[Halifax] Imagine Bloomfield | ? | ? | Vision

[someone123]

Well, it's approval in principle, which in HRM speak seems to be no real commitment. I think it's too early to judge.

These are already HRM-owned buildings that are not maintained at all, so it would be hard to make the situation worse.

[Keith P.]

Originally Posted by someone123

Well, it's approval in principle, which in HRM speak seems to be no real commitment. I think it's too early to judge.

These are already HRM-owned buildings that are not maintained at all, so it would be hard to make the situation worse.

If we spend $8 million on it with little improvement, it becomes far worse.

[worldlyhaligonian]

What is going on with this?

It would be a big plus for the whole area... things are improving in the north pretty well.

[Dmajackson]

Bloomfield Master Plan Enters New Implementation Phase

(Tuesday, May 18, 2010) - In June, the former Bloomfield School site will take its next step toward its exciting redevelopment when HRM looks for consulting services that will help define how community needs, cultural needs and development interests can be met.

On September 8, 2009 Regional Council adopted the Bloomfield Master Plan for the redevelopment of the site. The Plan establishes broad concepts for the site’s development including urban design, and a combination of economically feasible uses that are supported by the community.

The Master Plan outlines the potential for community partners from the arts and culture sector for the development and operation of community facilities. The Plan also envisions opportunities for partnerships with real estate developers and nonprofit organizations for the redevelopment of the property.

Next month, HRM plans to issue a Request for Proposals for consulting services to research management models for the Bloomfield property and to develop a framework for soliciting, evaluating and selecting development, along with nonprofit and community partners for the Bloomfield project.

The consultants will produce a Request for Expression of Interest process aimed at better understanding arts and culture space needs and priorities, and determining how developers and the arts and culture sector can best work together toward a successfully re-imagined Bloomfield. An accompanying Request for Proposals process will be developed to schedule and coordinate the implementation of the Master Plan and take the proposed development of the site from concept to reality.

[Jstaleness]

I forget where I saw the info. There is talk about re-opening the Bloomfield School. It's all the same set of buildings isn't it?

[Waye Mason]

Yep. 3.7 acres at Almon between Agricola and Robie.

So why? St Joe/A Murray MacKay is pretty beat up. It was famous for being profiled as a struggling inner city school in the Globe and Mail 5 years ago. The building is a 1900s structure with a 1960s addition. Green is St Joe's current location/catchment, purple the proposed area for Bloomfield.



But when I look at this map I wonder at the catchments... Bloomfield is in the centre of that neighbourhood.... it could be as simple as "we have to build a new school and it is easier to do that on a new site than renovate/rebuild on an active school site."

What you see is these schools all have decent enrolments and population over all on the peninsula has gone up, so you are not going to see a lot of opportunity to consolidate one school into another. Even Oxford, in the centre of the overlap there, is hard to close, as the schools you would divert into are all pretty full.

[someone123]

It will be interesting to see the 2011 census results for the peninsula. From 2001-2006 the single family dwelling type areas declined in population, not from abandonment but because families are getting smaller -- the number of people per unit has gone down tremendously since the 1950s. This is part of the reason why we need multi-unit buildings in these areas, just like Gladstone Ridge or the one on Windsor that everybody was up in arms about.

The downtown and "secondary" areas like Spring Garden, Cornwallis Park, and old North End grew (iirc). It seems like there would be relatively few school-aged children in these neighbourhoods, with the exception of the North End. I would expect few children in condos like the Martello building.

Is the yellow circle ("Holding School (Future Development)") an active public school now?

[planarchy]

Originally Posted by someone123

Is the yellow circle ("Holding School (Future Development)") an active public school now?

I think its this place on Morris -
http://maps.google.ca/maps?q=halifax...141.32,,0,0.42

[wackypacky]

Originally Posted by someone123

It will be interesting to see the 2011 census results for the peninsula. From 2001-2006 the single family dwelling type areas declined in population, not from abandonment but because families are getting smaller -- the number of people per unit has gone down tremendously since the 1950s. This is part of the reason why we need multi-unit buildings in these areas, just like Gladstone Ridge or the one on Windsor that everybody was up in arms about.

The downtown and "secondary" areas like Spring Garden, Cornwallis Park, and old North End grew (iirc). It seems like there would be relatively few school-aged children in these neighbourhoods, with the exception of the North End. I would expect few children in condos like the Martello building.

Is the yellow circle ("Holding School (Future Development)") an active public school now?

