The Official Saint John, NB Project Thread

[Smevo]

Originally Posted by kwajo

Well that's not really fair given that some sort of mil has existed on Union Point (the land that the current mill is built on) since before the idea of Tourism was even invented - well not quite, but you get my point.

Funny you should say that about Harbour Passage, because that's exactly where it goes; up toward the NBM and along Douglas Ave to Fallsview Park.

I see, and suspected as much. Since mills were there first (before the park anyway, not the falls obviously) it's more or less a non issue locally. It makes perfect sense historically to have a mill there, since the logs were sent downriver and the Reversing Falls would've been a dangerous spot for logrunners trying to break up jams. Tourists never think of that though, and that was my real point that it really detracts from the area and contributes to the negative image SJ gets from people who visit the city. As for Harbour Passage, that's what I was hoping for, since it wouldn't make much sense for it to pass the OSCO building from a tourism point of view, and Douglas Ave could use a little sprucing up...not the tear down and rebuild kind, just some TLC.

[reddog794]

I did the walk, and thought it was kind of modern to be able to be that close to a "bread" industry, while still enjoying a civil park. But yeah, it does look a bit barren.

It would be cool to have active industries be a tourism point, in these Eco minded times. "Look at this successful mill, operating by pro climate civil guidelines, beside the enchanting Reversing Falls" To have that said about us, would almost warrant the word, dynamic. Plus everything looks better when you add trees.

[Alberta Bound]

Hot trend continues: Real estate City's housing starts increase 23 per cent from 2006, while both Moncton, Fredericton register declines

SAINT JOHN - Housing starts in the Greater Saint John area continue to outpace last year's, bucking a trend that saw declines in Moncton and Fredericton to the end of November, according to figures released Monday by Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation.

Housing starts from January to November of this year are up 23 per cent in Saint John over the same period in 2006 for a total of 637 units compared to 517 a year earlier.

Moncton saw a .5 per cent decline from 1,327 units last year to 1,321 this year. Fredericton experienced a 12 per cent decline from 656 units last year to 579 this year.

But overall, total housing starts in New Brunswick's urban centres for November trailed last year's level by five per cent, mainly because of a decline in the number of multiple units under construction, said Claude Gautreau, senior market analyst for CMHC in New Brunswick.

According to the CMHC's preliminary data for November, 231 residential starts were recorded for the province last month, down slightly from the 244 units recorded during the same month in 2006.

"Although single starts remained strong, fewer multiples in November led to the overall decline for the month," Gautreau said.

In the province's urban centres, 136 single starts were recorded in November, up nine units from last November's total of 127 units.

Among New Brunswick's large urban centres, single starts were ahead of last year in both Saint John and Fredericton, while remaining unchanged in Moncton.

There was a decline in multiple starts in the province's urban areas during the month of November, with 95 units compared to 117 last year. Year to date, multiple starts trailed last year's total at the end of November with 1,213 units compared to 1,300 last year.

"The year-to-date decline in multiple starts has continued to be offset by strong single starts, leading to an overall year-to-date increase in total starts," said Gautreau.

In urban centres across Canada, total housing starts in November trailed last year's total by five per cent, down to 17,077 from last year's total of 17,998.

Single-detached starts rose to 8,065 units compared to 7,486 in 2006, while multiple unit starts declined 14 per cent from 10,512 units last year to 9,012 units this year.

In the Atlantic region, 738 starts were recorded in November 2007 compared to 819 units during the same period in 2006.


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In all fairness, Moncton is still a powerhouse of housing starts compared to Saint John. I think this a because Saint John is growing (hopefully) into a size it already was in the past while Moncton is growing into a size it has never been.

[mmmatt]

Originally Posted by Alberta Bound

In all fairness, Moncton is still a powerhouse of housing starts compared to Saint John. I think this a because Saint John is growing (hopefully) into a size it already was in the past while Moncton is growing into a size it has never been.

I agree...Moncton still has more than twice as many starts as SJ...however SJ is picking up steam, so it could be the other way around soon

I love how the TJ and the T&T spin the same stats to make it seem like thier respective home city is doing so well haha...in the T&T today the headline for those stats is "Moncton sees 2007 increase in multiple-unit building starts" and they dont really mention we are doing very slightly worse compared to last year in overall starts...but in the TJ they dont mention the fact that 67 of the 95 multiple starts in urban NB last month were in Moncton. Also Ill point out that 2006 was Monctons best year ever for housing starts, so being 6 less than the best ever is still very good.

