Tri-Cities Updates

[GMD]

Originally Posted by Burquitlaman

Thanks. I see it now.

In other news, I got tired of getting ignored by the burquitlam plaza people so I just emailed their leasing office and acted interested in leasing a space in the plaza. I asked about the construction timeline in my spiel 😂.

Let's see if they're going to bite. They've probably blacklisted my email by now. At this point the project is basically dead.

It is not dead, just sleeping. The weakness in the office market and higher interest rates are probably hitting Morguard pretty hard, I guess their financial situation is too delicate to launch a multi-billion project like this one. If rates come down and office market stabilizes, maybe they will go ahead next year.

[Changing City]

It seems unlikely that anything will happen soon. The shopping centre is presumably still performing ok financially, and Morguard have relatively limited residential development experience. They have recently sold off a hotel portfolio, and bought 20% of the Telus Garden office tower , and their financial results still look healthy, but they're pretty caution investors.

They've just started construction on a mid rise rental project in Mississauga, where they're based, but both Burquitlam Plaza and Coquitlam Centre are much more ambitious projects, so they may well wait until it's clearer how the economy, political landscape, and interest rates are playing out.

[mcj]

Originally Posted by Changing City

It seems unlikely that anything will happen soon. The shopping centre is presumably still performing ok financially, and Morguard have relatively limited residential development experience. They have recently sold off a hotel portfolio, and bought 20% of the Telus Garden office tower , and their financial results still look healthy, but they're pretty caution investors.

They've just started construction on a mid rise rental project in Mississauga, where they're based, but both Burquitlam Plaza and Coquitlam Centre are much more ambitious projects, so they may well wait until it's clearer how the economy, political landscape, and interest rates are playing out.

Your assessment is likely correct, they and others are sitting things out for the time being as short term market conditions have slowed things down temporarily. However, with long term projects like these the macro economic factors are relatively unchanged (save for the small cuts to immigration rates) and they'll end up playing catch up at some point soon. 5 years ago no one could have accurately predicted the economic events of the last 5 years, and that's about the time it'll take them (or any other developer) to complete a single phase, being cautious about what COULD happen in 5 years time will always result in them being laggards. It seems short sighted to not be advancing these projects, and I'm surprised the city of Coquitlam isn't laying on any pressure considering how central these properties are in the two dense cores. Something I think that'll also come back to bite them as other TOD centres become more complete neighbourhoods.

[GMD]

Originally Posted by Changing City

It seems unlikely that anything will happen soon. The shopping centre is presumably still performing ok financially, and Morguard have relatively limited residential development experience. They have recently sold off a hotel portfolio, and bought 20% of the Telus Garden office tower , and their financial results still look healthy, but they're pretty caution investors.

They've just started construction on a mid rise rental project in Mississauga, where they're based, but both Burquitlam Plaza and Coquitlam Centre are much more ambitious projects, so they may well wait until it's clearer how the economy, political landscape, and interest rates are playing out.

Their results have been OK, and they are mostly rebounding from the post-Covid hit, but they still aren't great. They did increase their distribution which shows some confidence, but they aren't sitting on much cash or achieving any growth.

Like mcj says, this project will take a long time so they are likely being short-sighted in being too cautious. Certainly, the forest of cranes around Burquitlam suggests that other developers with less central locations see money to be made.

Coquitlam Centre still makes good money for them I assume, but I am not so sure about Burquitlam Plaza, run-down, half empty, with many of the big name tenants gone, replaced by temporary uses like electoral offices and seasonal stuff. It looks like they have been running down all the leases in anticipation of proceeding with development, and it looked like they were ready to go a couple of years ago, but since then they have gone quiet, most likely due to economic conditions.

Council doesn't seem to be pushing them much on the site, perhaps they figure there is already enough construction in the area.

It is true Morguard doesn't have much experience with a project like this, but I'm sure there are plenty of partnership options, or even an outright sale if they wanted to make some actual return on the prime land they are sitting on. The property is a poster child for the potential benefits of a land value tax.

