[Burnaby] Southgate City | Phase 1 Completed

[officedweller]

Thanks for the update on those.

[BaddieB]

Originally Posted by Vin

Lol. A bunch of nonsense. Lots of Burnaby haters out there triggered by the City's sound development I see. Fact is, where can you find skytrain stations beside SFH neighbourhoods in Burnaby? You must be mistaking Vancouver for Burnaby.

This is embarrassing to post. Do you not have access to Google Maps?

[Vin]

Originally Posted by GenWhy?

It's a wee bit trcky because most skytrain stations are in industrial / former industrial areas but:
- Holdom
- Sperling (1 block north)
- Lake City Way (maybe)
- Production Way
- Royal oak

And aren't these areas already high-density or going to be high-density soon? There is so much vacant or underutilized land around Skytrain stations I'm not sure why they should target the SFH areas further away from the stations. Only morons would think that the SFH areas ought to be demolished while those parcels around the stations and large parking lots remain undeveloped.

Originally Posted by BaddieB

This is embarrassing to post. Do you not have access to Google Maps?

See above. No comments on the much older Vancouver stations built beside SFHs? Double standards.

[dleung]

Originally Posted by Klazu

One could also take Royal Oak off that list. Sure, there are no towers right next to the station, but few blocks over is building up like crazy.

Out of curiosity I streetviewed the area, and I have to say Polaris is a pleasant under-the-radar surprise. It's merely an inoffensive design, but it looks like they made a number of good choices with a mid-market budget, starting with a simple palette of materials, and dark spandrel that disappears really nicely - if all the spandrel in the city had that shade of green I wouldn't hate spandrel so much. And the metal panelling - yes, always go for black when in doubt.

[DoubleCH]

The crane at Icon has been torn down for quite a while but today they used a helicopter to haul (crane?) parts from the roof to the ground. I thought that would be quite an uncommon move. It's not like they need to haul a huge A/C unit to the roof. Each part they took down was relatively small.

https://youtu.be/sIcV249mbhg

[Lexus]

2025, Mar 22

I took another video with helicopter

• Video Link

Untitled by Lexus LX, on Flickr

Untitled by Lexus LX, on Flickr

Untitled by Lexus LX, on Flickr

[osirisboy]

The low rises and high rises are disjointed. They don’t go together whatsoever

[jollyburger]

Some detailed drone shots of the building

https://www.instagram.com/p/DDFVAnzPRlO/?img_index=1

[jasonpark]

Third tower seems to be moving along slowly. Still a few months away from completion. Do not think walkthroughs have been done yet. Landscaping and lobby are still being finished



https://i.ibb.co/r2d4yHLf/IMG-0570.jpg
https://i.ibb.co/YFMqsfhx/IMG-0572.jpg

[Burquitlaman]

My thing with these towers is the area. I'm just wondering why you would buy here when Lougheed and Burquitlam are so close? The latter two locations have the advantage of better transportation access (highway, Hastings, sky train lines, more walkable etc.)

Both B and L also have a ton of new towers to choose from, plus YMCA and the new recreation center. I believe Icon has a recreation center beside it no? So even that one advantage is basically moot. Help me out here... is it a cheaper area to buy?

[officedweller]

It's an oddball area built-up as a result of the former Safeway/Lucerne distribution site.
It's not an ideal location, as you mention, because its not really close to SkyTrain or major road transportation routes.
It will have its own supermarket to make up for that deficiency.
I don't think Ledingham McAllister would be cheap.
It may be quieter for retirees, and it's close to New West and Surrey if you go there often.

[jollyburger]

I wonder what Brentwood will be like traffic wise once it's more developed and there are 10-15 more towers. I mean it's central but it just feels like it's going to be more gridlocked even with minimal car usage.

[officedweller]

It's true that you may not want to live in the thick of things.
I live on the edge of Yaletown next to the busy Cambie Bridge, still walkable to the office, but that makes it easy to drive in and out of the downtown to the south if I need to.
I would not want to live in the middle of the downtown (i.e. Hornby, Howe, etc.) because if you need to drive out of the city (to the south), you need to deal with a lot more traffic.

[jasonpark]

Originally Posted by Burquitlaman

My thing with these towers is the area. I'm just wondering why you would buy here when Lougheed and Burquitlam are so close? The latter two locations have the advantage of better transportation access (highway, Hastings, sky train lines, more walkable etc.)

Both B and L also have a ton of new towers to choose from, plus YMCA and the new recreation center. I believe Icon has a recreation center beside it no? So even that one advantage is basically moot. Help me out here... is it a cheaper area to buy?

Good question. I personally live at Southgate currently but I lived at Lougheed for a year, so I can provide my perspective. I think the primary reason why people choose this area over Lougheed or Burquitlam is quite simple. If you open Google Maps, there is a community center 1 minute away, a high school 1 minute away, multiple elementary schools a few minutes away, and a new day care 2 minutes away. Plus your kids can walk to school without worrying about highway traffic. I don't even know if there is a single school on the coquitlam side of lougheed within a 30 minute walk. Closest highschool on the burnaby side of lougheed is a 30 minute walk away as well.

If you have kids, this is essentially the perfect place to live. Majority of the people living in this community are families with multiple kids. You can sign-up your kids for hockey, track and field, soccer, and it's all within a 1 minute walk away. The skytrain station is far enough where the sketchy petty crime people do not roam around this area but close enough to walk to take the skytrain for work. Any condos close to skytrain will get more crime, especially the condos in the lougheed area.