[Helladog]

Furniture store coming to valley

ERIN DWYER
DEVELOPMENTS
Published Tuesday December 11th, 2007
Appeared on page C6

Lane Home Furnishings has decided to bring a store to its customers.

The furniture store has broken ground for a 1,300-square-metre building on Millennium Drive in Quispamsis, which will cater to its many customers in the area who now make the drive to shop at its Fredericton store.

For four years, Lane Home Furnishings has had a store in the capital city.

With a growing customer base from the Saint John area, it decided to expand.

More than 20 per cent of its business hails from Saint John.

"We are down there every week delivering for people coming up here buying," said general manager John Belyea, who will be moving to the area to run the new store. "It's steady."

Belyea believes people in the Saint John area are venturing to Fredericton to buy new furniture because of the limited options in the city - only three furniture stores for a population base of 120,000. In comparison, he said, Fredericton has six stores for a population base of 50,000.

"People down there, they see the ads, they come up, have a look around, see the furniture, like it and end up buying. We're very happy with the clientele from the Saint John area."

Quispamsis was chosen because 80 per cent of the customers coming from the Saint John area live in the Kennebecasis Valley and Hampton area, Belyea said. Most of the rest of the customers come from Millidgeville.

"There was land available and it's a good location, visible from the four-lane there. And that area is growing up."

The new store, which will employ 10 to 12 full-time people, will be located next to A-1 Auctioneers.

"It's just an area that is going to continue to grow up along that street," Belyea said.

The new store is slated to open in March.

In operation since 1912, Lane Home Furnishings began in Mississippi and is owned by Furniture Brands International, which also owns Broyhill and Thomasville.

[michael_d40]

Originally Posted by Helladog

Furniture store coming to valley

ERIN DWYER
DEVELOPMENTS
Published Tuesday December 11th, 2007
Appeared on page C6

Lane Home Furnishings has decided to bring a store to its customers.

The furniture store has broken ground for a 1,300-square-metre building on Millennium Drive in Quispamsis, which will cater to its many customers in the area who now make the drive to shop at its Fredericton store.

For four years, Lane Home Furnishings has had a store in the capital city.

With a growing customer base from the Saint John area, it decided to expand.

More than 20 per cent of its business hails from Saint John.

"We are down there every week delivering for people coming up here buying," said general manager John Belyea, who will be moving to the area to run the new store. "It's steady."

Belyea believes people in the Saint John area are venturing to Fredericton to buy new furniture because of the limited options in the city - only three furniture stores for a population base of 120,000. In comparison, he said, Fredericton has six stores for a population base of 50,000.

"People down there, they see the ads, they come up, have a look around, see the furniture, like it and end up buying. We're very happy with the clientele from the Saint John area."

Quispamsis was chosen because 80 per cent of the customers coming from the Saint John area live in the Kennebecasis Valley and Hampton area, Belyea said. Most of the rest of the customers come from Millidgeville.

"There was land available and it's a good location, visible from the four-lane there. And that area is growing up."

The new store, which will employ 10 to 12 full-time people, will be located next to A-1 Auctioneers.

"It's just an area that is going to continue to grow up along that street," Belyea said.

The new store is slated to open in March.

In operation since 1912, Lane Home Furnishings began in Mississippi and is owned by Furniture Brands International, which also owns Broyhill and Thomasville.

flip-no-more pet dish

Dianne Craswell's cat kept flipping over his food dish.

Tired of cleaning up the messes, she went looking for a solution. She searched pet stores, but found nothing.

So Craswell, of St. George, decided to solve the problem herself and designed a flip-no-more pet dish that uses suction cups to attach the dish to the floor.

"My cat no longer bothers to flip or spill his dish," said Craswell, one of this year's winners in the What's Your Big Idea contest, part of Enterprise Saint John's Emerging Entrepreneurs Venture Forward Business Competitions sponsored by Aliant.

To enter the competition, participants were asked to design a new or improved product or service that met at least one of the following five goals: offer something new to customers; address a current problem; increase benefits to customers; improve product design or functionality or save money.

Stephen Kopps and Monica Adair, architects with the ACRE Collective, also won for their idea to design sustainable affordable housing. They'd like to assemble a design team to create a prototype building that would be a model for energy efficiency and affordability in Saint John.

"What will Saint John's legacy be for the years of environmental awareness?"

