Dear Editor,
After seeing 26 years of change, it boggles the mind what another five to 10 years will do to the downtown Richmond skyline. Cooney Road (and points west) from Granville Road to Bridgeport Road will be so tightly packed, most highrise dwellers can be assured they will only have excellent views of neighbouring condos.
This isn’t a rant against change — I actually agree with density to take advantage of mass transit. I live in a low-rise, circa-1990 condo just a five-minute walk from Lansdowne Station, and take transit whenever I go to Vancouver. So far, I am out of range of the gaping maw of highrise development (according to the most recent OCP map). Note, I don’t have an axe to grind, since I didn’t buy my condo as a view property.
One absurd example is “The Grand” (quite the misnomer) going up at the southwest corner of Lansdowne and Cooney. It was the site of a tiny stripmall, and will be inches from the high-rise just to the west of it. There will be a total lack of setback from both streets once this is complete.
Is any thought being given to the aesthetics of the finished product (not just individual developments, but how they affect each other)?
Michael Wakeling
Richmond
