By Pepper Parr
March 7th, 2018
BURLINGTON, ON
A number of citizens who delegated on the draft Official Plan wanted to know what their city was going to look like if the Plan was approved.
They asked if the city could prepare a digital three dimensional rendering of the city showing each development.
Great idea – but that isn’t something the city can do.
The city has a digital representation of the city – the problem is that it is far from complete.
They bought what they have a couple of years ago. In order to create a digital image you have to have data – some of that data does not belong to the city.
The rights to the data of a piece of property belong to the person who owns the property.
When the property owner approaches the city with a development application they have to include a digital profile.
The city can then plug that digital profile into what the city already has.
City manager James Ridge is quite right – he doesn’t have what the public wants. We are told by people that use this kind of software that there are work arounds that can be put in place but Ridge does not want to do that – he doesn’t have the budget and his staff is stretched to the limit.
He did say at committee that he would try and do something but nothing was going to happen in 2018 and if it was in 2019 it would be late in the year.
But there are plucky citizens in this city. Watch how some of them make the point that there is a way to give people an idea of what their city might look like in five, ten or fifteen years into the future.
Citizens can get a sense of what we have now; click on the double headed arrow on the lower right and get a 360 degree view of city hall and the buildings across the street from city hall.
Now imagine what that same space will look like when you add what has been approved and what is in the mind of a planner and you can come up with a bit of an idea as to what lower Brant Street will look like.
Now add in what is planned for the south side of James Street. 
And then add in the rendering of what is being thought about for the bottom of Brant Street. 
Despite the fact it is another concrete monstrosity, the architects rendering or staff mock up with sunlight, trees and patio may look OK but across the road we have an identical building that between them will block out light and create a wind tunnel. I agree with Stephen… boring, banal and bland.
The marriage of post-Soviet style utilitarianism with modern-day totalitarian North Korean minimalism will create a unique downtown architectural design that embodies the three B’s: boring, banal and bland. Moreover, the preponderance of washed out grey concrete will add to the sense of uniformity one typically finds in renowned world-class centres of excellence….like Pyongyang.
Instead of stringing lights on the pier maybe the developers could string them around the buildings. Either that or give each new prisoner …. sorry, tenant…a can of paint so they can decorate the outside of their unit like they do in Havana. Just about anything at this stage would help!
Josef Stalin, Jim Jong-un and Fidel Castro would be proud!
The bottom of Brant St is permitted at 17 stories in the proposed OP.This was revised from 22.
I have never heard of this proposal that is rendered here. This looks like at least 22 stories.
Can the Gazette please indicate where this suggestion came from?
Editors note:
The site was marked for 22 storeys – then Councillor Taylor got it moved down to 17 – MMW tried to get it to 15 but she lost that attempt.
As for the rendering – the developer said he knows nothing about it.
There will be a benefit for the developer if the structure on the corner of LAkeshore and John is kept and somehow worked into the finished development.
This comes from the staff “mock up” of what the down town could look like from the 1 hour preamble before the down town precinct plan. It’s an “example” building the staff came up with as far as I know.
If you want a head bender – it’s not recessed 45 from the center line of Brant street as was recommended in an other slide.
very modern looking what would be projected time line for each of these to be complete or shovel in ground?