Does anyone happen to know if we will get a population for the former cities and towns? ie Dartmouth

[someone123]

Originally Posted by wackypacky

Does anyone happen to know if we will get a population for the former cities and towns? ie Dartmouth

If it is the same as 2006 they will not create community profiles for the old cities but they will release census tract level data. The tracts give a pretty good idea of what's going on at a neighbourhood level and can be added together to give totals for the old city boundaries.

The city also sometimes publishes lists of HRM district populations.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by planarchy

I think its this place on Morris -
http://maps.google.ca/maps?q=halifax...141.32,,0,0.42

Interesting. I think that building was a replacement for this one:


Source

[haligonia]

*jaw drops* What a beautiful school. It's too bad it had to be replaced.

[Waye Mason]

The "holding school" is St Mary's and it is open.

The thing is, LMST and St Mary's draw kids in from outside the district, and St Mary's has a subsidized daycare, so a lot of health care type workers who take the bus and live in Dartmouth/Sackville put their kids in St Mary's. So, while population trends to 2006 indicated downward trends, last year, 2010/11, it looked like this, first number is enrolment, second capacity.

St Stephen 206 / 352
St Joe/AMM 249 / 396
St Catherine's 350 / 550
Oxford 350 (P-9) / 710
Joe Howe 103, with St Pats closed that goes to 160 / 286
St Mary's 116 /132
LMST 336 / 286
Tupper 277 / 308
Inglis 210 / 308

So this is actually pretty good, if you have to keep firmly in mind that a lot of these schools don't have specialized program delivery rooms, and the way HRSB calculated total capacity was any classroom shaped room was a classroom for capacity, even if it has an ESL program in it (for example).

So back in 2007, they proposed tearing down schools with classrooms used as program spaces, to build schools with slightly smaller rooms for program spaces.

I think the glaring one is Oxford. You could close that, but then the closest junior high for downtown is a 3.5 km walk, and that sucks. There is an argument to be made to put a JHS in a replaced or renovated Quinpool/St Pats.

There is no simple solution left to consolidate schools to save money. Each new school is $10-15 million, and there are no empty fields in the middle of the city waiting for them (except, ahm, maybe Bloomfield). If you closed St Mary's to go into Inglis, there is not enough space to do that in the building, so you need to put a wing on.

I think this is as optimized as we can get for a couple decades, with the exception of Oxford.

EDIT - when people talk about "the population drop on the peninsula" it kills me.... people in my neighbourhood used to have 8-12 kids. That is what changed. LMST main building, when it was the Catholic "St Thomas School" had 750 kids in it, 45 to a room.

[Waye Mason]

Originally Posted by haligonia

*jaw drops* What a beautiful school. It's too bad it had to be replaced.

What about this... too bad they didn't make this the junior high and close Gorsebrook.... look what a great job Grammar did renovating it.

http://maps.google.ca/?ll=44.63281,-...110.4,,0,14.46

[halifaxboyns]

Living in a city that has a lot more redevelopment occuring in the inner city; one of the struggles that Halifax is going to experience is that there hasn't been enough families moving back into the 'inner city'. So inner city schools still struggle with attendance, while those in the burbs are bursting at the seems.

If there is one thing I have learned from my experience here in Calgary - the HRSB is best to hold off on closing these schools. It actually doesn't take long to restore population levels for education. I realize that would be at a cost - but by closing inner city schools down, while pushing intensification, you end up in a worse situation down the road. I'm glad they are considering fixing up this site and re-using it as a school...why not?

[someone123]

Originally Posted by Waye Mason

EDIT - when people talk about "the population drop on the peninsula" it kills me.... people in my neighbourhood used to have 8-12 kids. That is what changed. LMST main building, when it was the Catholic "St Thomas School" had 750 kids in it, 45 to a room.

Yep. The population decline on the Peninsula since 1960 wasn't from abandonment. It happened because birth rates fell post-Baby Boom and because there has been more and more commercial development that in many cases replaced (old, crowded, and often inadequate) housing. I don't have statistics but I would guess that there are far more occupied housing units on the peninsula today than there were in 1960.

Something else to keep in mind is how expensive homes in central neighbourhoods are. People wouldn't be spending $500,000 on mid-sized South End homes if they didn't like the area.

Of course, I still think there needs to be a concerted effort to push for more housing in central areas. It's just not going to happen if the process consists of 2-3 year tortuous public consultation and appeals for every little 7 storey building that happens to fall within 500 metres of somebody who decides they don't want it. The scale of the Peninsula is such that it needs 10,000-20,000 new residents, which means thousands a year if that's to happen at a reasonable pace. That means maybe 10-20 moderate-sized developments per year.

