The LFP highlights all the potential tower plans downtown. A nice recap...
http://www.lfpress.com/2015/08/28/high-stakes-high-hopes-and-highrises#
In a city already awash with new downtown residential highrises, even more are coming — so many, so high, there are even complaints one would block another’s million-dollar views.
Pie-in-the-sky proposals, you say? Not the way the industry and city hall see things. Norman De Bono reports.
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It’s like a massive, residential suburb climbing into the sky above downtown London.
Nine highrise residential towers are proposed for the city’s core.
Add downtown midrise and highrise buildings in nearby Old East London to the mix and that jumps to 15 new buildings totalling about 2,900 residential units, a towering change for the city’s look and fabric.
It will change not just the city’s skyline but also its bottom line. Because if they’re all built, those projects would pump an extra $7.2 million a year into city coffers.
“It is a huge growth engine for London’s economy,” said Vito Frijia, president of the Southside Group, one of the city’s most active builders.
Each unit will provide the city with anywhere from $2,000 to $2,500 a year in tax revenue. And that doesn’t include the million-dollar penthouse units atop most highrises, Frijia said.
“It is income for the city, tax base for the city. It’s a lot of money.”
The city also calculates 1.5 residents a unit, meaning the ones on the books could bring 4,800 more residents to the more than 4,000 already in the core.
Those who follow London’s building sector say the city can absorb all those units, but it may take time to build them all and some may be still leasing space five or even 10 years from now.
“These will all not happen at the same time. Look at the (London Mews) site. It will be a $300-million development, but it was sold 15 years ago,” Frijia said.
The downtown demand is being driven by a few key factors, say those in the industry.
Seniors and retirees are selling off their four-bedroom suburban homes and want a smaller, simpler lifestyle, a continent-wide trend felt in London.
London is also attracting Toronto retirees, selling big homes and settling where it’s more affordable.
“People want to be in the core, they don’t want to be on the periphery,” Frijia said.
The wider city is also growing at a rate of about one per cent a year, or more than 3,000 new people, many of whom may want a downtown lifestyle.
“A lot of the demand is for downtown and everyone wants new and improved design, with an open-concept look,” Frijia said.
London is also at the “front of the trend” and downtown building may accelerate even faster, said Greg Priamo, a partner and planning consultant with Zelinka Priamo, a private planning firm in London.
“There is no question the approach of the city is that downtown London is the target for density,” he said. “We may see 5,000 more units downtown in the next 10 to 20 years.”
“Typical” of what’s happening in other cities, “London is not extraordinary” and will grow into all the highrise developments in the mix, he said. “I think they will all be developed in the fullness of time.”
If downtown is the target, the bull’s-eye is the massive, nearly 700-unit, $300-million Danford London development, also called Ayerswood, right in the middle of downtown on the former London Mews mall site, between King and Dundas streets at Clarence Street.
It will be a phased development, taking years to build, but will change the city.
“There is no question about that,” Priamo said. “It will be positive, it will bring people downtown and they will view the core as a neighbourhood and not just as a place to visit. That is the goal. The city is aiming to change downtown.”
John Fleming, the city’s planning director, said he isn’t surprised by the building interest in the core. He credits a combination of factors, including the North American trend back to city centres from the suburbs. Another is London’s policy to waive development charges, the fees builders are charged to help pay for growth, as an incentive to build more housing downtown and in nearby Old East London.
“I am very bullish on the downtown and its future,” he said. “Attitudes about living in urban environments throughout North America are changing.”
Fleming also pointed to major public investments made downtown since the late 1990s — Bud Gardens, Covent Garden Market, London Convention Centre and London Public Library — as a contributor. Still more may be on the way with the city’s new Downtown Plan proposing a revamped Dundas streetscape, upgraded forks of the Thames waterfront and pedestrian walkways in the core, to name a few.
Such attractions, offering better quality of living, not only make the core more attractive but have a “snowball effect (that) attracts more investment,” Fleming said.
The tower boom also fits hand-in-glove with a new vision for the city’s future, the London Plan, which foresees a more compact city built inward and upward in the core, with rapid transit feeding into it.
As for how many of the new towers pitched will be built, Fleming is confident but preaches patience.
“I always keep an eye on the long game. Some of them may be five or 10 years out. I can see a large number coming to the core. But if it takes 10 years for some of them, that is the way the market works.”
The downtown boom started with the building of CityPlace, a two-tower, $24-million development built by Drewlo Holdings on Dundas Street at Waterloo Street about 12 years ago. Tricar Group then built the first of its Renaissance towers on King Street more than five years ago, and the second opened in 2013. Demand has been brisk since.
“It’s really all about changing demographics,” Frijia said.
Fleming made it clear the city is making its presence felt in the look of any new towers. It wants high design standards. The planning department suggested 32 improvements to the Tricar Group’s recent Talbot Street proposal.
“I do see the critical importance of quality design. We need to create great neighbourhood environments and pay attention to design,” he said.
That’s a fine standard, as long as it doesn’t lead to micro-managing which can kill development, countered development lawyer Alan Patton, a partner in Patton Cormier Ferreira which represents many builders.
“A problem with development, not just downtown but elsewhere, is there is insistence on meddling in urban design matters,” Patton said.
“That leads to endless talks with city planning officials. I ask them what unsightly buildings have been built that are not adequate in urban design, and they can’t point to one.”
He cited classic London office buildings such as One London Place, City Centre and Talbot Centre as buildings that went up without city design influence.
