Development Rumours

[Jstaleness]

Originally Posted by DigitalNinja

It says addition, so I assume adding another 5-10 floors.

That would be really nice to see happen. If they were to re-clad the entire building as well it would be a very impressive building. Is Eastlink backing this?

[someone123]

Originally Posted by sdm

two other rumours to come out this past week was a 5 storey to 10 storey addition to Young Tower on Young Street.

The building will provide office space.

Bayers road centre annouced it is considering adding another 5 storey tower above the existing mall near the tim hortons. Again this would add more commercial space.

and the progress of suburban developments out pace the downtown.

Actually I think Young Street and Bayers Road are good places for office buildings. It makes sense for some sorts of businesses to be clustered downtown but doesn't matter for others, and in those cases the peninsula is a better alternative than office parks.

I don't think we will see 80s levels of office construction again downtown anytime soon. I'd be happy with a few new buildings and a better mix of uses, with lots more residential.

As for Agricola Street, that project has been vaguely mentioned for a while as the NSLC lease is terminating. It should be really good for the area, although it's sad that we didn't also get the McCully Worklofts (or at least won't see that built for a while).

[terrynorthend]

Originally Posted by someone123

Actually I think Young Street and Bayers Road are good places for office buildings. It makes sense for some sorts of businesses to be clustered downtown but doesn't matter for others, and in those cases the peninsula is a better alternative than office parks.

I don't think we will see 80s levels of office construction again downtown anytime soon. I'd be happy with a few new buildings and a better mix of uses, with lots more residential.

As for Agricola Street, that project has been vaguely mentioned for a while as the NSLC lease is terminating. It should be really good for the area, although it's sad that we didn't also get the McCully Worklofts (or at least won't see that built for a while).

Another development in that area that seems to have fallen off the earth is the Bottle Exchange site on the corner of Charles and Agricola. There was some sort of funky residential planned for there a couple years ago.

[miesh111]

The Young tower addition is not an addition or an addition of height. They are tearing down the parking garage behind the building and putting in a new, free standing 5 story. There as some confusion of this earlier.

[terrynorthend]

Originally Posted by miesh111

The Young tower addition is not an addition or an addition of height. They are tearing down the parking garage behind the building and putting in a new, free standing 5 story. There as some confusion of this earlier.

That makes more sense. Disappointing though.. I'd wish for a 9 story at least, and the idea of adding height to the current tower was intriguing.

[Dmajackson]

Originally Posted by miesh111

The Young tower addition is not an addition or an addition of height. They are tearing down the parking garage behind the building and putting in a new, free standing 5 story. There as some confusion of this earlier.

Not what I had hoped for really but it will at least give the tower some company since Kaye is hard to see thanks to the brewery.

[JET]

This should be classified as me starting a rumour, based on nothing but hope. Ferguson's Auto parts Ochterloney/Victoria Road is moving later this month. An excellent site for residential development. JET

[eastcoastal]

I think Gottingen Terrace is the townhouse development by the same people who did the building at the corner of Gottingen and Buddy Daye, the duplexes on Creighton St., and the building at the corner of Creighton and Buddy Daye. If this is what I think it is, it's slated for the empty lot that used to be Sobeys lands.

[JET]

Originally Posted by eastcoastal

I think Gottingen Terrace is the townhouse development by the same people who did the building at the corner of Gottingen and Buddy Daye, the duplexes on Creighton St., and the building at the corner of Creighton and Buddy Daye. If this is what I think it is, it's slated for the empty lot that used to be Sobeys lands.

Correct, there is a billboard on the property with with drawings of the proposed development. JET

[halifaxboyns]

I'd like to see the Canada Post Centre move out of it's location by the forum and that whole area redevelop as an office/high density residential pocket. It's certainly got the transit to suppor it.

I'd say office towers between 8 to 12 stories and condos up to 15 and restore the block pattern. Also some public open space and re-do the superstore with condos above.

[sdm]

Originally Posted by halifaxboyns

I'd like to see the Canada Post Centre move out of it's location by the forum and that whole area redevelop as an office/high density residential pocket. It's certainly got the transit to suppor it.

I'd say office towers between 8 to 12 stories and condos up to 15 and restore the block pattern. Also some public open space and re-do the superstore with condos above.

I agree they should relocate out of there, but would perfer residential growth through there.

This city has far too many business parks and if there is more office built i fear the core will suffer. We need office development in the CBD first, and making this site (canada post) residential would be idea as the distance to travel to the core is resonable as compared to living say in bedford and coming to the core.

[halifaxboyns]

Originally Posted by sdm

I agree they should relocate out of there, but would perfer residential growth through there.

This city has far too many business parks and if there is more office built i fear the core will suffer. We need office development in the CBD first, and making this site (canada post) residential would be idea as the distance to travel to the core is resonable as compared to living say in bedford and coming to the core.

