[Halifax] Promenade Robie South | 90 m | 31 & 30 fl | U/C

[Keith P.]

Originally Posted by IanWatson

What the rendering doesn't show is the Dexel proposal at the corner of Spring Garden and Robie. Those towers are going to be tight together!

So the old Coburg Apartments on that corner are finally going to meet their make? I was unaware of that. I was always curious about that building and how the units inside were. Never knew anyone who lived there.

[OldDartmouthMark]

Originally Posted by JET

30 years ago I had a basement apartment at 1465 Carlton St. A family lived above, and it was very well maintained. Since it was sold and made into more apartments the decline is painful to see. There should be laws that maintain the Heritage Street Scape. In some parts of the US all changes to historic houses must be approved and buildings maintained. I expect that this will never happen in Halifax. I had hoped that Wade and Sam might do something about maintaining historic heritage, but disappointingly no.

Anecdotally, I believe it exists to some extent in parts of Halifax, as a former coworker who was living in the Hydrostones had to apply to make any changes which may alter the appearance of the structure, but this may have just the Hydrostones?

Looking through the proposal, it seems that just one of the College Street victorians will be moved, so presumably the others will be leveled. Definitely no restrictions there, unfortunately.

[Keith P.]

Originally Posted by OldDartmouthMark

Looking through the proposal, it seems that just one of the College Street victorians will be moved, so presumably the others will be leveled. Definitely no restrictions there, unfortunately.

I'm not totally sure of that. On Carlton starting at the west side corner of College St there are 3 (and maybe a 4th, not sure) dumpy Victorians side by side that all appear to be student apartments which likely are all beyond saving. So perhaps those will be razed to make space to move a few survivors there.

[OldDartmouthMark]

Originally Posted by Keith P.

I'm not totally sure of that. On Carlton starting at the west side corner of College St there are 3 (and maybe a 4th, not sure) dumpy Victorians side by side that all appear to be student apartments which likely are all beyond saving. So perhaps those will be razed to make space to move a few survivors there.

I was going from the following text in the proposal which indicates that 5969 College will be moved to what was the back yard of the Carlton properties:

The alteration proposal is to move a registered municipal heritage building from its current location at 5969 College Street to a nearby location on College Street in the rear yards of two municipal heritage properties located in the registered heritage streetscape along Carlton Street.

However, currently (on Google streetside) in that 'back yard' location is a rather uninspired 1970s-looking brick and glass structure, and the renderings show both 5969 and another victorian building in the location, so it's not really clear.

[Drybrain]

Originally Posted by OldDartmouthMark

Anecdotally, I believe it exists to some extent in parts of Halifax, as a former coworker who was living in the Hydrostones had to apply to make any changes which may alter the appearance of the structure, but this may have just the Hydrostones?

Maybe he/she had an especially historic one with a particular desigation? I own a Hydrostone and there are definitely no restrictions on exterior renovations. The quantity of vinyl siding is evidence of that, but people are constantly adding dormers and mud rooms and all kinds of things that mess with the architectural integrity of the blocks.

[OldDartmouthMark]

Originally Posted by Drybrain

Maybe he/she had an especially historic one with a particular desigation? I own a Hydrostone and there are definitely no restrictions on exterior renovations. The quantity of vinyl siding is evidence of that, but people are constantly adding dormers and mud rooms and all kinds of things that mess with the architectural integrity of the blocks.

I don't know the details, but it was a number of years ago, though. IIRC, I think he was wanting to add a dormer but he told me was that it needed to be approved based on appearance, not structure.

Have you actually applied to do renovations? He found out during the process to get a permit, from what I remember.

[eastcoastal]

Well - it gets points for integrating those heritage buildings at College/Carelton (including the relocation of one)... and the massing seems decent. I can't say that I'm a fan of the style yet.

[eastcoastal]

... and I see there are sunken courtyards at the heritage buildings. Not sure that'll be a nice space/garbage pit.

[someone123]

An article about this proposal going to the local PAC: https://www.thestar.com/halifax/2018...f-the-top.html

Impossible to know if the article is capturing the gist of what the committee members said or picking out specific themes, but the focus on height is unfortunate. I also dislike how some people involved in the planning process seem to think that they are doing market planning, trying to match demand to supply through picking the right number of units to approve. They will not do a better job of this than the city's vibrant housing market will. The job of planners is to manage coordination issues that developers will not, e.g. make sure the public services needed for a development can be provided and make sure a development doesn't have an outsized negative impact on neighbours.

The height focus is annoying because the choice of 26 vs 20 storeys is arbitrary and unimportant. Of course nobody mentioned or was quoted mentioning that this proposal looks like it's from 2002, and there was no talk of materials, quality, or urban design. Planning is not only about height and density.