[halifaxboyns]

Originally Posted by someone123

Yep. The population decline on the Peninsula since 1960 wasn't from abandonment. It happened because birth rates fell post-Baby Boom and because there has been more and more commercial development that in many cases replaced (old, crowded, and often inadequate) housing. I don't have statistics but I would guess that there are far more occupied housing units on the peninsula today than there were in 1960.

Something else to keep in mind is how expensive homes in central neighbourhoods are. People wouldn't be spending $500,000 on mid-sized South End homes if they didn't like the area.

Of course, I still think there needs to be a concerted effort to push for more housing in central areas. It's just not going to happen if the process consists of 2-3 year tortuous public consultation and appeals for every little 7 storey building that happens to fall within 500 metres of somebody who decides they don't want it. The scale of the Peninsula is such that it needs 10,000-20,000 new residents, which means thousands a year if that's to happen at a reasonable pace. That means maybe 10-20 moderate-sized developments per year.

I know the Province of Alberta is doing a review of the MGA and one push that has been tossed around is including the provision of affordable housing through a DP or policy mechanism.

I just did a quick look through the HRM Act and it doesn't appear to deal with affordable housing provisions either through a DP or development agreement (I could be wrong - I just did a quick skim). But I think if you don't make sure densifiction can include everyone (by means of some affordable housing as a means to obtain height bonusing perhaps?) then you will never make a fully accessible community. That being said - if you attach it to bonusing for height, I'm sure you could ensure that everyone could have a chance to live downtown and grow the population.

[Waye Mason]

Originally Posted by halifaxboyns

I know the Province of Alberta is doing a review of the MGA and one push that has been tossed around is including the provision of affordable housing through a DP or policy mechanism.

I just did a quick look through the HRM Act and it doesn't appear to deal with affordable housing provisions either through a DP or development agreement (I could be wrong - I just did a quick skim). But I think if you don't make sure densifiction can include everyone (by means of some affordable housing as a means to obtain height bonusing perhaps?) then you will never make a fully accessible community. That being said - if you attach it to bonusing for height, I'm sure you could ensure that everyone could have a chance to live downtown and grow the population.

What's your read on the back yard issue? My understanding is places like Bay & King area of Toronto, where they have had fabulous success with condos, but they don't get really dense or get families, they get 25-55 y/o single yuppies in a 1500 sf luxury condos, one per residence.

I've talked to a couple development folks here and in T.O. that say the density with families comes from townhouses with tiny back yards, basically, hydrostone style, or "all of old Toronto".

So we need both, but are people in Calgary really moving families downtown into towers? I'm interested because I hear this is really hard!

[halifaxboyns]

Originally Posted by Waye Mason

What's your read on the back yard issue? My understanding is places like Bay & King area of Toronto, where they have had fabulous success with condos, but they don't get really dense or get families, they get 25-55 y/o single yuppies in a 1500 sf luxury condos, one per residence.

I've talked to a couple development folks here and in T.O. that say the density with families comes from townhouses with tiny back yards, basically, hydrostone style, or "all of old Toronto".

So we need both, but are people in Calgary really moving families downtown into towers? I'm interested because I hear this is really hard!

I wouldn't be surprised if it's the same here...I don't have the census data near by. I think part of the mentality is that you can't raise a family in a condo - only a house or town house. I don't agree with that...but I have heard rumblings that there are a lot of young families moving into condos in the centre city with very young children (I'd guess...typically no older than 4?).

The problem that parts of the centre city in Calgary face is that there is no school site for the east side of downtown (near city hall - where I live). There are in the beltline, central portion and west sections of the centre city. So I am only guessing but if people live in the east parts and then need to school children, I'd guess they are moving into the central/western portions closer to schools.

The great thing about the centre city is that we've got a very good mix of housing uses. So we have everything from single family houses, duplex, semis all the way up to Townhouses, low-medium and high density (and rise) multi family. So there is a good mix of housing. I think HRM has a good mix in the regional core, but it could be more.

[Dmajackson]

Halifax school site to go up for grabs
January 12, 2012 - 8:14pm BY CHRIS LAMBIE BUSINESS EDITOR
Council to seek proposals in spring

The city’s looking to unload a piece of prime real estate in north-end Halifax.

It is expected to issue a request for proposals this spring for the former Bloomfield School site bordered by Agricola, Robie and Almon streets.

“It’s been the subject of planning and working with community groups for the past number of years and now we’re ready to take that next step and go out and sort of gauge the interest in future activities for the site,” said Shaune MacKinlay, who speaks for the city.

Halifax Regional Municipality is open to the idea of selling the 1.5-hecatre site that is now zoned institutional.

...

Read More Here