Quote:
Originally Posted by Keith P.
We have debated this point here ad nauseum, but there are a lot of reasons why so many old Halifax buildings have disappeared. Many of them were unremarkable wood boxes that did not offer anything other than being old. Some that were perhaps more worthy of preserving were lost in the rush to build Harbour Drive. Many were allowed to deteriorate and by the end were run-down low-rent apartments. Heritage is great until you have to pay to keep it up and try to make it commercially viable.
As for the rules being slanted towards tearing down and rebuilding, explain to me why nothing new was built DT in about 20 years. The late '80s to the late '00s were an era where DT development was in stasis.
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Sorry, Keith, I did not word that last post very well. I wasn't intending to state that lack of heritage protection is the
only reason why not many old buildings remain, but it looks like we both agree that so many have disappeared.
We have discussed this topic many times, and it's not my intention to repeat it all, but my point is that, while a great deal has been made about heritage preservation preventing development, the reality is that heritage buildings are not really protected here.
The reasons for stagnated development now or 20 or 40 years ago were not that there are too many heritage properties preventing development from happening. The fact is that Halifax's downtown was neglected back then as business parks were growing.
You can lay the blame anywhere you like but the reality is that as part of the urban renewal planning regimes of the fifties and sixties, the focus was shifting to the suburbs and the downtown became less desirable for both business and residential development.
Perhaps part of the blame lies in the clunky approval process, perhaps it's that business parks like Burnside were made more financiably viable than the downtown, maybe blame it on viewplanes... but it wasn't a perceived inability to tear down heritage properties preventing it. The reality is that most people in the position to make decisions on developments don't really appear to give a darn about heritage properties - financial viability is the main concern.