[Keith P.]

Meanwhile those two paragons of progress and growth, Peggy Cameron and Howard Epstein, weigh in.

http://www.thechronicleherald.ca/new...unters-245035/

“Over 50 per cent of the buildings (in that area) are heritage protected,” said Peggy Cameron, co-chairwoman of the Friends of Halifax Common. “Another 11 have been identified as potential, or what would qualify as, heritage buildings. The city has never worked on that request, they’ve only worked on what the developers want.”

...

“Most of the comments at the committee meeting were around the mapping, the density that would be added to the neighbourhood,” said Coun. Lindell Smith, who represents Halifax Peninsula North on regional council and sits on both the planning advisory committee and the Halifax and west community council.

Smith said the block is a prime corner but said the question arises about too much density, especially with a Drexel Developments project slated for the same block. That proposal for the Spring Garden Road side consists of two towers of 30 and 16 storeys with 250 residential units and 60,000 square feet of office space and 21,000 square feet of ground floor retail space. In August, the peninsula planning committee recommended that the Halifax and west community council approve the development with lowered tower heights of 16 to 20 storeys to conform to the municipal Centre Plan, still in its own development stage.

The Robie, College and Carlton application would require amendments to the municipal planning strategy and land-use bylaw. The applicant has proposed substantial alterations to three registered municipal heritage properties, including moving two of them, one from 5969 College St., to a nearby College location in the near yards of two other municipal heritage properties.

Proposed alterations to heritage properties upset Cameron, who says requests in 2012 and 2016 from her group to establish an area conservation district in that area have been ignored by the city.

Cameron said that Howard Epstein, a former city councillor and former MLA, sent a letter to Mayor Mike Savage in August inquiring about the requests for a conservation district but received no reply.

“Proposals for the towers shouldn’t be proceeding until those requests are considered,” Cameron said. “All of this evidence that this is an historic neighbourhood and it should be a heritage conservation district has been ignored because a couple of developers have been playing monopoly on the block and they are going to spend a lot of money to be able to railroad through all the rules. That’s the only reason that block has ever been considered as a targeted growth area under the Centre Plan is that two developers want to do developments there. It hasn’t got anything to do with demonstrated need or even capacity.”

Cameron said an already approved 18-storey highrise to be developed by Killam Properties next to the Camp Hill Cemetery on Carlton Street will satisfy the bulk of HRM’s growth target of 400 additional residents for the area.

[OldDartmouthMark]

The concern about heritage properties is a valid one, though it's been observed before that 'heritage protection' doesn't really protect anything, so even if she got what she was asking for it wouldn't mean that the buildings were safe from being torn down.

However, I don't believe that the density argument is valid. More density will not hurt the area - the opposite is true, I believe.

IMHO, these are mutually exclusive arguments, and they should both be able to be addressed. More height could be added to the towers to achieve density with a smaller footprint, and thus allow for preservation of the heritage properties.

Interestingly, they are both huge developments - collectively taking up most of the block in question - but the renderings of each one show the existing buildings in place (as would be expected). We don't really have an accurate rendition of what that area will be with both developments in place, and I think that leaves people lacking how significant the total change will be.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by OldDartmouthMark

The concern about heritage properties is a valid one, though it's been observed before that 'heritage protection' doesn't really protect anything, so even if she got what she was asking for it wouldn't mean that the buildings were safe from being torn down.

It's valid to question why a relatively vibrant and historic area is being torn down for redevelopment when there are so many underused sites around. I don't think that is something individual developers can fix though, or that development of the city should be put on hold. That would just push more development out to the suburbs and put more strain on infrastructure.

I don't agree that this is a pair of enormous developments that should be considered out of scale for the city. The city is growing rapidly now and most land is off limits for redevelopment. Halifax can't grow by 8,000-10,000 people per year AND have stable inner-city neighbourhoods with at most tiny boutique developments AND have affordable housing AND limit suburban sprawl. Something has to give, and the best and most feasible option right now is to allow taller buildings. The expanded tax base that these buildings bring in can be used to pay for things like affordable housing and heritage preservation.

Folks like Peggy Cameron tend to argue against whatever they don't like without talking about the (bad) trade-offs. That comment about old mixed-use areas being "up to 40% denser" is BS. This debate is about a particular block and these developments will create far more residential units than what exists there now. That's part of the reason why these buildings are triggering NIMBYism.

[Drybrain]

Originally Posted by someone123

It's valid to question why a relatively vibrant and historic area is being torn down for redevelopment when there are so many underused sites around. I don't think that is something individual developers can fix though, or that development of the city should be put on hold. That would just push more development out to the suburbs and put more strain on infrastructure.

