Brandon DonnellyCanada must become a global superpower
The silver lining to the US starting a trade war with Canada and regularly threatening annexation is that it has forced this country out of complacency. Indeed, I'm hard pressed to remember a time, at least in my lifetime, when patriotism and nationalism has united so much of Canada. According to a recent survey by Angus Reid, the percentage of Canadians expressing a "deep emotional attachment" to the country jumped from 49% in December 2024 to 59% in February 2025. And as further evidence of...
Brandon DonnellyThe bank robbery capital of the world
Between 1985 and 1995, Los Angeles' retail bank branches were robbed some 17,106 times. In 1992, which was the the city's worst year for robberies, the number was 2,641. This roughly translated into about one bank robbery every 45 minutes of each banking day. All of this, according to this CrimeReads piece by Peter Houlahan, gave Los Angeles the dubious title of "The Bank Robbery Capital of the World" during this time period. So what caused this? Well according to Peter it was facil...
Brandon DonnellyThe story behind those pixelated video game mosaics in Paris
If you've ever been to Paris, you've probably noticed the small pixelated art pieces that are scattered all around the city on buildings and various other hard surfaces. Or maybe you haven't seen or noticed them in Paris, but you've seen similarly pixelated mosaics in one of the other 79 cities around the world where they can be found. Or maybe you have no idea what I'm talking about right now. Huh? Here's an example from Bolivia (click here if you can't see...
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Brandon DonnellyBuild whatever you want
As a gross generalization, there are probably two ways in which one can approach the building of a new building. The first is based on demand. You believe that there is demand for new housing or new office space or some other use, and so you decide to build new space in order to satisfy that exact demand.
Sometimes developers get it wrong and build too much space or the wrong kind of space, but the reason for building remains the same: you believe that there is a market waiting for you.
The second way to build is to completely disregard the market and just build whatever you feel like building because it is going to serve some other alleged purpose. And that is arguably what is happening in Saudi Arabia with The Line and what happened in places like North Korea with its "Hotel of Doom."
I suppose that there is a chance that somebody in North Korea believed (or pretended to believe) that there was demand for a skyscraper that was 1,000 feet tall and housed 3,000 hotel rooms, but in reality, the real reason was that leadership thought it looked cool and that it would make for good propaganda.
To be fair, there was probably also some hope that it would spur demand and attract foreign investment. But it's still a case of just building whatever you want.
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Daily insights for city builders. Published since 2013 by Toronto-based real estate developer Brandon Donnelly.
As a gross generalization, there are probably two ways in which one can approach the building of a new building. The first is based on demand. You believe that there is demand for new housing or new office space or some other use, and so you decide to build new space in order to satisfy that exact demand.
Sometimes developers get it wrong and build too much space or the wrong kind of space, but the reason for building remains the same: you believe that there is a market waiting for you.
The second way to build is to completely disregard the market and just build whatever you feel like building because it is going to serve some other alleged purpose. And that is arguably what is happening in Saudi Arabia with The Line and what happened in places like North Korea with its "Hotel of Doom."
I suppose that there is a chance that somebody in North Korea believed (or pretended to believe) that there was demand for a skyscraper that was 1,000 feet tall and housed 3,000 hotel rooms, but in reality, the real reason was that leadership thought it looked cool and that it would make for good propaganda.
To be fair, there was probably also some hope that it would spur demand and attract foreign investment. But it's still a case of just building whatever you want.
Support Brandon Donnelly
Brandon DonnellyBuild whatever you want
Subscribe to Brandon Donnelly
Daily insights for city builders. Published since 2013 by Toronto-based real estate developer Brandon Donnelly.
Brandon DonnellyCanada must become a global superpower
The silver lining to the US starting a trade war with Canada and regularly threatening annexation is that it has forced this country out of complacency. Indeed, I'm hard pressed to remember a time, at least in my lifetime, when patriotism and nationalism has united so much of Canada. According to a recent survey by Angus Reid, the percentage of Canadians expressing a "deep emotional attachment" to the country jumped from 49% in December 2024 to 59% in February 2025. And as further evidence of...
Brandon DonnellyThe bank robbery capital of the world
Between 1985 and 1995, Los Angeles' retail bank branches were robbed some 17,106 times. In 1992, which was the the city's worst year for robberies, the number was 2,641. This roughly translated into about one bank robbery every 45 minutes of each banking day. All of this, according to this CrimeReads piece by Peter Houlahan, gave Los Angeles the dubious title of "The Bank Robbery Capital of the World" during this time period. So what caused this? Well according to Peter it was facil...
Brandon DonnellyThe story behind those pixelated video game mosaics in Paris
If you've ever been to Paris, you've probably noticed the small pixelated art pieces that are scattered all around the city on buildings and various other hard surfaces. Or maybe you haven't seen or noticed them in Paris, but you've seen similarly pixelated mosaics in one of the other 79 cities around the world where they can be found. Or maybe you have no idea what I'm talking about right now. Huh? Here's an example from Bolivia (click here if you can't see...
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