General Urban Kitchener Updates and Rumours

[Bjays93]

I've been trying to help KW developments get more exposure over at UT since they had projects there for pretty much every city surrounding the GTA except KW. I think some are finally gaining some traction.

I suspect most other cities do not have as active (independent) forums as we do.

This is definitely the case

[taylortbb]

The Duke Food Block appears to have been sold by Vive to IN8. It's off the Vive website, and the Kitchener property ownership records show IN8.

Wild speculation: I wonder if IN8 is talking to St. Peter's church? So far IN8 hasn't really seemed to be interested in being a landlord, and the Duke Food Block is kind of small for them. The property really only makes sense for IN8 when combined with the St. Peter's church property. At the same time, the St. Peter's church property is large enough they'd hardly need to own the tiny sliver that's the Duke Food Block to make for a viable project, so why buy it? Even combined the property would be tight for two towers, especially with The Regency on one side and DTK Condos on the other.

[WaterLouGehrig]

IN8 actually built/designed their parking garage to connect to a future phase where St. Peters Church is. 

But I imagine this through a wrench in the plans: https://www.therecord.com/news/waterloo-...north.html

[cherrypark]

The Duke Food Block appears to have been sold by Vive to IN8. It's off the Vive website, and the Kitchener property ownership records show IN8.

Wild speculation: I wonder if IN8 is talking to St. Peter's church? So far IN8 hasn't really seemed to be interested in being a landlord, and the Duke Food Block is kind of small for them. The property really only makes sense for IN8 when combined with the St. Peter's church property. At the same time, the St. Peter's church property is large enough they'd hardly need to own the tiny sliver that's the Duke Food Block to make for a viable project, so why buy it? Even combined the property would be tight for two towers, especially with The Regency on one side and DTK Condos on the other.

If they were building on the St. Peter's lot, perhaps a plan incorporates the food block into the street level but provides a benefit of the air above level, such as having some podium level lofts looking over Duke instead of over the roof and back side of the food block?

[ijmorlan]

The Duke Food Block appears to have been sold by Vive to IN8. It's off the Vive website, and the Kitchener property ownership records show IN8.

Wild speculation: I wonder if IN8 is talking to St. Peter's church? So far IN8 hasn't really seemed to be interested in being a landlord, and the Duke Food Block is kind of small for them. The property really only makes sense for IN8 when combined with the St. Peter's church property. At the same time, the St. Peter's church property is large enough they'd hardly need to own the tiny sliver that's the Duke Food Block to make for a viable project, so why buy it? Even combined the property would be tight for two towers, especially with The Regency on one side and DTK Condos on the other.

If they were building on the St. Peter's lot, perhaps a plan incorporates the food block into the street level but provides a benefit of the air above level, such as having some podium level lofts looking over Duke instead of over the roof and back side of the food block?

Or adding in the Food Block property just reduces the floor area ratio of the overall site.

[Lens]

The $ investors behind IN8 Did buy the food block with hopes of buying and demolishing most of if not all of the church complex. The affordable housing project obviously changed things which is good because the church is beautiful and a great example of midcentury architecture, something we don't have a lot of downtown. I'd imagine IN8 will sell the food block once they're done using it as a construction office.

[panamaniac]

One assumes the developers had some sort of discussion with the church, but the idea that it might be demolished is beyond surprising. I really can’t see it happening ...

[nms]

Kitchener Fire Department says it needs more staff and new fire station to deal with growing city (CBC, October 5, 2021)

"Our last station ... in 2008 it opened, station seven, and we're in 2021, so our biggest challenge is that we can't meet our response times especially in the downtown core," Fire Chief Bob Gilmore told CBC K-W's The Morning Edition on Tuesday.

The report showed response times for medical or fire rescue calls between 2016 and 2019 took longer than the industry standard 43 per cent of the time, and call volume had increased by 14.51 per cent during that same time.

Gilmore said the FUS states that anything above 2,500 calls a year is considered a high-volume station. 
Fire station 2, which primarily responds to emergency calls in the downtown, is the department's busiest station. They were responding to more than 3,100 calls in 2016 and more than in 3,800 in 2019.  Station 4, located on Fairway Road, is expected to reach the 2,500 call benchmark within the next year, according to the report.

Is it too late to reactivate the (at least) three fire stations that were closed in the downtown core? I can think of the one on Duke St, the one on Highland, and the one that used to be on Guelph St.

Are there other Canadian examples of fire stations that are incorporated into larger buildings? Perhaps change "ground floor commercial" to "ground floor emergency services"?

[Chris]

Is it too late to reactivate the (at least) three fire stations that were closed in the downtown core? I can think of the one on Duke St, the one on Highland, and the one that used to be on Guelph St.

