the cult of the view

View

FALSE CREEK VIEW CONES

A Alder Terrace to Mount Seymour

B1 Charleson Seawall to the Lions

B2 Charleson Seawall to Crown/Grouse

C1 Laurel Landbridge to the Lions

C2 Laurel Landbridge to Crown/Grouse

D Heather Bay to the Lions

E1 Cambie Bridge to Crown/Grouse

E2 Cambie Bridge to Mount Seymour

G1 Olympic Village Shipyard Pier to North Shore Mountains

H1 Olympic Plaza View to North Shore Mountains

J1 Creekside Park to the Lions & North Shore Mountains

10 Granville Island to Hollyburn Mountain

12.1 Granville Bridge to Crown/Grouse

12.2 Granville Bridge to Mount Seymour This

February

Outlying Area View Cones

3.1 Queen Elizabeth Park to Downtown (Revised, Council report 1990 12 11)

3.2 Queen Elizabeth Park to the North Shore (this View is composed of four sub-sections) (Revised, Council report 1990 12 11)

9.1 Cambie St. at 10th/11th to the North Shore (Revised, Council report 1990 12 11)

9.2 Cambie St. at 10th/11th to the North Shore (Revised, Council report 1990 12 11)

20 Granville at Broadway to the Capilano Valley

21 Commercial Dr. at 15th to Crown/Grouse

22 Main St. at 6th to the North Shore

27 Trout lake to Crown/Grouse

F1

The stunning view is especially important in a city that, perhaps second to the panoramic backdrop of nature, is obsessed with its real estate market.1 This combination has led to the construction of residential towers that use the view as a crucial selling point. These towers now proliferate throughout much of the downtown. Like most towers across North America, these buildings generally opt for the same winning strategy: uniform floor plates stacked on top of each other with a retail podium at the bottom and condos or offices above.2

What is unique to Vancouver’s towers, however, is their slenderness. Small lots combined with City Council’s push for higher densities have resulted in narrow towers with constrained floor plates.3 These proportions don’t make much sense from a financial standpoint, as Berelowitz notes, “These slim new highrise towers are not cost-efficient, however, so why do they continue to be built?...He or she does it for the view. The willingness to pay for spectacular views over the heads of the rest of the city to the sea and mountains beyond is what offsets the construction cost inefficiencies.”4

The rise of the mixed use tower also brought with it the growing disappearance of not only open-air public space, but indoor public space as well. Iñaki Abalos comments on this urban transformation, “Interior public space has...lost its essential qualities as it is no longer hospitable to the casual passerby. Subjected to commercial interests, interior space has become selective and guarded, secure - a ‘simulacrum’ of public space, to use Jean Baudrillard’s term - intended to create the spectacle of an egalitarian society made cohesive by consumption.”5

This statement, though dramatic, is not without truth. As seen in Vancouver, towers seem to offer a vibrant public life through the abundant supply of shops, cafes, and restaurants in their podiums, but this kind of public life is only really accessible to those who are willing to pay for it.

2

3

4 Ibid.

5 Abalos, Tower and Office. 244 site

The site is in the downtown West End neighborhood of Vancouver. The West End is primarily composed of low-rise buildings, framed by a wall of towers on its East and South sides.

There is a particular section of the tower corridor where a cluster of new high rises are slated for development. All of which will be luxury condos that help to fund the maintenance of a variety of amenities and arts programs in the low rise area via Community Amenity Contributions, or CACs1. It is a way these controversial towers somehow give back to the community, even though it is difficult to see the connection when the money is so dispersed.2 a tower for pleasure

What if one of these towers didn’t become a condo, and instead, the CAC’s were channeled into a single neighboring site?

What opportunities arise if all of this vertical space was for public use rather than for private developers and ownership? What is an architecture that not only shelters from rain, but is enhanced by rain? What is a tower that enjoys the penthouse view in the distance, but is equally intrigued looking inward to itself?