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Originally Posted by fredinno
How? The design isn't done in a matter they can just block people off from coming in that they don't want to. CoV lists it as a public park, so how does this affect things in a practical, day-to-day sense?
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Well, it's not sitting on public land for one thing. And it never was.
Bonsor park on the other hand is.
That land (along with the one the Rec. centre sit on) belong to the City of Burnaby.
The fact that Quadreal decided to make that plaza public (and probably through some agreement with the City and the parks department that I imagine manages it) allow public access to it to the degree that it's listed as a public park now doesn't change that fact or the difference from Bonsor park.
It was probably to their benefit that they did so in terms of fostering good relations with the city, but they just as easily would have been within their rights to develop it as a private outdoor amenity space for the residential towers, or as commerical plaza for the mall itself.
Quote:
Originally Posted by fredinno
I said to build it on *top* of the bus loop's airspace (see: Shops at New Westminister). They may need to move the bus loop to the South side of Bonsor temporarily, but they'd have to do that for any redevelopment of Metropolis anyways (the mall partially overhangs the bus loop.)
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Yes, and that's what the city wasn't amenable to.
They didn't want (and presumably still don't want) to relocate the bus loop - even temporarily to allow for any construction to occur where it sits whether to allow a tower on top of it or to replace it.
Translink are a party to a such a decision as well and in their view the bus loop is best served being as close to the skytrain station as possible (which obviously makes sense).
South of the skytrain guideway on Beresford (the other possible logical location) is a no for the city since they envision (or at least did before) Beresford as being a future pedestrian artwalk of sorts with limited vehicular access (public or private).
And that's where the city still stands on that situation.
And by the way, the tower they proposed to build over the bus loop would have been a Metrotower IV - i.e. an office tower extension to their current Metrotowers I - III
There was talk some time back of them also wanting to do a residential tower (or more) but they were looking at the north side of the mall parking lot adjacent to Kingsway for that (in front of the Superstore and Silvercity).
Quote:
Originally Posted by fredinno
I think it's Ivanhoe that was unhappy at Concord, but still.
The issue with 'just wait' is the massive Metropolis site becomes increasingly more and more of a target, since it's so massive and central in Metrotown.
Also, the last major renovation of the mall was almost 20 years ago.
Basically every other mall (including Ivanhoe's other malls near SkyTrains and in urban areas) are giving up waiting and building up on their lands.
Some are being demolished and rebuilt.
That property tax bill is huge, and even successful malls like Lougheed and CF Richmond are being redeveloped (the latter not as entirely as the first, but still) despite the loss in sales revenue.
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The thing is, most of those other malls are being redeveloped specifically because they had recently began to start losing revenue - even while property taxes remain high and continue to rise.
Certainly in the case of Lougheed mall and Brentwood, and although Oakridge wasn't necessarily in the same boat revenuestream-wise, Quadreal's vision (And Ivanhoe Cambridge prior to that, as the previous landlords and landowners) foresaw a complete re-do of the commercial plaza space anyway.
Metropolis isn't in the same situation and if anything a major reveldopment on the scale of an Oakridge or an Brentwood mall would almost certainly result in a steep fall in mall revenue for IC.
Its still one of the top revenue earning malls not just in western Canada but in all of Canada and I believe 2nd highest even per capita outside of Greater Toronto (behind only Pacific place).
They've had some vacancies in recent times - mostly the after-effects of the Pandemic - but they seem to have little to no trouble getting new tenants or having current tenants expand their spaces.
It's probably part of the reason why they have no problem with an 80 year build-out masterplan proposal and slow-walking it in a more phased style like Lougheed, rather than going for a one-shot redevelopment and complete re-do in on go ala Oakridge.
They can literally afford to sit it out and wait until they get an administration at city hall that is more amenable to what they have in mind with such an extended timeline because the golden goose is still laying them eggs in the time being.