The Inclusive on Courtland | 38, 34, 30 & 29 fl | Proposed

[MacBerry]

IMO, the most likely answer is in the savings of hundreds of thousands of dollars over the years which the developer will save in taxes. As a fully enclosed indoor mall the property taxes would be much higher on a fully enclosed large building.

Secondly, the TPO site is not meant to be an everyday, local, and enclosed, "lets go to the mall" site.

If that’s true then it’s yet another screw-up in the design of property taxes. I’m a bit unclear — is it simply because the property would be worth more fully enclosed, and therefore the mill rate would apply to a higher assessment, or is it because of special provisions related to some legalistic definition of the use of the property?

As to your second point, I’m not clear on what you’re saying. Nobody would ever want to visit one store, then walk to another? Or they would, but they would be more comfortable being rained on while they do so?

As a specialty mall, in terms of property tax valuation, the best analogy is the one you put forward  ... the rate set would be less for PTO because they have not enclosed it into the traditional regional mall which we see as a fully enclosed building. I don't think it is a special consideration but a means to pay less for a  tax assessment for one large building.

With your query about my thoughts on the visitor attraction factor, it is IMO about who and why people go to say a Community Centre Mall like Stanley Park Mall or Regional Mall (Fairview Park) or a Super-Regional Mall (Square One or Sherway Gardens). All of these malls all have daily consumer attractants such as bank(s), grocery stores, pharmacy all at a size supported by a distance decay factor based on service needs. How far people are willing to travel for certain services and meet, greet and eat functions is a consideration in mall development. 

Toronto Premier Outlets and most "outlet malls" are not trying to attract the kids after high school or the lunch crowd who might also buy from shops or food courts. Outlet malls aren't trying to get parents into a drug store for prescriptions or specialty retailers for daily needs. Regionals (Fairview Park) attract people from across the city/region and beyond and have a variety of small lease holders and usually two anchor stores. Super-regional malls will have major anchor stores such as Neiman Marcus, Holt Renfrew or Nordstrom's  and have a much longer distance attraction radius.

Lastly,  each of these mall types have different transportation infrastructure needs such as highway(s), expressway(s), buses, LRTs or subways and the confluence of these.