18-30 King St East | 106.9m | 32 fl | Proposed

[Pigeon]

.

[Pearlstreet]

I am loving this colourful comment left on raisethehammer.org regarding this...

"Buy a row of run-down buildings. Do nothing to improve them. Wait ten years. Damn, they haven't fallen over yet. Say you can't rent them out and need to demolish them so you can build something new. Demolish them. Grin like an oldschool hockey player." -(anonymous)

[thistleclub]

Originally Posted by coalminecanary

We have facade grants for actual improvements and I'm all for expanding these sorts of "Carrot" programs.

Interestingly, I seem to recall hearing that the Pigott Building was recently sidelined from obtaining heritage grants to address work on its facade (facade work eventually went ahead, but the slight is notable since the building is a local architectural icon). I think some technicalities regarding the ownership makeup or governance model or something of the sort impaired their eligibility. Dunno if anyone can corroborate this anecdote.

[thistleclub]

Full points for audacity, but I'm not sure what this was intended to accomplish.

Could it be a novel way of flushing out progressive investors who care about the core? Of wrong-footing City Hall?


$120-million complex still in diapers
(Hamilton Spectator, Andrew Dreschel, Oct 25, 2012)

They’re polar opposites. Good cop/bad cop. An old married couple. All rolled into one.

Developer David Blanchard is dark, slight and soft-spoken.

Rob Miles, his property manager, is big, blonde and blustery.

Together, around their paper and coffee cup strewn board table at 1 Main East, they’re bickering proof that their plans for a $120-million development on the south side of Gore Park isn’t even out of diapers yet.

“This is a condo tower,” says Blanchard, indicating a Legoland-like rendering of the proposed complex for the block bounded by King, Main, James and Hughson.

How many storeys? a reporter asks.

“Well, we don’t know,” says Blanchard.

“I don’t think the condo will be part of the final discussion” Miles interjects.

“Don’t even say that,” says Blanchard. “Don’t talk about it.”

Why?

“Because …” Blanchard begins

“ … it probably won’t happen,” Miles finishes.

“It doesn’t matter, Rob,” Blanchard shoots back. “The point is this is totally an open book. We don’t know what it’s going to be.”

And so it goes. Back and forth, for the better part of an hour.

There’s no anger, no rancour, just two guys sitting on a crucial piece of downtown property who have no defined idea of what’s going in there.

It could be a commercial, retail and residential development.

Or it could be “scaled back” to small boutique buildings for single tenants.

Blanchard isn’t sure if there’s a way to save a couple of heritage buildings fronting King East.

Miles says the real answer is they’ll be happy to restore the facades if someone donates $10 million to the project.

They’re not really open to a casino going in there.

But if someone approached them, they’d look at it.

Make no mistake. These guys are the real deal. One day, something eye-popping will certainly arise on that block.

After all, they didn’t spend something like eight years and $9 million assembling the property to idly sit back and watch it crumble, especially after recently terminating the handful of remaining leases.

But they’ve got no city approvals in place, no tenants lined up, no final design, no concrete plans.

Yeah, they’ve talked to a few grocery stores and office users and they know a bit about the condo business.

But they also know that’s probably kind of premature at this stage.

“There’s no sense in really doing that,” says Blanchard, “until we have a really good plan that we’re all happy with. How do you sell something when you’re vague, when you’re this and you’re that?”

How long before they nail down that good plan?

“It depends how fast this heritage bubble comes to the forefront,” says Blanchard.

For his part, Miles is confident the concept will ultimately dwarf heritage concerns. But he also speaks of the next phase in terms of “if” not “when.”

He wonders how the city is going to feel about a building shadowing Gore Park.

And how will it feel about a truck loading zone and driveway for servicing retail businesses?

“If the city says, ‘No, we will not allow you to have your trucks come off Main Street and load into that garage,’ we’re screwed,” says Miles.

“We can’t do anything with this because whether we have a grocery store or retail, they have loading needs.”

Blanchard says it’s a very important site and they want to do it right, but he agrees there could be “innumerable obstacles.”

No doubt. And now that they’ve gone public, they can add another big one to the list — managing expectations.

[Beedok]

After all, they didn’t spend something like eight years and $9 million assembling the property to idly sit back and watch it crumble, especially after recently terminating the handful of remaining leases.

But isn't that Hamilton tradition?

[Duckyboy]

Originally Posted by coalminecanary

Well, everything's for sale at the right price

Hahaha... yes, I guess that's true. Who knows that's going on in their heads, though.

I'm not saying everything is on the up & up, I'm just saying that there are probably a lot of variables involved that we might not be thinking of.

[coalminecanary]

Sounds like they are after some money. Start the bidding at 10 million and see what those buildings are worth to us!

Real nice.

[thistleclub]

Rich history, bright future for Gore Park area
(Hamilton Spectator, Emma Reilly, Nov 17, 2012)

On the south side of Gore Park, the past and the future are colliding.

The buildings along King Street East between James and Hughson are some of the oldest in the area, dating back to the 1840s.

But developer David Blanchard envisions a different future for that strip. He hopes to create a $120-million commercial, retail and residential space in the block between Gore Park, Main Street East, James and Hughson streets.
His firm, Wilson and Blanchard, already owns most of the property within that block.

Early plans for the project call for a two-storey grocery store opening off the south side of Gore Park, an office tower, hundreds of underground and above-ground parking spots, and a condo tower fronting onto Main Street.

If the project goes ahead, it will be the largest downtown development since Jackson Square was built 40 years ago.