[Burquitlaman]

Originally Posted by GMD

Their results have been OK, and they are mostly rebounding from the post-Covid hit, but they still aren't great. They did increase their distribution which shows some confidence, but they aren't sitting on much cash or achieving any growth.

Like mcj says, this project will take a long time so they are likely being short-sighted in being too cautious. Certainly, the forest of cranes around Burquitlam suggests that other developers with less central locations see money to be made.

Coquitlam Centre still makes good money for them I assume, but I am not so sure about Burquitlam Plaza, run-down, half empty, with many of the big name tenants gone, replaced by temporary uses like electoral offices and seasonal stuff. It looks like they have been running down all the leases in anticipation of proceeding with development, and it looked like they were ready to go a couple of years ago, but since then they have gone quiet, most likely due to economic conditions.

Council doesn't seem to be pushing them much on the site, perhaps they figure there is already enough construction in the area.

It is true Morguard doesn't have much experience with a project like this, but I'm sure there are plenty of partnership options, or even an outright sale if they wanted to make some actual return on the prime land they are sitting on. The property is a poster child for the potential benefits of a land value tax.

On the topic of Council... I emailed them today. Karened it up big time because I've been emailing Morguard for six months without getting a reply. My email was forwarded to someone else in the city (I'll refrain from saying who for the sake of their privacy). This is their response:

"I have been forwarded your email for response. The Burquitlam Plaza redevelopment application has been in process for some time now and there have been some delays while important considerations for the project get completed. Some of these factors are not entirely within the applicant’s control as they rely on external parties.

Generally, the City can’t compel property owners to redevelop their properties. Those decisions are left up to individual property owners. In this case, I have spoken with the agent for Morgaurd, as recently as last week, about their desire to advance the application for Council’s consideration shortly. There are a few outstanding items that require further resolution, but hopefully the application will be advancing for Council’s consideration within the next few months."

So few more months before it gets approved. I thought the project had the go ahead!? It was all over the news in 2022.

The wait continues.

[officedweller]

Don't think renderings of Band were ever posted.

Band


https://www.bop.ca/project/band/


https://www.bop.ca/project/band/


https://www.bop.ca/project/band/


https://www.bop.ca/project/band/

[officedweller]

Originally Posted by madog222

Renders from the March 27th public hearing:

Intracorp is currently calling this Gardena.
Buildings are now 42 and 15 floor towers with 526 strata units and two 6 floor buildings with 189 market and 29 non-market rentals.

42 fl tower is 225m geodetic which would be about 133m from grade.

This is immediately north of Strand's Alina

Gardena


https://rennie.com/developments/gardena

https://intracorphomes.com/gardena/masterplan

More renderings of Gardena at Intracorp Instagram (from May 2023):

https://www.instagram.com/p/Cr9Mvg9yaXe/

From March 2024:

Grosvenor closes $39.6M financing for Intracorp's huge Gardena dev.
https://renx.ca/grosvenor-closes-396m-financing-for-intracorps-huge-gardena-dev

[officedweller]

Elmwood

Don't think Elmwood renderings were posted either:


https://marcon.ca/en/projects/


https://marcon.ca/en/project/elmwood/

Sept 12, 2024:
Excavation complete.


https://www.instagram.com/p/C_08QXjpQSx/?hl=en

[SpongeG]

elmwood was posted before as was Band. Elmwood is above ground now, I pass it at least once a week, i'll try pay more attention when I go by but it was definately at least one floor up already.

the renders conveniently leave out the ugly huge power poles alongside it.

[GMD]

Originally Posted by SpongeG

elmwood was posted before as was Band. Elmwood is above ground now, I pass it at least once a week, i'll try pay more attention when I go by but it was definately at least one floor up already.

the renders conveniently leave out the ugly huge power poles alongside it.

Maybe they are planning to bury them? We can always hope... there used to be poles on the South side of Broadway along there as well after all.

