning application." A building is as-of-right, or it isn't. There is nothing that needs to be submitted prior to construction unless you're applying for a variance (which is rare, and rarely granted). So hypothetically any underbuilt lot outside a landmarked/special district is a potential site. But there's nothing in the regulatory process that documents proposed structures. The first required public notice is a New Building permit, but that's once construction starts.

An interesting thing about Toronto is that they seem to engage in widespread "spot zoning" which allows development that is inconsistent with the comprehensive plan or zoning code and benefiting a single land owner. It's illegal in a number of states, but seems to be the par for the course in Toronto.

We're not talking variances, which are usually minor. This is a non-stop constant stream of amendments to the plan to allow for a specific development.

Anyone know why this is the case?

There is something seriously wrong with a master plan when it constantly must be amended or have exceptions in order for the city to develop. In other words, most development in the city should be allowed as-of-right if the city is being developed according to the adopted plan.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by Crawford

Chicago has essentially no towers of 150m+ outside its core (maybe there's one or two, but basically none).

yes, there are only two towers over 150m in chicago located outside of the greater downtown core.

in fact, these are the only two towers over 150m in the entire midwest that are located outside of a downtown core.

all of the other 131 towers in chicago that stand over 150m are bounded by north/ashland/cermak.



Park Place Tower - 161.9m/531 ft. - 1971:
~5 miles north of the loop


source: https://www.skyscrapercenter.com/bui...ace-tower/3213



Park Tower Condos - 156.3m/513 ft. - 1973:
~7 miles north of the loop


source: https://www.skyscrapercenter.com/bui...dominiums/3569



off-topic aside: my parents live in the 2nd one.

[ATXboom]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

to put that number into perspective, here are the total number of towers over 800' that currently exist in north america's cities (including U/C):

new york - 43
toronto - 8
philadelphia - 4
san francisco - 4
atlanta - 3
los angeles - 3
houston - 3
seattle - 2
dallas - 2
miami - 2
cleveland - 1
jersey city - 1
charlotte - 1
oklahoma city -1
pittsburgh - 1
edmonton -1
calgary - 1

Missing Austin - 1 (6X under construction - 848')

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by ATXboom

Missing Austin - 1 (6X under construction - 848')

i pulled all the data from the CTBUH.

they don't have that one listed as U/C yet.

but it's cool that Austin will soon be joining the 800' club.

Detroit might soon be joining too, if the details of Hudson Tower are ever sorted out.

[Centropolis]

Originally Posted by Crawford

Toronto is growing like Dallas, Chicago's population is flat. So it makes sense that Toronto has more robust overall metropolitan growth. But Chicago's core is probably changing more than all but a handful of North American cores.

And the building typologies seem pretty similar, overall. To me, this cluster of new construction Chicago highrises looks the same as the newer stuff in Toronto:

https://www.google.com/maps/@41.8676...7i16384!8i8192

i 100% don't recognize the south loop anymore. i think theres a like circa 2005 south loop version that just wont update in my brain.

imagine what chicago would be doing with dallas...or toronto population growth.

[dc_denizen]

We still don’t have any data on greater Toronto residential completions.

Does this show Ontario residential completions, clocking in at around 24000 per year?

https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1...ers%5B1%5D=4.1

[plutonicpanda]

I wasn't aware Houston had more skyscrapers than Los Angeles. That is interesting.

[dc_denizen]

Miami likely has more than both

[JAYNYC]

Originally Posted by plutonicpanda

I wasn't aware Houston had more skyscrapers than Los Angeles. That is interesting.

It's been that way for many years. Only recently has L.A. begun to bridge the gap.