I don't agree that this is a pair of enormous developments that should be considered out of scale for the city. The city is growing rapidly now and most land is off limits for redevelopment. Halifax can't grow by 8,000-10,000 people per year AND have stable inner-city neighbourhoods with at most tiny boutique developments AND have affordable housing AND limit suburban sprawl. Something has to give, and the best and most feasible option right now is to allow taller buildings. The expanded tax base that these buildings bring in can be used to pay for things like affordable housing and heritage preservation.

Folks like Peggy Cameron tend to argue against whatever they don't like without talking about the (bad) trade-offs. That comment about old mixed-use areas being "up to 40% denser" is BS. This debate is about a particular block and these developments will create far more residential units than what exists there now. That's part of the reason why these buildings are triggering NIMBYism.

I've actually spoken to Cameron about issues like this, and she likes to cite the Stantec report from 2012 on population growth and peninsula development to argue that larger buildings aren't needed. That was a dodgy argument back then, but the city's recent population growth, and the much larger proportion of it that's begun accruing to the regional centre, has shot way up, pretty much invalidating the assumptions of the Stantec report.

She basically doesn't have a good answer as to how to accommodate the city's growth, just a lot of not-very-apt comparisons to other cities with denser historic development. I have no problem with her criticizing the current development paradigm, but if she can't propose feasible alternatives, I don't know what to say. She basically insists on mostly stable residential areas (she does seem fine with infill to some degree, and in-law suites, etc) but no significant change in building stock. And then she's advocated dor a six-storey maximum everywhere else. It's just not enough to house people.

Specific to this site, the argument that older neighbourhoods are denser doesn't hold here. This development will replace one very crappy 1980s-looking mid-rise apartment building, a fairly mediocre 1930s-looking building, and four historic houses. Of the four houses on the site, two will be preserved in-situ and one will be moved, so we'll end up losing only one historic house (the one right at the corner. The development proposal makes it sound as if this will be moved too, but I can't see it on the site plan or renderings.)

I actually think it's a great house, and would like to see it retained and restored. But ultimately, to build this entire project, we'll lose exactly one single good building. It seems like a pretty good heritage trade-off.

I've said it before, but my beef with this development has nothing to do with scale (this area is the most appropriate in the city for it) or heritage issues, but the ugly brown mish-mash of the towers. Especially contrasted with what's going up immediately to the north, it's pretty hideous. I'm hoping for a redesign, but not a scale-down.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by Drybrain

I actually think it's a great house, and would like to see it retained and restored. But ultimately, to build this entire project, we'll lose exactly one single good building. It seems like a pretty good heritage trade-off.

With a bit more coordination it might be possible to have more Morris House type projects in Halifax. The city is full of house-sized holes, particularly in the North End. HRM could maintain a list of potential host sites, give out some tax breaks to those property owners (e.g. you don't pay more tax if you replace your empty lot with a house; partly this just makes up for broken property tax incentives), and then get developers to pay the moving and restoration costs in exchange for their density bonus.

This is the kind of approach that is not economical with 6 storey infill projects but is very economical with 400 unit highrise redevelopments. It is something groups like the Heritage Trust can love, and even Peggy Cameron would probably be OK with these houses ending up in a stable residential area. It provides a path for Halifax to densify without losing as much heritage.

Example empty lot:

https://www.google.com/maps/@44.6562...7i16384!8i8192

What used to be there?


Source

The city also needs to get more serious about encouraging landlords to keep heritage buildings in good condition. This is another "bigger, growing city" adjustment. Some of these properties are worth millions and are huge cash cows whether they are developed or not. And they are valuable because of the quality of the environment they are in. It's not unreasonable to expect landlords to keep up with their neighbourhood.

This should not be acceptable:

https://www.google.com/maps/@44.6407...7i13312!8i6656

This ties in with the point about moving houses because landlords tend to neglect buildings for years and then conveniently argue that they are tear-downs.

[mleblanc]

Ah yes, the parking lot and student slum conservation area must be protected at all costs. Our city will be a cultureless pit without them!

[Keith P.]

To what should be nobody's surprise, Peggy Cameron and co. return, this time with a new label for their anti-development group:

https://www.thechronicleherald.ca/ne...-group-274789/

A Halifax citizens group doesn’t like the way two development proposals for the west end of Spring Garden Road are being presented.

“It’s a very dishonest process because no one has been able to see these buildings together,” said Peggy Cameron of the Development Options Halifax group.

The two proposed projects would create a combined four towers. Kassner Goodspeed Architects has applied to develop a 0.6-hectare lot at Robie, College and Carlton streets, to build separate towers of 26 and 20 storeys. The building, providing 400 residential units and 32,000 square feet of commercial space, would require the relocation of a registered heritage building at 5969 College St.