[Burquitlaman]

The Band renderings really threw me off. All this time I was thinking the project is going to be a high tower (on the North side of the lot) with a wood low-rise beside it. Based on these renders, the tall tower is on the southern side of the lot and on the North side there is another concrete tower?

In any case, they're much further along on the North side of the lot.

[gaviscon]

Originally Posted by GMD

Maybe they are planning to bury them? We can always hope... there used to be poles on the South side of Broadway along there as well after all.

I have a bad feeling they won't bury it because the power lines run across Clarke Rd and the Skytrain..

I think developers usually remove the poles first, if they have plans to remove them in the first place.

Image courtesy of Lexus from the Elmwood thread:

[officedweller]

Those are pretty big poles, too.

[GMD]

Originally Posted by officedweller

Those are pretty big poles, too.

Well the ones they removed on the other side of the street also crossed Clarke, but they were buried before the Skytrain came through, I believe.

It's true you might have expected the poles to come down before construction got this far but it could be they are also waiting on Burquitlam Park District development across the street (but probably not, they are probably going to stay, just wishful thinking on my part).

[dpogue]

Those power lines are higher voltage lines going between the Barnard substation and the Como Lake substation. The original wooden posts were replaced in that area with taller metal ones as part of the Evergreen Line construction, to ensure the train could safely pass underneath.

[Snow_Wolf]

3650 Westwood Street, Port Coquitlam
Found out it's easier to take pictures from Woodland Drive. No crazy-tall wall on that side.


Full resolution

2992 Glen Drive, Coquitlam


Full resolution


Full resolution

[jollyburger]

Has this one popped up before? Coquitlam/Arno Matis/OCMI. 2027 completition

OCMI is currently preparing an application to the City of Coquitlam to build a 30-storey tower. The rezoning process typically takes 2 years, but we’ve added a 1-year buffer to account for potential delays. At the 3-year mark, we will decide whether to flip the project to a third party or proceed with construction ourselves.

https://www.ocmi.ca/projects/lougheed-landmark

https://www.arnomatisarchitecture.com/project-coquitlam-rental.php

[gaviscon]

Where is the site location for that?

[jollyburger]

Originally Posted by gaviscon

Where is the site location for that?

576 Lougheed Highway Coquitlam BC. Off of North Road near Anthem's Soco project.

Their project update from September. They might just end up throwing it off to a developer once they finish the rezoning. Entertaining read I wonder if this Arno Matis project gets built or not.

The Lougheed Landmark project remains in the negotiation phase as we finetune the application for the official hearing. The one certainty with development projects is navigating bureaucracy. We have invested hundreds of man hours leading up to the committee meeting based on multiple feedback sources. Our architect is familiar with the process and assures us that this happened on many of his successful rezonings in the past. We have also engaged the services of an urban planning company to help facilitate communications with City staff. Our next step is to submit our application under the C7 zoning.

https://julyono.com/2024-09-20-lougheed-landmark-investor-update/

[Spr0ckets]

Seems like a big one, this.

I hope this is the right place to post this....

"Six towers with nearly 2,000 homes and retail village proposed for massive Port Coquitlam mixed-use redevelopment near SkyTrain"

Local developer Wesbild has submitted a rezoning application to redevelop Poco Place shopping centre, which is located at 2755 Lougheed Highway — the northeast corner of the intersection of Westwood Street and Lougheed Highway.
.....The Poco Place property is a transit-oriented development site directly served by the Westwood Street bus stops for the R3 Lougheed Highway RapidBus. It is also a 15-minute walk from SkyTrain’s Lincoln Station or a 20-minute walk from SkyTrain’s Coquitlam Centre Station.

According to the developer, this would be Port Coquitlam’s first-ever “transit-oriented, high-rise development.” The property is on the geographic fringes of Port Coquitlam but is immediately adjacent to the core of Coquitlam’s designated city centre area — within the realm of influence of the adjacent municipality’s emerging downtown and next to their future high-density redevelopments.

Source :
https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/poco-pla...-coquitlam-wesbild-2755-lougheed-highway