Brandon Donnelly
Daily insights for city builders. Published since 2013 by Toronto-based real estate developer Brandon Donnelly.
Brandon Donnelly
Daily insights for city builders. Published since 2013 by Toronto-based real estate developer Brandon Donnelly.
I’m in Provincetown, Cape Cod right now. One of the things that is great about this town is the scale of it. It’s compact and many of the streets feel like laneways or alleys (I’m obsessed, I know). It’s all about pedestrians here. Even the main drag, Commercial Street, is effectively a pedestrian street – though it’s not technically closed to cars most of the time.
There’s something liberating about being able to get where you need to go by walking or biking or skateboarding. And all of those things are done here. I enjoy the inherent efficiency that compactness brings. That’s why I was excited to learn this morning about the following proposal at 24 Mercer Street in Toronto (via Urban Toronto):
It’s a 12 unit, 17 storey building on a 195 square metre lot. The proposed FSI is 16.8. And it will have zero parking. I would be incredibly curious to know what the construction costs will be and how the overall project pencils out. But regardless, it’s exciting to see someone trying to make use of such a tight site. I would love to see more of this in Toronto and I am certain we will.
What do you think about projects like this? Some of you may call this “poor planning,” but I see the efficient use of resources.
I arrived in Boston early this morning. It has been about a decade since I was last here.
I took the subway in from the airport, which is typically what I like to do when I visit a city. It’s such a great way to get a feel for a place. And in the case of Boston, Logan Airport is only a few stops away from downtown.
I’m in Provincetown, Cape Cod right now. One of the things that is great about this town is the scale of it. It’s compact and many of the streets feel like laneways or alleys (I’m obsessed, I know). It’s all about pedestrians here. Even the main drag, Commercial Street, is effectively a pedestrian street – though it’s not technically closed to cars most of the time.
There’s something liberating about being able to get where you need to go by walking or biking or skateboarding. And all of those things are done here. I enjoy the inherent efficiency that compactness brings. That’s why I was excited to learn this morning about the following proposal at 24 Mercer Street in Toronto (via Urban Toronto):
It’s a 12 unit, 17 storey building on a 195 square metre lot. The proposed FSI is 16.8. And it will have zero parking. I would be incredibly curious to know what the construction costs will be and how the overall project pencils out. But regardless, it’s exciting to see someone trying to make use of such a tight site. I would love to see more of this in Toronto and I am certain we will.
What do you think about projects like this? Some of you may call this “poor planning,” but I see the efficient use of resources.
I arrived in Boston early this morning. It has been about a decade since I was last here.
I took the subway in from the airport, which is typically what I like to do when I visit a city. It’s such a great way to get a feel for a place. And in the case of Boston, Logan Airport is only a few stops away from downtown.
As soon as I got in, I walked over to see the Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy Greenway (above image). It’s a linear park that was made possible by burying the city’s elevated waterfront expressway – the infamous “Big Dig.”
I recognize that it was a lavishly expense infrastructure project that went many times over budget, but walking across the greenway to get to the water was rather pleasant. Will Toronto’s The Bentway achieve a similar result at a fraction of the cost?
With that out of the way, I went for a lobster roll. It had to happen. I then walked around Faneuil Hall and Quincy Market (above image). It felt a bit touristy, but what a remarkable pedestrian-only area.
And now I’m on a boat heading over to Provincetown (Cape Cod) for a wedding. I’m writing this blog post over a spotty wifi connection, so out of fear that I may spontaneously lose it, I am going to end here. See you all tomorrow.
A couple of years ago, an architect friend of mine from Chicago (who was in town for work) told me that when it comes to units of measurement the building industry in Toronto is schizophrenic. She basically said, sometimes you use the international system (metres) and sometimes you use customary units (feet).
And this is absolutely the truth. We are constantly switching back and forth between the two. The drawings that go into the city are in metres and millimetres, but the drawings that get shown to prospective renters and buyers are in feet and inches. We’ll say that the Tall Building Design Guidelines stipulate that towers should be 25 metres apart, but then in the next sentence say that we’re going to need a 24 inch transfer slab.
This kind of measurement bilingualism is so common that I bet some of you have cheat sheets with common conversion factors posted up at your desk. It probably includes things like: 1 square metre = 10.76 square feet.
Over the years though, I have found myself naturally drifting more and more towards metres and millimetres. So much so that when people throw out inches in a meeting, I’ll now sometimes ask them what it is in millimetres: “Wait, how thick does the slab need to be?” A lot of this has to do with the fact that all city planning documents are in metres. So it’s simply more efficient to stick with one system of measurement and avoid constantly converting back and forth.
That said, there are still lots of people who prefer feet and inches (particularly in my industry) and many instances where I default to thinking in customary units. I’m 6 foot 3, not 1905 mm. But, I am ready to go all in with the international system. I think it would make life simpler and more efficient. After all, it is called the international system.
What system of measurement do you think in?
As soon as I got in, I walked over to see the Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy Greenway (above image). It’s a linear park that was made possible by burying the city’s elevated waterfront expressway – the infamous “Big Dig.”
I recognize that it was a lavishly expense infrastructure project that went many times over budget, but walking across the greenway to get to the water was rather pleasant. Will Toronto’s The Bentway achieve a similar result at a fraction of the cost?
With that out of the way, I went for a lobster roll. It had to happen. I then walked around Faneuil Hall and Quincy Market (above image). It felt a bit touristy, but what a remarkable pedestrian-only area.
And now I’m on a boat heading over to Provincetown (Cape Cod) for a wedding. I’m writing this blog post over a spotty wifi connection, so out of fear that I may spontaneously lose it, I am going to end here. See you all tomorrow.
A couple of years ago, an architect friend of mine from Chicago (who was in town for work) told me that when it comes to units of measurement the building industry in Toronto is schizophrenic. She basically said, sometimes you use the international system (metres) and sometimes you use customary units (feet).
And this is absolutely the truth. We are constantly switching back and forth between the two. The drawings that go into the city are in metres and millimetres, but the drawings that get shown to prospective renters and buyers are in feet and inches. We’ll say that the Tall Building Design Guidelines stipulate that towers should be 25 metres apart, but then in the next sentence say that we’re going to need a 24 inch transfer slab.
This kind of measurement bilingualism is so common that I bet some of you have cheat sheets with common conversion factors posted up at your desk. It probably includes things like: 1 square metre = 10.76 square feet.
Over the years though, I have found myself naturally drifting more and more towards metres and millimetres. So much so that when people throw out inches in a meeting, I’ll now sometimes ask them what it is in millimetres: “Wait, how thick does the slab need to be?” A lot of this has to do with the fact that all city planning documents are in metres. So it’s simply more efficient to stick with one system of measurement and avoid constantly converting back and forth.
That said, there are still lots of people who prefer feet and inches (particularly in my industry) and many instances where I default to thinking in customary units. I’m 6 foot 3, not 1905 mm. But, I am ready to go all in with the international system. I think it would make life simpler and more efficient. After all, it is called the international system.
What system of measurement do you think in?
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