I love the detail between the windows. Looks like wood, but is more of the ceramic tile.
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I was going to post photos but Tumblr won't let me today so I'll just report that the fencing has been removed on the front (Hollis) side and the building looks great. The recessed residential entry is unique. The building does a good job of blending while looking sharp.
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This angle will become unavailable if and when Governor's Plaza gets underway:
https://scontent-sea1-1.xx.fbcdn.net...48&oe=5E395323 Source |
I notice the sign says it is fully leased.
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I am most interested to see who's going to move in at the Roy and Green Lantern. I'd expect it to take another 2 years for the "dust to settle" along that stretch and for it to hit a new steady state of tenants and activity. Likewise Bishop Street could turn into a real gem in a few years with a couple more changes. |
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Bishop is going to be great someday. The Governor is supposed to start next year, and then I think there are plans to retrofit 1360 Lower Water with a few extra floors and an exterior that's more suited to downtown rather than Clayton Park. Lower Bishop has been a construction zone for 4+ years now, and looks like it'll continue to be for a number of years to come. But it'll be worth it in the end. |
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To me the biggest issue the neighbourhood faces is that there are a lot of historic buildings that aren't in great shape. The wooden building across from Flynn Flats is a good example of what I am talking about. |
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The circa 2000 strategy of building facilities like the MetroPark to encourage people to drive downtown and shop didn't work at all. Maybe free parking and wide open streets would, but I don't see how that could be viable downtown or what the point of that would be, particularly in this era of declining bricks and mortar retail. The area has a 1700's street grid and lots of historic buildings. It doesn't make sense to try to reconfigure it to work like Bayers Lake. It's designed for pedestrians. It also makes sense to have some parts of the city that are designed for pedestrians and transit and some for cars. Not everybody can or wants to drive everywhere and some people like to drive and don't care about boutique stores or historic buildings. If you hate busy areas you can move to Tantallon or something, get a suburban job, and never set foot downtown. |
I don't disagree with your take. What you describe is essentially what I am saying. The issue is that HRM seems to demand commercial ground-level space in every new development to satisfy current-day planning theory. The only customers for those spaces will be those who live DT. At some point there will be an excess of such space, if there isn't already, given how long it has taken for many of those spaces to be occupied.
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But the main streets like Barrington, Spring Garden Road, or Gottingen should have storefronts, and I think those will eventually fill up. Flynn Flats is in a weird hybrid area that isn't a major commercial hub but is busier than a normal residential area. I would expect it to have some buildings with 1-2 shops in them and some with nothing, exactly what we see. There's nothing wrong with buildings like the Waterford which have no shops. I'd say it should just be left to the market to decide but bad street level designs can have big negative externalities, hurting a whole block. I think sometimes the city does need to push for commercial spaces to help the long-term health of the city. I also think a bit of an oversupply of commercial space (office and storefront) is really good for a city's economy. A healthy city is one with 10% vacancy, where new businesses have good options to choose from, not one where every little space is filled and many existing or potential businesses are out of luck. Of course, the space doesn't all have to be in one small area. Spring Garden Road can be packed and competitive rent-wise while Gottingen and Agricola can offer affordable space for small businesses. It's also worth pointing out that ground-level space in busy areas is not very desirable for condos and apartments. I live in a quiet area and even in my building the ground floor units are much cheaper (and get ~95% of the break-ins, although I do know somebody who had a thief climb up onto his second-floor balcony). |
I generally don't think planning rules should require ground floor commercial, except on the busiest streets (and in those cases the market usually provides it anyways), but I do like the Downtown Halifax Plan rules that require ground level floor-to-floor heights to be 4.5 metres. It does add a little up-front cost to the building, but floor-to-floor height is pretty much the only thing you can't change about a building later in its life. If the market isn't there for commercial now, they can be nice residential units with high ceilings, and then get converted someday in the future.
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This one looks nice from afar but when you get up close it looks poorly finished. I hope there will be some repair work done to the ground level tiles as a number of them are broken and a lot of them do not line up cleanly on the corners which makes it look quite shotty.
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Overall though this is a great building. |
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Got any pics? Probably won't be walking in that area for awhile.
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