April 14, 2015

Ray Spaxman: How high could we go?

Ray Spaxman:
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Last week, when I was travelling back from a meeting at UBC, I drove back along Spanish Banks and it was such a gorgeous day I had to stop and sit for a time and rejoice again at our beautiful city.
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I sat there and wondered how it might change in the future. I imagined how the the higher buildings that are appearing around the world might look in our downtown.
I took a few iPhotos of my favourite scene and came home.
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Then I played with my PowerPoint and thought you might be interested in the result.  I have drawn simple rectangles to show a few other cities highest building. They do not do justice to architectural shaping but show their comparative  heights.
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 Spax
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It makes you think doesn’t it?

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Leave a Reply to AntjeCancel Reply

  1. Interesting comparison. Despite what we like to think, Vancouver is not a Big City. It’s a medium sized city with large ambitions.

  2. Potential earth quakes may also put a cap on heights.

    Downtown, especially the west end has a lot of room for far more high rises, as does Broadway corridor all teh way to UBC. West-End is fairly low density for its small size and distance to beaches and downtown, and there are almost no highrises along 4th or Broadway despite highrises with 20 stories now at UBC. Where is the subway in UBC’s plan ?

    Subway along Cambie is also very low density along many stops.

    Unclear why there is no subway in the 2040 Metrovan plan along Marine Drive in N/W-Van with access to downtown from there via both bridges.

    A 2040 models of Vancouver with 4M people would be useful.

    The myopic planning in Metrovan without any thought for RAPID transit is mind boggling. Smalltownish indeed !

    1. I am fairly sure that the North Shore doesn’t want to have a population by 2040 that would justify the need and investment into a subway.

  3. So man has created artificial “mountains” where nature failed to provide any. Big deal. We don’t have that problem here. I think putting a wall of towers between people and real mountains is a crime.

    Vancouver really is a small city with mostly small ambitions. A select few among us have big ambitions and to be frank we’d be better off without any of them.

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