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I lived in that exact building for a couple years. The major downside of it and similar developments is that it's extraordinarily noisy from all the street tra

by poutine 18y ago

I lived in that exact building for a couple years. The major downside of it and similar developments is that it's extraordinarily noisy from all the street traffic. Made me hate buses with a severe passion. This is the major downside to mixing a lot of cars with apartment buildings. Many cities do this way better than Vancouver which is terribly overrated as a city to live in. For instance in Beijing the city blocks are very large with residential (schools, etc) on the inside and the major streets on the outside with little through traffic. As a result it's quiet at your apartment through the day in a city of 15M.

pkaler 18y ago
There are a few ways to manage this. The first way is to have larger sidewalks. This puts traffic further away from the buildings and there is less echo reverberating up sides of buildings. The sidewalks are larger in Gastown and deeper in Yaletown. Granville Street is being repaved to have larger sidewalks, too. The second way to do this is to make the first floor retail. Then make floors 2 through 10 be commercial office space. People don't have to sleep in this space so sound doesn't matter as much. I live on the 17th floor and I don't really notice traffic noise. I do get noise from Granville Street on Friday and Saturday from the Christian Audigier crowd. If I go to bed early on the weekend, I just sleep with ear plugs in. Inconvenient, but not that huge of a deal. I used to live in the West End across from a senior's home. I swear an ambulance used to rip up the street at least once a week with it's siren blaring to pick up a senior. Ear plugs don't help in that case. The third way to reduce noise is to have better windows. The building does have almost floor to ceiling windows and they are not the most sound proof. The City of Vancouver needs to improve the building code with respect to windows. It would save a lot more energy, too.

by poutine 18y ago

pkaler 18y ago

There are a few ways to manage this. The first way is to have larger sidewalks. This puts traffic further away from the buildings and there is less echo reverberating up sides of buildings. The sidewalks are larger in Gastown and deeper in Yaletown. Granville Street is being repaved to have larger sidewalks, too. The second way to do this is to make the first floor retail. Then make floors 2 through 10 be commercial office space. People don't have to sleep in this space so sound doesn't matter as much. I live on the 17th floor and I don't really notice traffic noise. I do get noise from Granville Street on Friday and Saturday from the Christian Audigier crowd. If I go to bed early on the weekend, I just sleep with ear plugs in. Inconvenient, but not that huge of a deal. I used to live in the West End across from a senior's home. I swear an ambulance used to rip up the street at least once a week with it's siren blaring to pick up a senior. Ear plugs don't help in that case. The third way to reduce noise is to have better windows. The building does have almost floor to ceiling windows and they are not the most sound proof. The City of Vancouver needs to improve the building code with respect to windows. It would save a lot more energy, too.