Kopps and Adair asked in their submission. "The buildings we design today are those we will occupy for the next 50-100 years."

Other winners included Garrett Tonge, a business marketing student at NBCC-SJ who wants to create a service for people who need access to important information in a hurry; Emilie Thomas, a business student at UNBSJ, who plans to design a system to encourage people to shop locally; and Jean-Claude St. John, another UNBSJ business student, who is looking to revolutionize how families use train travel.

Supporters of the program are the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency, the New Brunswick Department of Post-Secondary Education Training and Labour, and Enterprise Saint John.

market intelligence

A seminar this week for emerging entrepreneurs and small businesses will give them the scoop on how to find out what their customers are thinking.

The market intelligence seminar will tell them where to collect data on trends in the industry and what the competitors are doing and how to use the information to grow their business.

The seminar will be held Thursday from noon to 1:30 p.m. at the Business Resource Centre, 40 King St. Register by e-mailing [email protected] or by calling 648 - 4640.

Erin Dwyer writes the Developments column for the Telegraph-Journal. It appears Tuesday. If you have an item or suggestions contact us at [email protected] or 1-506-645-3338.

That excellent news!, Some how i missed that in the paper,

[skyscraper_1]

Has the city's population grown quite a bit in the last year?

[Alberta Bound]

Originally Posted by skyscraper_1

Has the city's population grown quite a bit in the last year?

I don't think we know that. The working aged population increased by 0.7% over the past 12 months (as did Halifax) according to Statistics Canada. Hard to say where they get those number though.

[thefishingnut]

Originally Posted by Alberta Bound

In all fairness, Moncton is still a powerhouse of housing starts compared to Saint John. I think this a because Saint John is growing (hopefully) into a size it already was in the past while Moncton is growing into a size it has never been.

I think as well, it takes a while to build up a construction force to get an increased number of homes built in the first place. I know in the KV area, the good crews have more work than they can handle, and the wait to get them is long. I spoke to an excavator recently, and he told me he has stopped booking more work because he has more than 20 foundation excavations already in his queue.

[kwajo]

Originally Posted by thefishingnut

I think as well, it takes a while to build up a construction force to get an increased number of homes built in the first place. I know in the KV area, the good crews have more work than they can handle, and the wait to get them is long. I spoke to an excavator recently, and he told me he has stopped booking more work because he has more than 20 foundation excavations already in his queue.

Very true. As an example, my parents in Rothesay had to get a new well dug this fall, and all the Well drilling companies are stretched way beyong capacity with all the new homes being built in KV.

(Of course what we should be arguing is that Quispamsis needs to get off its ass and build a real water system. If they keep increasing density, at some point there are going to be water supply issues if the whole town is still using private wells)

[PostModernPrometheus]

" Originally Posted by skyscraper_1
Has the city's population grown quite a bit in the last year?

I don't think we know that. The working aged population increased by 0.7% over the past 12 months (as did Halifax) according to Statistics Canada. Hard to say where they get those number though."

Hard to know objectively if the population has increased over the past year, but it certainly seems that way to me (in a completely unscientific, subjective way)

[GUB]

This is kind of off topic, but does anyone know when Starbucks is slated to open?
I'll be in SJ for the holidays and was hoping I could finally get a real cup of coffee---no offense to those who drink Tim's coffee flavored beverage.
Serioudly though, besides the city market Java Moose, there really isn't anywhere I know of in SJ to get real coffee. There are a couple nice spots in Kenn. Valley, but SJ is somewhat coffee deprived.

[michael_d40]

Originally Posted by GUB

This is kind of off topic, but does anyone know when Starbucks is slated to open?
I'll be in SJ for the holidays and was hoping I could finally get a real cup of coffee---no offense to those who drink Tim's coffee flavored beverage.
Serioudly though, besides the city market Java Moose, there really isn't anywhere I know of in SJ to get real coffee. There are a couple nice spots in Kenn. Valley, but SJ is somewhat coffee deprived.

Starbucks in McAllister Place has been open for several months now.
The drive thru starbucks will be open in February,
and the Starbucks in Indigo will be open in March

[SJTOKO]

Have they started the Cruise Ship Terminal yet? Any word?

