General Urban Waterloo Updates and Rumours

[ijmorlan]

Yeah, speed the fuckin thing up around places like Hayward Avenue etc. I recently took a trip on the LRT with a train engineer who works for BNSF - and this girl drives intermodal freight trains with hundreds of cars along some of the toughest routes in North America...so she knows a lot about trains.

Good to get validation from somebody who has more than armchair experience with trains (and I include myself in the “armchair” category).

I agree, it should be possible to add the couple of infill stops that make sense and still end up with a faster end-to-end time than we have right now by fixing the various speed issues.

[Acitta]

Waterloo getting a green office building made of wood

[danbrotherston]

I do like the modern wood timber buildings. That's great...or at least, has great potential.

It's actually got good bicycle access to the south, you can take the MUT along King St. to the trail behind the Manulife Building, and get to much of Waterloo and Kitchener. It's even winter maintained. There's only a small chance of you being run over at the highway interchange. To the north, it's much worse...you can ride through the mall, which is probably the best option. You can get to Northfield, which we all know is world famous for being bad.

Which really does bring me to the main point. This is 500 meters from an LRT station, but unless you want to run across 8 lanes of high speed (like 80+ km/h) traffic, it's going to take you a kilometer walk to get to the LRT station. As is a pattern with the LRT somehow, pedestrian access was not a priority.

[ac3r]

It should look good. Edge uses a lot of wood in their work (I don't mean as a construction material, but for the architectural design materials) so they seem to have a good eye for it.

[tomh009]

Waterloo getting a green office building made of wood

The first in the city (of Waterloo) -- but Kitchener has at least the Mayfair Hotel project already.

[nms]

From the article:

Woodin is not the first mass timber building in Waterloo Region — Kitchener developer Bernie Nimer built the five-storey One Young office building across from Kitchener City Hall just before than pandemic hit. As well, a 41-unit residential mass timber building is under construction on Block Line Road for the YW Kitchener-Waterloo.

[CP42]

I’ve seen a couple articles recently about how tenants of The Atrium in Uptown Waterloo are moving out already. I know this site was purchased back in the spring (by Momentum I believe?). Have any plans been made public?

[taylortbb]

I know this site was purchased back in the spring (by Momentum I believe?). Have any plans been made public?

Yep, by Momentum. No public plans yet.

[Lebronj23]

I drove by and saw the NE corner of King st N and Hickory being dug up, it looks like a pretty big site too. Anyone know what’s going on there?

[CP42]

I often get ads for condos that are a bit exaggerative (e.g., steps from uptown when it’s on Columbia st), but this one that came across my Instagram today was quite strange.

It claims to “revolutionize condo living in Waterloo”, be “surrounded by ski resorts”, “a stone’s throw from the bustling urban centre of downtown Kitchener”, and “at one of the most convenient locations in Toronto for both transit and driving”.

Quite odd. I’m not sure if this has any substance at all - but somebody did pay to have it as sponsored content on Instagram.

The profile picture of the Facebook page shows the logo for Greenpark Group - which has no mention of this development on its website: 
https://www.greenparkgroup.ca/new-condos/

[panamaniac]

The "revolutionize condominium living" bit made me throw up in my mouth, a little. On the other hand "just a stone's throw from the bustling urban centre of Kitchener" is not something I would expect to see in anything pertaining to Waterloo. Is the pendulum beginning to swing back after forty years? Stay tuned.

[ac3r]

TIL we're surrounded by ski resorts in Waterloo Region.

[KingandWeber]

Also, where is that ornate fountain in Waterloo? I must know!

[danbrotherston]

Seems like this is intended to dupe investors who don't live in the area.

[timc]

The same text appears on the Elevate Condos page: https://regorealty.ca/development/elevate-condos/