Brandon Donnelly — Daily insights for city builders. Published since 2013 by Toronto-based real estate developer Brandon Donnelly. — Page 644

Winnipeg has a building along its waterfront that, I am told, is affectionately referred to as the "spaceship." Designed by the award-winning architecture practice, 5468796 , the spaceship is a 41-unit circular condominium building that is raised up on 35 foot stilts in order to fabricate views outward from the site. Sans stilts, the site wouldn't have really had any.

The raised up portion is made up of two circular floors, each with 20 identical units (so 40 in total). The 610 square foot units are all pie-shaped studios that splay outward to a 22 foot wide living room/bedroom. Supposedly, a circle creates 30% more perimeter glass than if the building were orthogonal. So good for views. I should know this.

The building is organized around a central core and circulation system. The building's common area corridors are also open and exposed to the elements. A fascinating design decision given the climate in Winnipeg, and most of Canada. But this would be good for build costs, good for the building's overall efficiency/loss factor, and probably pretty good if you're worried about things like airborne viruses.

Completed in 2017, the hard cost budget for the project was supposedly $4.75 million . The developer in me is wondering how the hell they built 28,000 square feet for $170 per square foot. And the Torontonian in me is aghast at studios as large as 610 square feet. These would be generally sized 3 bedroom suites here in Toronto (I kid).

On top of the building's two floors is also a pretty unique penthouse suite that can be rented on Airbnb for what looks to be a reasonable price. The main living space is essentially a glass box with 360 degree views of the city. I am ashamed to say that I have never been to Winnipeg. But as soon travel resumes and these provincial boundary checkpoints dissolve , I think it might be time for a trip to the spaceship.

All photography by James Brittain Photography

Benjamin Dachis and Rhys Godin of the C.D. Howe Institute have a new report out talking about the effect of COVID-19 on the future of public transit in Canadian cities. In it, they make the argument that public transit is a key enabler of the agglomeration economies that make cities so valuable. And right now, most people aren't using it (see above).

Why are agglomeration economies so important?

According to some studies, doubling the population of an urban area has tended to increase mean incomes by between 3-8%. In the Canadian context, similar research has found that people living in more populated regions (cities) tend to have incomes that are between 3-5% higher than those living in more rural areas. So when it comes to average incomes, bigger cities tend to be better. (Does Zoom change this? I'm not convinced.)

Of course, to make bigger cities function properly, you generally need public transit. And when you do have fast and reliable transit, that, they argue, is going to help drive the agglomeration economies which ultimately help to increase incomes. Because of this important relationship, Dachis and Godin argue that Canadian governments have a habit of systematically undervaluing the importance of transit investment.

If you're interested in reading the full report, click here .

https://youtu.be/5W-zPqrGQWA

Google Earth has a feature called Timelapse that combines millions of different satellite images to show you how the world has changed over the last 37 years -- sometimes for the better and sometimes for the worse. It's a feature that's been out for a few years, but they just made it available in 3D. Some of you may have also missed the feature if you don't normally use Google Earth. So here's an overly wondrous video (also embedded above) showing off the new feature, and here is a dedicated site that allows you to quickly try out Timelapse in 2D. Dubai's "coastal expansion" is one of the places you can quickly land on and its growth over the last few decades is always mind boggling to see. But of course, there are also many other important Timelapses that should be viewed. A number of them speak to our environmental impacts on the world.