[michael_d40]

Originally Posted by SJTOKO

Have they started the Cruise Ship Terminal yet? Any word?

still nothing

[Alberta Bound]

Infrastructure Canada - Media Advisory
SAINT JOHN, NB, Dec. 14 /CNW Telbec/ -The Honourable Greg Thompson,
Minister of Veterans Affairs, on behalf of the Honourable Lawrence Cannon,
Minister of Transport, Infrastructure and Communities, and the Honourable Roly
MacIntyre, New Brunswick Minister of Supply and Services and Minister
responsible for the Regional Development Corporation, together with Norm
McFarlane, Mayor of Saint John, will make an important announcement on transit
infrastructure.

<<
Date: December 17, 2007

Time: 9:00 a.m.

Location: City Hall
Eighth Floor
15 Market Square
Saint John, New Brunswick
>>

Anyone have any idea what this is about or is it just in regards to SJ Transit's new building?

[Helladog]

I'd go and find out, but I have Xams.

[Helladog]

SITE OF FUTURE HARBOUR PASSAGE LOOKOUT

Published Friday December 14th, 2007
Appeared on page c5

Surveyors from Conquest Engineering were lowered in a basket by a boom truck operated by John Flood & Sons (1961) Ltd. Thursday as they checked out a site near the western end of the Reversing Falls bridge. The site, atop the abutments of an old bridge, will be the location of a lookout for Harbour Passage that will be constructed next year.

[michael_d40]

Hampton Inn & Suites is the latest of four new hotels in Greater Saint John

Jeff Ducharme
Telegraph-Journal
Published Saturday December 15th, 2007
Appeared on page B3

SAINT JOHN - With four new hotels bringing hundreds of new rooms to the city, those who book and try to lure lucrative conventions to the area believe Greater Saint John has jumped up a notch.

One hotel, the Amsterdam Inn, has already opened at the corners of Concorde and Millennium drives in Quispamsis. Three other hotels - Best Western, the Hampton Inn & Suites, and Microtel Inn are in the works. The Hampton Inn, located on the site of the East Point Shopping complex, will open for its first full day of business today.

"It can only bring positive things to the city," said Hampton Inn & Suites manager Glenda MacLean. "There's definitely a need for it."

The four-storey hotel has 116 rooms, one meeting room for in-house purposes, a breakfast area, swimming pool, whirlpool and water slide.

MacLean said company officials did their homework before deciding on Saint John.

"That means the economic indicators are there to support it," she said. "In the past, the city hasn't been able to be a player."

And according to MacLean and others in the industry, every indication is positive one.

Ellen Tucker of Freedom Tours said the opening is great news for her business.

"It opens us up to conventions that we didn't have the traffic for," Tucker said.

Sally Cummings, conventions manager with Tourism Saint John, said the area has 1,533 rooms when all the hotels, motels, and bed and breakfasts are counted up. The new hotels will add more than 300 rooms to that total.

"It's another thing we can use to sell the city," Cummings said.

This year the city attracted 260 meetings and sporting events. Some 46,000 delegates from such events pumped $34 million into the local economy.

With more rooms available, Cummings said her group can attract bigger and better events.

"All this goes hand-in-hand. It's all good news for us - absolutely.'

Peter Asimakos of Uptown Saint John said while he'd like to see a new hotel call the uptown home, he said the location doesn't matter as long as the city can boast more rooms.

"If you don't have (enough rooms), you're not in the ball game," Asimakos said of the convention and event business.

Getting the people here, regardless of where they stay, is key.

"Then you have the ability to experience the authentic character of Saint John."

Microtel Inns & Suites plans to break ground for new economy hotels in the Saint John and Moncton areas early next year.

The firm says it will build seven new hotels in Canada in 2008. The company will build five of the seven on the East Coast, including Halifax, Dartmouth and Sydney in Nova Scotia along with the two in New Brunswick. The two others will go to London and Woodstock, Ont.

[PostModernPrometheus]

SITE OF FUTURE HARBOUR PASSAGE LOOKOUT

Published Friday December 14th, 2007
Appeared on page c5

Surveyors from Conquest Engineering were lowered in a basket by a boom truck operated by John Flood & Sons (1961) Ltd. Thursday as they checked out a site near the western end of the Reversing Falls bridge. The site, atop the abutments of an old bridge, will be the location of a lookout for Harbour Passage that will be constructed next year.

Good to see...I was eating at the fall's restaurant the other week, and it struck me that this whole area (Fallsview park included) has soooooo much potential....I think it's great that Harbour Passage is expanding as far as the falls...hopefully, it will serve to catalyze upgrades/developments in the area......

On a related note, has anyone heard any updates on the plans for the inner harbour marina around market slip?