NEVER JUDGE A TALL BUILDING BY ITS HEIGHT ALONE

"go for the cape, go for the cape"

Tall buildings are nothing more than an intense amount of building mass, which in contemporary urban conditions goes hand-in-hand with a minimal footprint of land.  Where before towers-in-the-park (toasters) might be built at three times density, today we're contending with the same magnitudes of building mass on smaller sites resulting in densities of ten times and more.

The standard challenge to a tall building is to declare: it's too tall – as if a shorter tall building represents a better solution.  As a consequence many a tall building has been squashed down, all the while maintaining the same intensity of bulk.  It's a mugs game.

It's better to appreciate tall buildings as being a particular subset, a typology, within the big building category, and then recognise the true issue is building bulk – its density.

IMO...the best solutions in any class of intensity have less density, and use height to relieve the at-grade conditions.

Toronto's tall building guidelines have gone through three iterations.  The initial series was new-city oriented, primarily based upon North York conditions.  Then the guidelines were adapted to old-city conditions as found in the downtown, and lastly, adjusted better suiting the mid-city conditions as found for instance at Yonge Eglinton.

The initial guidelines identified tall buildings as being comprised of three components: the base or podium, the tower shaft, and then twiddling with the ornamentation of the roof – the lid.  The real work came in the later production, appreciating the complexities of the base portion where buildings meet the ground, meshing with the surrounding urban condition.

Modeling the upper works of a tall building, the shaft and lid, is a relatively straight forward proposition and it contains that basic quandary about the 'the height, the height'.  So be it.  I'm confident that others can thrash out upper works considerations – although I'm sometimes surprised, disappointed.

principal levels

When I'm introduced to development propositions, I've taken to posing this question: What about the 'three children'? – namely: the ground level plan, the below-grade and above-grade levels.  These are the three principal levels.  Of note, the three children are a critical subset found within the podium portion of the guidelines' lexicon.  

The ground level is traditionally recognised as the urban floor plate incorporating the building, its site and the surrounding streetscape.  However, in intensification projects the ground level becomes burdened by the increased density aloft.  To preserve urban reciprocity requires creating a planning fiction – tripling the urban floor plate by consolidating the three principal levels.

There's nothing particularly new in this approach.  It's more about the degree of attention applied to this critical portion of a intensification proposition – the three principal levels. Whereas for instance towers-in-the-park often placed parking on grade, parking is relegated underground in intensifying buildings.  Meanwhile there's a tendency to trivialise requirements for short-stay parking for taxis, deliveries etc. that serve the residents aloft. This function instead tends to spill into the street, competing for space.  

Here's where simply hand wringing about 'the height, the height' can distract attention away from the intricate considerations of the three principal levels with its potential public realm benefits.  This situation is exacerbated when constructive dialogue breaks down – as for instance, when a project 'jumps the shark' and is redirected to the OMB. 

The best-result solution is a Made in Toronto Solution. Granted, this is only attainable if all parties approach the exercise sincerely and realistically, and take time to construct a comprehensive beneficial outcome – and yes, reasoning an appropriate height is an integral part of the whole.