Dexel Developments wants to develop an adjacent half-hectare lot, providing 250 residential units, 60,000 square feet of office space and 21,000 square feet of commercial space. That development would feature two towers of 30 and 16 storeys.

Cameron said both projects are large, with a combined footprint that is more than three-quarters the size of Nova Centre. The proposed towers would abut the western edge of Carlton Street, a unique designated heritage streetscape recognized by the federal, provincial and municipal governments, she said.

“People know they are large but they haven’t been able to understand how large they are because there have been invididual meetings for each proposal but never anything that looked at them together.”

Separate public meetings were held a week apart this spring to discuss the two projects.

“Clearly, staff have acknowledged that the two are happening adjacent to each other and included that information in the public meetings,” said Waye Mason, municipal councillor for the area.

Staff presentations at the June 4 and 11 public meetings did provide slides that introduced the projects that were proposed for adjacent lots.

This weekend, Cameron and her group will display renderings of the adjacent developments created by Dalhousie University architecture students Hadrian Laing and Sara Haroun at the Glitter Bean Cafe on Spring Garden Road, across the road from the proposed developments.

“We are reimagining what this development could look like, providing alternatives,” Laing said Thursday.

Laing said a three-dimensional model that is in the works will allow stakeholders to view the proposed projects from different angles and to easily interpret what it will look like.

Laing, who lives in the area, said he would have expected the city or the developers to have already provided a rendering or model of what the streetscape would look like with both projects.

“We were shocked,” Laing said. “To go and look at the traffic assessments that have been done, the wind assessments, the sun assessments but for each building individually, it doesn’t make a lot of sense and it won’t result in an informed decision for the community.”

Laing said for stakeholders to make informed decisions, all proposed developments ought to be included in a model.

“That’s what we really are focused on,” he said. “What would the streetscape look like if all the developments were approved. That’s something we can literally render for people to see.”

Cameron said the public should see the whole picture in context, not just half of it.

“This is the kind of presetanation that should be going on at every public consultation where the people get to see what the actual outcome is going to be,” she said. “This is a game-changer. These two proposals together are ... almost 80 per cent of the square footage of the Nova Centre. So they are massive, unprecendented in this area. Everything in the neighbourhood is at risk from density creep to outright speculation by developers who are playing monopoly all over the city.”

Cameron said it’s time city planners start looking at the facts.

“There is statistical evidence that smaller, older, mixed-used neighbourhood areas are significantly higher in their returns for economics, jobs, for locally owned businesses, for diversity, for women-owned businesses, for affordability and for density,” she said. “They can be up to 40 per cent higher in density than new developments.”

Citing the Older, Smaller, Better report from an American research team that evaluated several U.S. cities in 2014, Cameron said the smaller and older neighbourhoods are where young people want to live.

The two proposals would require the demolition of a dozen buildings, mostly small-scale businesses like restaurants and hairdressing shops and small residential buildings along Spring Garden, Cameron said.

Cameron said the development proposals will go to the Heritage Advisory Committee, which offers regional council guidance on heritage buildings and streetscapes. From there, the proposals would go to community council, and if approved at that level, they would likely move on to a public hearing and regional council deliberation.

Perhaps Peggy is reusing the red "Godzilla" rendering that the Save the View bunch used to try to torpedo the Nova Center.

[macgregor]

Originally Posted by Keith P.

To what should be nobody's surprise, Peggy Cameron and co. return, this time with a new label for their anti-development group:

https://www.thechronicleherald.ca/ne...-group-274789/



Perhaps Peggy is reusing the red "Godzilla" rendering that the Save the View bunch used to try to torpedo the Nova Center.

Development Options Halifax?

DOH!

[Querce]

with a combined footprint that is more than three-quarters the size of Nova Centre.

just like to point out that this means it has the footprint of the average Sobeys or Superstore parking lot

[sk8tr]

I work in the Tupper Building and frequent the neighbourhood businesses. Like most such developments, I don't care how tall the buildings are, but I really hope that good urban design elements are there at street level, and that quality materials are used. Based on past performance, I have more confidence in Dexel than Kassner-Goodspeed. We'll see.
Most of my students (and employees) live in the Barrington South neighbourhood or near Quinpool Road, and very few live in the mid-rises and high-rises that line Spring Garden Road. I suspect, once this block is built out, that more Dalhousie students and staff will choose to live where they study and work, respectively.

[JET]

Those buildings next to Hope Cottage were there not that long ago.

It's a fair argument that the public should get to see what the Robie/Carlton block proposals would look like together, I have tried to imagine that myself.