Posted Apr 24, 2010, 2:43 PM
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Join Date: Sep 2003
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I heard about this from a friend last week. Glad to hear its already moving forward. I was not aware of the meeting the article references though. I wonder if it was only for residents of Spring Garden Terrace.
From todays Herald.
Killam begins project with . . . Lego
Neighbours used toy blocks to help company design apartment building
By CHRIS LAMBIE
Business Editor
Building a $17.5-million apart ment in downtown Halifax likely won’t be child’s play for Atlantic Canada’s largest landlord.
But that’s how it started.
At a recent public meeting, a planner working for Killam Prop erties Inc. asked neighbours to use Lego to show what they’d like the 100-unit apartment building to look like. “Rather than coming and say ing, ‘This is our design,’ we want ed people to engage in what they viewed it as being," said Nick Pryce, a project manager with
Terrain Group Inc.
“We had Lego blocks to repre sent
units and said, ‘How would you build these on the site?’ " People came up with some remarkable ideas, including a tall nar row structure that allowed more sunlight into the building, Pryce said. “That’s not to say we’re going to go up with a big, tall tower, but it was one of the interesting analy ses that came out of the process." Killam already owns Spring Garden Terrace, which fronts on Spring Garden Road between Car leton and Summer streets.The plan is to construct another building on what is now a parking lot behind the existing structure, just south of Camp Hill Cemetery. The developer hasn’t decided whether the new building will be connected to Spring Garden Ter race, built in the early 1960s.
“I know it sounds crazy, but as a planner, I try to sort of engage the community in the design," Pryce said. “The residents actually identified challenges with join ing it to the existing building. So we’re probably looking at trying maybe to do it stand-alone."
Michael Napier Architecture is now coming up with a design for the building, he said.
“Part of the challenge that’s faced at the moment with trying to do development is people have a negativity toward the word den sity, which is probably a reflec tion of the post-World War era of planning and social housing that occurred, versus getting over the concept of it’s not density, it’s more about the design," Pryce said.
“You’ll never please everybody. But how can we do a design that stands up?"
He acknowledged some people who live in the area will likely op pose the new building.
But it will allow “more people to have and enjoy the opportuni ties that existing residents in the area have, which is the cafes, the shops, the access to public trans port, utilizing the parks in the area, walking versus being car dependant, being near the hospi tals, the universities. Those are all assets that we should be mak ing sure we capitalize on," Pryce said.
“It’s an excellent location," said Robert Richardson, Killam’s executive vice-president.
The company bought Spring Garden Terrace about five years ago. The longtime property buyer announced last month that it was planning to become a developer as well, issuing $44 million worth of new shares to pay for various projects.
“This would be our first devel opment in Halifax," Richardson said.
Spring Garden Terrace is 11 storeys high. But Killam doesn’t know yet how tall the new building will be, he said.
“It really is open for discus sion," Richardson said. “The thing is, the additional hundred units is the number we’re work ing with in terms of a viable num ber on that site. There’s a real push by the city to increase densi ty on the peninsula. . . . All the amenities are here on the peninsula. All the services for water and sewer are already here. We would be meeting one of their ob jectives with this."
(clambie@herald.ca)
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