(09-21-2022, 06:21 AM)Spokes Wrote: It's also odd to me because it seems like anything over a certain height feels the same from ground level. Like would we really notice a difference of 25 floors to 35?
Or is it about things like traffic?
Barely. I mean unless you're looking at the building it's hard to really notice them beyond what's in your immediate vision. Stand at street level outside of The Regency at Queen and Weber which is 18 floors and then do the same beside Charlie West or Duke Tower which are 31 and 39. Unless you look up, you really don't notice any difference on the ground most of the time.
In general, height limits are more about how things look from a more distant view. Montréal doesn't allow anything higher than Mont Royal as the mountain is meant to be a symbol. Cities like Ottawa won't allow anything tall directly in the core to preserve the views of Parliament Hill.
Then you have cities like Washington (DC) which don't allow anything past around 130 feet - though despite the myth that it's because nothing was to exceed the height of the Capitol Hill, it's actually just because they're like Waterloo and decided to set a specific limit (there are varying explanations as to why, though). I think it could be altered at this point, but I guess it's up to them to decide. It's not like Waterloo has any specific feature in the skyline that needs to be preserved, so the height limit is a bit arbitrary. But you can easily densify a city without any height - most of Europe and even Washington being a great example. In German or Austrian cities, the majority of buildings are no more than 6 floors. In Washington, nothing exceeds 14. Yet they're some of the densest cities in the world. I suppose it's something the City of Waterloo and its residents would need to decide if they want to alter or not. For some reason, I suspect the answer would be a big fat No however...just because they like to be different.