General Updates and News

[midasmull]

Originally Posted by someone123

The budgets are a bit funny. $11M for 38 units for Hope Cottage (in what looks like a fairly small building, but maybe it's a bit bigger than it seems due to the hill) and $5M for 62 units on Herring Cove Rd.

It's almost as if basing building permit fees on the total budget and then allowing the developer to self-report might lead to some people taking advantage of the situation.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by midasmull

It's almost as if basing building permit fees on the total budget and then allowing the developer to self-report might lead to some people taking advantage of the situation.

Shocking!

Do the permits connect with other taxes or can you say the unit cost you $100k for HRM building permit purposes, but then in the end for income purposes you declare say $400k costs on a unit sold for $500k?

I recall some building permit comparisons between cities being posted in the Canada section. I think that data is incredibly noisy and hard to compare across jurisdictions.

[Ahogan9]

Does anybody proposed for 2 new TV stations, CityTV and YesTV in Halifax?

[TheCuriousMind]

Hi All,

Wanted to introduce myself and figured this is the best place. I'm a long-time lurker on the forum and figured it was time to finally register an account and start contributing. I'm a structural engineer based out of Montreal who grew up in Halifax, and I try to stay connected with the city I know and love by keeping up with developments and urbanism in NS/Halifax proper. Looking forward to contributing my thoughts (and potentially conceuptual designs) for potential improvements/developments in Halifax.

Someday I dream of returning to Halifax and getting involved in local politics to turn the tide against NIMBYism and obstruction of progress into a balanced, rational urbanism that represents the diverse needs and wants of our population without being too beholden to outdated and counterproductive norms and regulations. Cheers all!

-Simon

[teddifax]

Can you start now, Simon?

[Antigonish]

Originally Posted by TheCuriousMind

Hi All,

Wanted to introduce myself and figured this is the best place. I'm a long-time lurker on the forum and figured it was time to finally register an account and start contributing. I'm a structural engineer based out of Montreal who grew up in Halifax, and I try to stay connected with the city I know and love by keeping up with developments and urbanism in NS/Halifax proper. Looking forward to contributing my thoughts (and potentially conceuptual designs) for potential improvements/developments in Halifax.

Someday I dream of returning to Halifax and getting involved in local politics to turn the tide against NIMBYism and obstruction of progress into a balanced, rational urbanism that represents the diverse needs and wants of our population without being too beholden to outdated and counterproductive norms and regulations. Cheers all!

-Simon

Welcome Simon it's good to have you on board. A lot of us are like you, yearning to come back home and make a difference after being in exile for [x] years. Stick around and join in the discussion, the more active the better

[someone123]

Welcome!

[Empire]

Welcome Simon! It will be nice to hear your forward thinking views. So much untapped potential for improved building design in this prime development era for HRM.

[Patriots]

Since we are doing some introductions I will throw my hat in. I have followed for over a year and thought I would start contributing. Part of my formal education was in urban planning but 3 decades ago began a career in finance. My overriding concern is how we manage the provincial objective of significantly increasing Nova Scotia's population and tax revenue base, and a result Halifax's population growth in an efficient but realistic manner. I look forward to our discussions.

[HalifaxRetales]

former Ben's Warehouse off Hammonds Plains Rd. (10 Science Park Dr) is being torn down to build a new Halifax Regional Fire & Emergency Station

[Keith P.]

Originally Posted by Patriots

Part of my formal education was in urban planning but 3 decades ago began a career in finance. My overriding concern is how we manage the provincial objective of significantly increasing Nova Scotia's population and tax revenue base, and a result Halifax's population growth in an efficient but realistic manner. I look forward to our discussions.

A wise career choice. I find most urban planners unfortunately have no concept of the financial implications of their decisions.

[Dmajackson]

Originally Posted by HalifaxRetales

former Ben's Warehouse off Hammonds Plains Rd. (10 Science Park Dr) is being torn down to build a new Halifax Regional Fire & Emergency Station

Just to clarify it's a new Fire Station #1 and the new HRFE Headquarters. HPR is likely a good spot to have a strong fire department presence. The extreme wildfire risk is something that's not going to go away. Convenient spot for 2023 events. Right in between the wildfire and flooding zones.

It was a quiet week for development permits. The only thing I noticed is a renovation permit for a new unnamed restaurant in Bedford Place Mall.

[Dmajackson]

Originally Posted by new2halifax

As an aside, have you considered migrating the blog to a more robust platform? I know that Wordpress for example has a migration tool that should make the process relatively straight forward.

I took some great advice from new2halifax and have migrated my tumblr blog to a wordpress site. All of my old posts are there plus a few from this week and a few scheduled for the next few days. I can still cross-post photos onto this forum. Importantly, I can post from my phone hassle free which means regular photo updates.

HalifaxDevelopments.ca - Halifax Developments Blog

- DJ

[OldDartmouthMark]

The new blog looks great!

[Keith P.]

Originally Posted by Dmajackson

I took some great advice from new2halifax and have migrated my tumblr blog to a wordpress site. All of my old posts are there plus a few from this week and a few scheduled for the next few days. I can still cross-post photos onto this forum. Importantly, I can post from my phone hassle free which means regular photo updates.

HalifaxDevelopments.ca - Halifax Developments Blog

- DJ

I tried to use Wordpress and found it extremely difficult and unintuitive to use. But you seem to have figured it out and your site looks good. Don't know how you did it. Their tools might as well have been written in sanskrit for me. The Block Editor was a complete exercise in frustration.

[bartekci]

Originally Posted by Dmajackson

I took some great advice from new2halifax and have migrated my tumblr blog to a wordpress site. All of my old posts are there plus a few from this week and a few scheduled for the next few days. I can still cross-post photos onto this forum. Importantly, I can post from my phone hassle free which means regular photo updates.

HalifaxDevelopments.ca - Halifax Developments Blog

- DJ

Great to see! And echoing that the blog looks great/clean.

[kzt79]

Dalhousie University wins suit against HRM to allow it to tear down heritage home
by Aaron Beswick · Reporter for Saltwire

https://www.saltwire.com/halifax/news/da...it-to-tear-down-heritage-home-100915681/

In a lengthy written decision, Rosinski castigated the heritage advisory committee and council itself, finding both the process used and decision to list the property was biased.

“There is a reasonable apprehension of an attitude of closed-mindedness at the (committee) level and a reasonable apprehension of bias at the HRM council level, a bread-crumb trail that led to a clearly unreasonable result,” reads Rosinski’s decision.

Nice to see.

[new2halifax]

Originally Posted by Dmajackson

I can post from my phone hassle free which means regular photo updates.

That's great! Glad the migration was hassle free.

[new2halifax]

Originally Posted by kzt79

Dalhousie University wins suit against HRM to allow it to tear down heritage home
by Aaron Beswick · Reporter for Saltwire

https://www.saltwire.com/halifax/news/da...it-to-tear-down-heritage-home-100915681/

Yes. Thanks for that.

I wish they would allow universities to build bypassing zoning restrictions. Specially if it's within the distinct boundaries of the university. Why not let SMU or DAL build a massive residence in the middle of their campuses?

[Keith P.]

Originally Posted by kzt79

Dalhousie University wins suit against HRM to allow it to tear down heritage home
by Aaron Beswick · Reporter for Saltwire

The CBC story on this was posted earlier in the proper Urban Design and Heritage forum.