However, Blanchard’s plans call for demolishing the buildings that currently stand along that stretch.

Blanchard, who has preserved several high-profile heritage buildings in the past — including the Pigott, Gowlings and Landed Banking buildings — argues that in this case, the buildings have been altered so many times over the years that they’re no longer of major historical value.

The buildings along King don’t have heritage designation, but they’re included on the city’s list of buildings of historical interest.

Here is a brief history of Gore Park’s south side.

18-22 King Street East
• Known as the Kerr Building
• Built in the 1840s for two Scottish brothers, Archibald and Thomas C. Kerr, who established a dry goods business
• Housed several dry goods operators until 1906, then became a shoe and leather store from 1910 to 1922
• For the next 30 years, it housed a wide variety of office, retail and restaurant uses
• In 1952, 20 King St. W. was purchased by Anna Minden and became known as the Minden building

24 King Street East
• Built in 1879 for James A. Skinner, a crockery merchant who opened his “China Palace” at the same location around 1850
• Skinner’s business was so successful that the store needed to be enlarged in 1875
• Minden's Ladies Wear moved to this location in 1924, successfully operating here until a fire forced the business to close in 1951
• By 1939, the front façade of the building was altered, including installing tripartite windows in the second and third storeys

28 King Street East
• Built in 1874 for furriers William H. Glassco & Sons
• After being damaged in a fire, the store was rebuilt in 1924. The remodel included a “fur vault” that was heralded as the first of its kind in Canada
• Glassco’s fur vault is the likely reason for three more furriers occupying the store — including Holt, Renfrew and Co., whose Hamilton store was located here from 1945 to 1958.
• It was occupied by V. Howel and Son furriers from 1960 to 1974 and South Side Men’s Clothing from the early 1980s until the early-21st century

[Dr Awesomesauce]

So now Blanchard's the arbiter of what has historical value or not?

Here comes the push to sway opinion on those old beauties. Pretty soon people will start saying they're shite and should be brought down.

[Pigeon]

.

[coalminecanary]

Let me show you what's entirely possible in these buildings that he considers "garbage" - and for a lot less money than 10 million dollars:

Before:


After

[Duckyboy]

Hahaha... I swear; the guy could cure cancer and people would bitch about him. Does anyone here even know him personally? Anyone?

This place is starting to resemble RTH.

[urban_planner]

Originally Posted by Duckyboy

Hahaha... I swear; the guy could cure cancer and people would bitch about him. Does anyone here even know him personally? Anyone?

This place is starting to resemble RTH.

I couldn't have said it better myself, I rarely visit RTH because its so one sided, and everyone is a self proclaimed expert!

[Pigeon]

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[matt602]

I don't need to know him to be pissed off about losing more of our built heritage downtown. The buildings aren't falling down. They are structurally sound. I've seen dilapidated, condemned abandoned buildings brought back from the dead. It's all about dollars, and this guy is already proposing to grab them from the public funds. I don't care what other buildings he has successfully restored, it doesn't change a thing for me. I'm sick of seeing buildings needlessly destroyed in our downtown core.

[Dr Awesomesauce]

Originally Posted by Duckyboy

Hahaha... I swear; the guy could cure cancer and people would bitch about him. Does anyone here even know him personally? Anyone?

This place is starting to resemble RTH.

I don't understand your analogy. What's he done that's so bloody fantastic? And what is it about his proposal that you love so much? Is it the parking garage facing Gore Park that you're so excited about?

Saying he's going to demo those buildings is one thing but then saying that they're not historically significant /valuable is a whole other animal. We're just not that stupid. We know when they were built. We know who built them. We know nothing he or anybody else ever builds will resemble them in style or quality. That's it. Once they're gone, they're gone.

[mattgrande]

I just can't understand why anyone would build office space in Hamilton when there's so much sitting vacant...

[coalminecanary]

What does it matter if you know him personally? This isn't a model train set he's rebuilding in his attic. This is the most important corner in the entire city. And he wants to put a Target there. Actually he doesn't know what he wants, other than 10 million dollars from the city - or else.

[Duckyboy]

Originally Posted by matt602

I don't need to know him to be pissed off about losing more of our built heritage downtown. The buildings aren't falling down. They are structurally sound. I've seen dilapidated, condemned abandoned buildings brought back from the dead. It's all about dollars, and this guy is already proposing to grab them from the public funds. I don't care what other buildings he has successfully restored, it doesn't change a thing for me. I'm sick of seeing buildings needlessly destroyed in our downtown core.

It just seems a little rash, that's all. I mean, the guy ACTUALLY saves a few older buildings from completely falling down, and you don't care.

But if he even MENTIONS the possibility (no action has been taken yet) of taking down a few other buildings, you crucify him & that all but wipes out anything else he's done? How is that logical?

Maybe try taking a look at things from the angle that this might be a good thing for this city; making it a better, more livable place where people might actually WANT to live (in the downtown) rather than consider it a wasteland.

I am all for preserving old buildings (I recently bought a 1900 house and am renovating the entire thing), but maybe this will be better overall for the city.

I could be wrong, but there might be a silver lining that far outweighs the buildings that get destroyed.

Or it might just go to shit. Who knows. My original post was merely commenting on the fact that there seems to be a lot of hate on this board; I used to come here to get away from the RTH bullshit, but now I see it slipping along the same slope.

[Dr Awesomesauce]

The ONLY value Hamilton has is in its heritage. If we remove that architecture from downtown, you take away the one thing that makes it a worthwhile place.

What drew artists to James North and antique dealers to Locke? It wasn't easy access to the 403, I can tell you that.