From my perspective; I saw it as a ratio. So make the area mostly residential (say 70 to 80%) and then the rest commercial - perhaps 1 more office tower and then strip mall commercial retail units (CRU's).

The location would be great. I'd also suggest redoing the superstore with condos above - I always thought that was visionary for Vancouver to do. Plus since it's mostly surrounded by commercial - whose going to complain with 7 or 8 stories of residential? Plus - more customers!

[halifaxboyns]

I wanted to ask a question about the economic slowdown and projects in Halifax? I've read different things on here - but have many projects other than the huge ones (like Twisted Sisters) been slowed down or stopped?

Here in Calgary it was like everything died. So many big condo projects in the Beltine and the Core just stopped. The Bow and a few office towers have kept going; although one (which finishes next year - has no tenants what so ever).

I know that slowly the 'holes' in the ground of started to get busy with activity again; but two more condo projects in the burbs seem to have stopped around some of the southern LRT stations.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by halifaxboyns

I wanted to ask a question about the economic slowdown and projects in Halifax? I've read different things on here - but have many projects other than the huge ones (like Twisted Sisters) been slowed down or stopped?

It is a strange situation because there are financing problems despite the fact that the local economy in Halifax is doing very well.

It is true that there are a bunch of projects on hold, like United Gulf, Salter, and International Place, but it's important to note that it was never feasible for these to all start at the same time. Part of why we saw so many proposals was that HRM by Design was coming through and developers wanted to get development agreements before any new restrictions came into play. I predict that, of these major proposals, we will see 1-3 actually built over the next few years, while some will be shelved and not reintroduced for 5+ years.

The reality is that there is a lot of construction happening right now in Halifax. I don't think there has been this much in the city since the 80s. The other nice thing is that there's a wide variety of projects of different types all over the city - even Gottingen Street has new things under construction.

Bedford DJ maintains a compilation thread here of projects in the city: http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/showthread.php?t=154160

11 projects are under construction in the city of Halifax alone - including 2 office buildings, academic buildings, condos, and apartments. This is very good for a smaller city. On top of that there's the huge King's Wharf project in Dartmouth, tons of stuff in Bedford...

[someone123]

Allnovascotia is reporting that the Spring Garden-Queen lands should be going up for sale soon. The city plans on selling them off over a six-year period.

Hopefully they'll have the first chunk sold off in the next couple of months. I'm not sure which lot would be best to start off with.. perhaps the Clyde/Queen/Birmingham lot. That one has a lot of potential for a major storefront along Queen and it could complement the library nicely.

The Infirmary lands are a little less important and won't be fully sold off anyway, since Dal has the parking lot on the corner.

HRM by Design has the following requirements for the Clyde Street lots:

Maximum height (with bonus): 28 m
Setback: 0 - 1.5 m
Streetwall Height: 15.5 m on Clyde, 18.5 m on sidestreets

So basically this looks like 8 storey buildings that will step down to a max of 4 storeys or so on Clyde.

[someone123]

There are a bunch of new (to me) renderings up on Geoff Keddy's website...

All of these can be found at http://www.geoffkeddy.com/geoffkeddy/Photos.html?Photos&1

Lucknow Street project


Seymour and Coburg project


Green Lantern Granville Street facade improvements


I think all of these look pretty good. I really like the Granville design and it could go well with the redevelopment of the building next door and United Gulf towers, plus the red Roy Building side - this is going to be an area of modern looking architecture if it ever gets going.

Seymour and Coburg to me looks like it's for the Needs site next to the new Dal building. If somebody takes a wrecking ball to the red brick apartments and brown metal house across the street this will be a lovely area. I really like the residential side streets north of Dal and the houses along Coburg Rd.

[fenwick16]

These look interesting. Is the Green Lantern approved as shown above (I would be surprised if the Heritage Trust doesn't oppose it based on it not fitting it with the surrounding buildings).

[phrenic]

Holy 🞵🞵🞵🞵, these look like they were actually conceived of this century. Awesome.

[spaustin]

Originally Posted by fenwick16

These look interesting. Is the Green Lantern approved as shown above (I would be surprised if the Heritage Trust doesn't oppose it based on it not fitting it with the surrounding buildings).

The Green Lantern is a small project. Maybe it's as of right? I don't know what there would be to object to about having a modern back on the Green Lantern. The back of it right now is just a mess. They're going to rebuild the front and there isn't anything significant on Granville anymore. Some modern architecture would look good in the area given the cartoonish colouring of MEC.

[MonctonRad]

Originally Posted by fenwick16

These look interesting. Is the Green Lantern approved as shown above (I would be surprised if the Heritage Trust doesn't oppose it based on it not fitting it with the surrounding buildings).

I approve of #1 and #2. The third rendering of the building next to MEC I find rather bizarre though. What's the height limitation on this block?