Are there other Canadian examples of fire stations that are incorporated into larger buildings? Perhaps change "ground floor commercial" to "ground floor emergency services"?

Highland has been turned into apartments, Duke an office and Guelph looks like it's a club house. Guelph St moved the firehall to Guelph and Lancaster.

If a new one needs to go downtown they have the Bramm Yards or the old bus station. There is the ambulance station at Weber and Water. Maybe with the acquisition of another property or two this could be a shared facility with EMS?

[cherrypark]

Is it too late to reactivate the (at least) three fire stations that were closed in the downtown core? I can think of the one on Duke St, the one on Highland, and the one that used to be on Guelph St.

Are there other Canadian examples of fire stations that are incorporated into larger buildings? Perhaps change "ground floor commercial" to "ground floor emergency services"?

Highland has been turned into apartments, Duke an office and Guelph looks like it's a club house. Guelph St moved the firehall to Guelph and Lancaster.

If a new one needs to go downtown they have the Bramm Yards or the old bus station. There is the ambulance station at Weber and Water. Maybe with the acquisition of another property or two this could be a shared facility with EMS?

I was just musing the other day that it might be nice if whoever owns that patch of grass next to the EMS station there would either improve it for park space or build something on that prime space.

[tomh009]

Kitchener Fire Department says it needs more staff and new fire station to deal with growing city (CBC, October 5, 2021)

"Our last station ... in 2008 it opened, station seven, and we're in 2021, so our biggest challenge is that we can't meet our response times especially in the downtown core," Fire Chief Bob Gilmore told CBC K-W's The Morning Edition on Tuesday.

The report showed response times for medical or fire rescue calls between 2016 and 2019 took longer than the industry standard 43 per cent of the time, and call volume had increased by 14.51 per cent during that same time.

Gilmore said the FUS states that anything above 2,500 calls a year is considered a high-volume station. 
Fire station 2, which primarily responds to emergency calls in the downtown, is the department's busiest station. They were responding to more than 3,100 calls in 2016 and more than in 3,800 in 2019.  Station 4, located on Fairway Road, is expected to reach the 2,500 call benchmark within the next year, according to the report.

I'd like to see a breakdown of the calls that they responded to. Based on my (earlier) reading, as well as anecdotal observations, a lot of the calls the fire department responds to are medical only, and there is little need for a giant fire truck to be sent out. The number of actual fires has been on a rather steady decline for a very long time.

Maybe more of those medical calls could be redirected to paramedics, and, if necessary, we could add another paramedic crew or two?

[jamincan]

That was precisely what I was going to say. Our EMS is stretched thin, so Fire is needed as a first responder. This makes little sense, but as long as fire is a municipal responsibility and EMS is regional, it's unlikely that something will be done about it.

[jeffster]

Kitchener Fire Department says it needs more staff and new fire station to deal with growing city (CBC, October 5, 2021)

"Our last station ... in 2008 it opened, station seven, and we're in 2021, so our biggest challenge is that we can't meet our response times especially in the downtown core," Fire Chief Bob Gilmore told CBC K-W's The Morning Edition on Tuesday.

The report showed response times for medical or fire rescue calls between 2016 and 2019 took longer than the industry standard 43 per cent of the time, and call volume had increased by 14.51 per cent during that same time.

Gilmore said the FUS states that anything above 2,500 calls a year is considered a high-volume station. 
Fire station 2, which primarily responds to emergency calls in the downtown, is the department's busiest station. They were responding to more than 3,100 calls in 2016 and more than in 3,800 in 2019.  Station 4, located on Fairway Road, is expected to reach the 2,500 call benchmark within the next year, according to the report.

Is it too late to reactivate the (at least) three fire stations that were closed in the downtown core? I can think of the one on Duke St, the one on Highland, and the one that used to be on Guelph St.

Are there other Canadian examples of fire stations that are incorporated into larger buildings? Perhaps change "ground floor commercial" to "ground floor emergency services"?

Seems like they play musical chairs when it comes to fire stations - some are shut down when others are opened. This will likely happen again.

Where on Duke St did they have a station? And wasn't there one on Ottawa (close to King) at one point, right beside Town Bowl?

I am not sure how many fire departments you need based on population. That said, I do recall as a young kid, when Kitchener had about 132,000 people, we had 5 departments, now we're about double the size, and have 7.

[Chris]

Where on Duke St did they have a station?

It was at Duke and Breithaupt.

https://www.google.com/maps/@43.4554543,...384!8i8192

[Chris]

I just want to share this weird time warp on Google maps. I didn't change anything in the settings but as I clicked my way down Duke St the fire hall changed to an older version from 2015.

https://www.google.com/maps/@43.4558412,...312!8i6656