“They are land-use planners, not architects, and they criticize proposals from world-class Toronto architects,” Patton said of city officials.
He also questioned the degree to which the Downtown Plan, with a broad walkway planned from the Via train station on York Street to Dundas, cutting through the proposed Danford development, as an example of city over-planning in the core.
“There have been obstacles that slowed the applications,” Patton said.
Priamo said he’s heard concerns from builders about the city micro-managing and meddling, but noted he works with planners in other cities and there’s little difference.
“It is a legitimate concern — there is no question. But it is prevalent in most large municipalities. In some cases they are better, in other cases worse. They’re pretty typical.”
As for whether all the new buildings in the mix will be filled or even built, Patton said builders do their homework and don’t casually take on tens of millions of dollars in debt.
“These are experienced developers, they have growing confidence in London and in the downtown,” he said.
“They watch growth trends and they are seeing that some investments made by the city have been helpful. There is a vibrant private sector downtown, on Richmond Row and King Street, and they believe these are prudent investments if they can get co-operation from the city planning department.”
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DOWNTOWN RESIDENTIAL HIGHRISES
Who, where, how big and where they’re at in the proposal or planning stages:
505 Talbot St.
Tricar Group, 30 storeys, 199 units. Approved by city planning and environment committee; to city council Tuesday for final approval.
183 King St.
Southside Group, 25 storeys, 200 units. Developer Vito Frijia preparing site-plan application to submit in about two months. Earlier bid to tear down a building, deemed historically important rejected.
560 and 562 Wellington St. at Wolfe Street.
Auburn Developments, 188 units, 25- storeys, just north of Centennial Hall. Site-plan application city has is on hold, after opposition from nearby Woodfield area. Has been called out of character for the area; would loom over Victoria Park and Victorian homes.
50 King St.
Middlesex County, 30 storeys, 200 units. City has site-plan application, but project opposed by residents in nearby Renaissance Towers who fear it will block their spectacular views.
King and Clarence streets, former London Mews site
Danford London, two towers, 35 and 32 storeys, total 698 units; third low-rise building with retail and commercial space and some residential. Value believed to be $300 million. Builder Tony Graat seeking rezoning; in talks with city over pedestrian walkway planning department wants through the space.
Horton and Waterloo
Creative Property Development, 15- to 25-storey highrise on historic railway Roundhouse site. Early days, city has no site-plan application.
96 Ridout St. S.
Zoning approved, Tricar, 22-storey condo tower, 191 units — one-bedroom, two-bedroom and penthouse.
Talbot and Fullarton area
Rygar Developments, 33-storey, 248 units, $100 million. Proposal to build at 100 Fullarton fell through when site could not be bought; now shifted to a nearby site at Fullarton and Talbot. Zoning approved.
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DOWNTOWN MIDRISES
89 Ridout St. S.
Tricar building a four-storey with 35 units.
310 Central Ave. and 581-585 Central Ave.
Six-storey, 35 units, by B.J. Hardick. Zoning approved.
356 Dundas St.
Six storeys, 69 units, by Yossie Lavie. Has applied to city.
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ELSEWHERE
Dundas Street at Lyle Street, Old East Village
Medallion, site-plan application made for third apartment tower, 22-storey, 299 units. Zoning approved to join sister towers, one 24-storey, 325-unit at King and Hewitt streets, the other 21-storey, 292-unit mid-block along King Street.
250 to 272 Springbank Dr., near the Coves
Rand Developments, two 14-storey highrises. Originally denied by city, developer won an Ontario Municipal Board ruling giving project new life. City preparing a site-plan application it has to take to the OMB.
Former South Street Hospital site
1,050 units in highrises; 450 in midrise buildings. City sought and received expressions of interest from developers and will issue request for proposals to build by year-end.
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WHO’S LIVING DOWNTOWN
More than 4,000 people, 75% growth from 1996 to 2011.
Most residents are between 20 and 40 years old.
Median household income has risen 46% over the last decade, to $50,553 from $34,667.
Total core property assessment rose 61% from 2004 to 2013, from $654.4 million to more than $1 billion.
Store vacancies fell to 11.5% from 12.1% from 2011 to 2013.
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SO, YOU WANT TO BUILD A HIGHRISE?
It takes, as one developer puts it, “big-boy pants,” including:
Three development phases — buying the land, getting city hall approval and getting financing.
The lot needs to be at least an acre, with enough room for parking, usually a garage on lower levels.
Builder then has to prepare to apply to city hall to get the plan approved, called site-plan approval.
Experts — architects, planners, structural and mechanical engineers and geo-technical consultants — need to be hired to prepare the building design.
There may also be a host of needed studies, such as on traffic impact, noise and vibration and shadows, urban design, soil tests or evironmental assessment and, in some cases, a heritage impact study.
Once completed, the application with the design goes to the city planning department. That begins a series of negotiations about urban design guidelines, the project’s look, parking and impact on the neighbourhood. Planners critique and recommend changes.
At this point, the builder has spent about $200,000 just to make the application, not including buying the land.
When the builder and planning staff agree, it goes to the politicians, the city’s planning and environment committee and then to full city council, where even more changes may occur before approval.
After all that, it’s time to get the money: A builder will need about $40 million for a 29-storey tower.
Banks, even if they grant the loan, will only offer up half. The builder needs to supply the rest.
The loan, and interest, will be repaid once rents start flowing in. That may take years. It’s why builders often have several projects on the go at the same time.
“You have to have the capital, you need to have your big-boy pants on. It’s a huge investment,” says Vito Frijia, president, Southside Group in London.
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