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Canadian 001 said:
Office Tower Conversion planned on Jasper Ave
www.ctvnews.ca

Office tower on Jasper Avenue to be partly converted into residential complex

Plans are in place to convert much of a major downtown Edmonton office building into housing, retail and recreational space.
www.ctvnews.ca www.ctvnews.ca

Floors 12-19 are being changed to Residential
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Maybe that is the smart trend here now, partial conversion. It sort of makes sense, probably easier than full conversion, still have all the revenue from the office tenants remaining if the construction can be not too disruptive.

However, I really had to laugh at the councilor's silly boilerplate statement about not needing to spend to build new parks. She should know the city is in fact spending a lot of money on a new park a couple blocks away and also on the existing two across the street.

I also would like to see something done with that old food court, so hoping it all works out.
 
archited said:
From a history perspective I know of at least two churches in Edmonton that in years past have been turned into music venues and at the time of the transition were very successful but didn't last -- one was further turned into a needs-based facility for food and shelter and the other was eventually demolished.
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I mean, I can't believe we're forgetting the most obvious one: The Starlite Room was a Salvation Army Citadel! (That's why, when it was first converted to a theatre, it was called the Citadel Theatre.)
 
Kosy123 said:
So far:
Phipps-McKinnon: 100 units
McKenney Building Conversion: 33 units
Financial Building Conversion: 33 units
Standard on Jasper: no idea how many this one is but since it's floors 12-19, maybe 80-100 units?

CBRE did mention that Highfield Place got taken off the market for conversion but we have nothing concrete on that so I didn't add it to the list.
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Thanks for summing this up. And the former Enbridge (now Peak Residences) project is not very far in the rear view mirror, either.

City Council got some absolute venom from some voices here for declining to fund office conversions, so it's very gratifying to see that the private sector is capable and willing to tackle some of this very important work without relying on taxpayer dollars.
 
Gus Haynes said:
Thanks for summing this up. And the former Enbridge (now Peak Residences) project is not very far in the rear view mirror, either.

City Council got some absolute venom from some voices here for declining to fund office conversions, so it's very gratifying to see that the private sector is capable and willing to tackle some of this very important work without relying on taxpayer dollars.
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Peak is finally finished and has residents so I counted it out, but fully agree with you there on the office conversion subsidy point.

I’d rather see subsidies on new builds rather than conversions, as a preference.
 
CplKlinger said:

(Wfsites) - Page not found

www.sturgeoncreek.ca
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CplKlinger said:
Fort Saskatchewan might get a new apartment building in its downtown core! Fort Station is the site of the former Fort Mall, which was partially demolished and redeveloped in 2015 by new owners, after years of financial difficulties and a court sale. It was envisioned to be a mixed-use site with commercial and residential units, but it hasn't had the greatest success so far. It does have a much more successful commercial scene than the previous mall did at the time of its closure, but a large chunk of the site remains empty. According to one of the co-owners, whenever they court potential commercial tenants, they say that they love the site but that downtown just doesn't have enough people living in it right now. Furthermore, aside from a couple of 6-unit townhouses (12 units total). no residential units have been built so far. There had been a number of proposals over the years, from apartments, to assisted living facilities, to hotels, but none had seen the light of day.

The co-owner of the site gave an update to council during their meeting last Tuesday. He said that he has investors lined up who are willing to invest cash and sign a mortgage for a 72 unit apartment building on the site. This would be crucial not just for the commercial prospects of the site, but also in helping to rejuvenate downtown. It would cost $11 million to build, and in order to make it more viable, the owners would take advantage of a CMHC loan program. It provides favourable interest and finance rates, and in return, 20% of the units (1 and 2 bedrooms) would need to be priced at 20% less than the market rate for at least 10 years in order to help fill the gap in affordable housing.

In order to meet the CMHC requirements, the city would need to provide some support for this project; the owners thus requested a 3-year tax abatement. Administration did not prepare a motion for this, but said that a notice-of-motion could be given by a councilor to address this at the next meeting if council wanted to take action in the near-future. However, there was a lot of support for this on council, so Mayor Katchur granted an exception so that a motion could be moved directly at their current meeting. Instead of approaching this as a one-off, council and administration both expressed a desire to explore how they can lay the groundwork for this sort of thing for future proposals as well. This is the motion which passed unanimously:

“That Council directs Administration to provide a report providing options to enable tax incentives for affordable housing and downtown redevelopment, and further that the report be presented to Council prior to the fourth quarter of 2021."

You can see the full presentation, questions, and debate here.
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It's not a 72-unit apartment, but it's still nice to see. The owners of the old mall are building a 54-unit apartment with 1 and 2 bedroom units, and on another part of the property they're building 42 units of townhomes, and these are 2 and 3 bedroom units. They're being built and rented by NewRock Properties; their listings and floorplans are here.
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Glenco said:
So much parking lot
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Yeah, it was disappointing to see; with all the families there, it should really have more green space. On the bright side though, when you factor the townhomes the owners built a few years ago there's now 124 1-3 bedroom units on the old downtown mall site, which is more than we can say for a lot of other old malls, and a pretty significant increase for a city the size of Fort Sask.
 
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