Lastly, the units in these towers are quite big, close to what you will find in townhouses or low-rise wood frames. 2 bedroom is minimum 850-900sqft. One bedroom is around 650sqft. There are plenty of 3 bedroom units as well.

I think you can probably find better value in wood frame condos further into Coquitlam, Surrey, or Langley if you want to be close to skytrain, schools, and community centres. But, I don't think you can find anything for similar price in Burnaby at the moment. Closest might be Royal Oak area with all the new townhouses. But they built all of them literally next to the skytrain path. You can hear the skytrain go past you every 5 minutes which makes no sense to me how anyone could sleep.

[GMD]

Originally Posted by jasonpark

Good question. I personally live at Southgate currently but I lived at Lougheed for a year, so I can provide my perspective. I think the primary reason why people choose this area over Lougheed or Burquitlam is quite simple. If you open Google Maps, there is a community center 1 minute away, a high school 1 minute away, multiple elementary schools a few minutes away, and a new -care 2 minutes away. Plus your kids can walk to school without worrying about highway traffic. I don't even know if there is a single school on the coquitlam side of lougheed within a 30 minute walk. Closest highschool on the burnaby side of lougheed is a 30 minute walk away as well.

If you have kids, this is essentially the perfect place to live. Majority of the people living in this community are families with multiple kids. You can sign-up your kids for hockey, track and field, soccer, and it's all within a 1 minute walk away. The skytrain station is far enough where the sketchy petty crime people do not roam around this area but close enough to walk to take the skytrain for work. Any condos close to skytrain will get more crime, especially the condos in the lougheed area.

Lastly, the units in these towers are quite big, close to what you will find in townhouses or low-rise wood frames. 2 bedroom is minimum 850-900sqft. One bedroom is around 650sqft. There are plenty of 3 bedroom units as well.

I think you can probably find better value in wood frame condos further into Coquitlam, Surrey, or Langley if you want to be close to skytrain, schools, and community centres. But, I don't think you can find anything for similar price in Burnaby at the moment. Closest might be Royal Oak area with all the new townhouses. But they built all of them literally next to the skytrain path. You can hear the skytrain go past you every 5 minutes which makes no sense to me how anyone could sleep.

I appreciate this detailed perspective. To my mind, it just shows that different areas will appeal to different people, and that is ultimately the beauty of a market based (rather than centrally planned) approach, let developers figure out where people want to live and what kind of units people want/need to live in, and let them build them. And if they screw it up too badly, they go under and get replaced by someone more competent.

[Burquitlaman]

Originally Posted by jasonpark

Good question. I personally live at Southgate currently but I lived at Lougheed for a year, so I can provide my perspective. I think the primary reason why people choose this area over Lougheed or Burquitlam is quite simple. If you open Google Maps, there is a community center 1 minute away, a high school 1 minute away, multiple elementary schools a few minutes away, and a new day care 2 minutes away. Plus your kids can walk to school without worrying about highway traffic. I don't even know if there is a single school on the coquitlam side of lougheed within a 30 minute walk. Closest highschool on the burnaby side of lougheed is a 30 minute walk away as well.

If you have kids, this is essentially the perfect place to live. Majority of the people living in this community are families with multiple kids. You can sign-up your kids for hockey, track and field, soccer, and it's all within a 1 minute walk away. The skytrain station is far enough where the sketchy petty crime people do not roam around this area but close enough to walk to take the skytrain for work. Any condos close to skytrain will get more crime, especially the condos in the lougheed area.

Lastly, the units in these towers are quite big, close to what you will find in townhouses or low-rise wood frames. 2 bedroom is minimum 850-900sqft. One bedroom is around 650sqft. There are plenty of 3 bedroom units as well.

I think you can probably find better value in wood frame condos further into Coquitlam, Surrey, or Langley if you want to be close to skytrain, schools, and community centres. But, I don't think you can find anything for similar price in Burnaby at the moment. Closest might be Royal Oak area with all the new townhouses. But they built all of them literally next to the skytrain path. You can hear the skytrain go past you every 5 minutes which makes no sense to me how anyone could sleep.

Thanks for the detailed perspective. Brought up good points. With respect to kids, my wife and I don't have any. I wasn't thinking about kids at all. I can imagine the convenience of not having to worry about getting kids to school in the morning (and back) when they're across the street. The school looks very decent as well.

Re. size, I had no idea! Thanks for the info. In my current space we're quite cramped. I suddenly have a reason to think about Southgate if we ever sell the current place (sadly, not anytime soon).

[jasonpark]

Originally Posted by A320

Burnaby eliminates affordable rental requirement in Southeast burnaby, except for Southgate city: https://www.burnabynow.com/local-new...urhood-9659228

Interesting to see that they have singled out this one project. Is that fair? I wonder if LedMac will speak out/consider legal action.

Looks like they did speak out against it in a letter to the Council

https://pub-burnaby.escribemeetings....cumentId=78562

[BaddieB]

deleted

[jasonpark]

Icon has been completed and looks ready for move-in. Out of all three towers, this tower looks the best. Reminds of a high end hotel. Believe move-ins should happen in the coming weeks.

[Lexus]

2025, Sep 8

Untitled by Lexus LX 700, on Flickr

Untitled by Lexus LX 700, on Flickr

Untitled by Lexus LX 700, on Flickr

Untitled by Lexus LX 700, on Flickr

Untitled by Lexus LX 700, on Flickr

Untitled by Lexus LX 700, on Flickr

Future phase 2

Untitled by Lexus LX 700, on Flickr