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archited
Senior Member
Bed, Bath and Because we're Canadian...
vmsd.com
New Leases on Life for Ex-Canadian Bed Bath & Beyond Stores
New brand and Canada Tire taking over BB&B leases
vmsd.com
David A
Senior Member
Despite the recent spate of US chains closing or leaving Canada, maybe things are not that much better elsewhere.
Airboy
Senior Member
Look at the number of closures in Portland downtown.
MacLac
Senior Member
Apparently DT Portland can’t even sustain a Walmart…..
MacLac
Senior Member
I think Portland is a Barometer for the insane rampant thieving, homeless, store closing, drug use, crime ridden filth that is taking place in the US…..besides the usual Detroit, Dayton, Cleveland bunch. If Portland tips over so will every other “safe” US City they thought they had
archited
Senior Member
Hard Times for Retail continues...
vmsd.com
Retail Suffers Most Job Losses in April
Sector led all industries with nearly 15,000 cuts for the month
vmsd.com
David A
Senior Member
Gail Asper is really frustrated. Even though this is about Winnipeg, I think this is something to keep in mind for us too.
Unfortunately, bad urban planning, with too much concrete and barriers, lack of accessibility, difficult to navigate forced alternative routes happens in a lot of places.
Unfortunately, bad urban planning, with too much concrete and barriers, lack of accessibility, difficult to navigate forced alternative routes happens in a lot of places.
archited
Senior Member
Small Alberta towns were initially sustained by agricultural endeavors and then in more recent decades by oil and gas exploration. Here is an article on what may come next...
When Faced With Dwindling Downtowns, Architects Can Support Growth from Within
In Boswell, Ind., Nowhere Collaborative shows us what a practice embedded in rural communities can look like, writes Anjulie Rao.
www.architectmagazine.com
archited
Senior Member
For the betterment of us Mall...
vmsd.com
Well, Well, Well: Malls of the Future
Wellness is taking center stage in forward-facing retail complexes
vmsd.com
archited
Senior Member
David A
Senior Member
Both San Fransisco and Portland in my opinion have beautiful downtowns with a lot of potential. I haven't been to Portland for a long time, but more recently San Fransisco and even pre COVID did see the problems.
It is grimy, dirty and run down. It particularly seems to be a downtown where there are mostly the rich and the very poor and not much between, probably in part because of very expensive office and residential space.
I don't know what the answers are for them, but I hope they can somehow fix it. I also hope we do not go down the path they have and I feel we are better positioned not too.
archited
Senior Member
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| The National Post has launched a new newsletter about Alberta. It's aptly titled "What's up with Alberta?" The mission is to help Albertans further understand the place they live, and bring Alberta news to a wider public interested in Canada's most dynamic province. This subscriber-exclusive will be sent out Tuesday and Thursday evening, and feature news and analysis from the best writers at the National Post, Calgary Herald and Edmonton Journal. Please check it out, sign up and tell all your friends. |
archited
Senior Member
So here's the dirt... Ordering online is killing Retail and hybrid work is killing Office demand.
time.com
We have got to find ways to buck this trend. Here is my list:
1. Work towards hybrid retail solutions where retail displays are much more compact and related to "style and function" with remote delivery enabled from much less expensive warehouse locations (Amazon does this from its online presence for sales); add in situ entertainment at retail locations to engage customers (including gaming and XR potentials as well as "in person" events); encourage small, local retail operational unions whereby these unions negotiate with landlords for space consumption and lease rates, and, alternatively, gang together for collective website endeavors to promote self-images as individual pages within the context of a collective web presence -- these could be multi-layered (e.g. Area Representation (downtown Edmonton), Street Representation (104th Street), Building Representation (Milner Building) and then finally individual Retail Store Representation (Saucy Ballz & Finger Piez Eatery) whereby search engines are ordered to hit on any one of the layered Landing Pages with cross references to the other Pages.
2. Kill the trend for demising spaces in Retail components of Mixed Use Buildings -- encourage developers to standardize exterior door and window sizes so that there is complete exchangeability of locations of one versus the other.
3. Kill the Zoning trend that separates Office Functions from Residential Functions from Retail Functions from Service Functions from Hospitality and Entertainment functions (there are plenty of Building Code restrictions for adjacent spaces without codifying them in Zone categories as well. This alone would be a boon for buildings like the Empire Building, the Milner Building and the CN tower -- all looking for ways to reimagine themselves.
4. Similar to Point 3. above, allow Professional Offices to have a Residential Component so that Professionals can live and work at their office. I for one would consider working in a downtown tower if I could have my residence there as well. Klaus Hoffman (my first and only employer after post-secondary graduation) bought property on an acreage just east of Sherwood Park and on it built a residence with a large common workspace for employees. In the "Art District" in Los Angeles many loft buildings allow artists to live and work "in residence".
Add more ideas to this if you are so inclined...
Return-to-Office Full Time Is Losing
The pandemic may be officially over, but workers aren't coming into offices any more than they did a few months ago.
1. Work towards hybrid retail solutions where retail displays are much more compact and related to "style and function" with remote delivery enabled from much less expensive warehouse locations (Amazon does this from its online presence for sales); add in situ entertainment at retail locations to engage customers (including gaming and XR potentials as well as "in person" events); encourage small, local retail operational unions whereby these unions negotiate with landlords for space consumption and lease rates, and, alternatively, gang together for collective website endeavors to promote self-images as individual pages within the context of a collective web presence -- these could be multi-layered (e.g. Area Representation (downtown Edmonton), Street Representation (104th Street), Building Representation (Milner Building) and then finally individual Retail Store Representation (Saucy Ballz & Finger Piez Eatery) whereby search engines are ordered to hit on any one of the layered Landing Pages with cross references to the other Pages.
2. Kill the trend for demising spaces in Retail components of Mixed Use Buildings -- encourage developers to standardize exterior door and window sizes so that there is complete exchangeability of locations of one versus the other.
3. Kill the Zoning trend that separates Office Functions from Residential Functions from Retail Functions from Service Functions from Hospitality and Entertainment functions (there are plenty of Building Code restrictions for adjacent spaces without codifying them in Zone categories as well. This alone would be a boon for buildings like the Empire Building, the Milner Building and the CN tower -- all looking for ways to reimagine themselves.
4. Similar to Point 3. above, allow Professional Offices to have a Residential Component so that Professionals can live and work at their office. I for one would consider working in a downtown tower if I could have my residence there as well. Klaus Hoffman (my first and only employer after post-secondary graduation) bought property on an acreage just east of Sherwood Park and on it built a residence with a large common workspace for employees. In the "Art District" in Los Angeles many loft buildings allow artists to live and work "in residence".
Add more ideas to this if you are so inclined...
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archited
Senior Member
The explosion has begun...