06-12-2015, 09:47 AM
(06-09-2015, 01:55 PM)tomh009 Wrote: David's Gourmet was too early: only the Kaufman Lofts was occupied then, as I recall, and that's not enough to make a difference. Once City Centre and One Victoria are occupied (and Arrow Lofts already is), there will be a lot more people living in downtown Kitchener. (But there is already competition for David's in the core, too much so, I think for them to succeed.)
I'm afraid that even then it won't be enough, judging from other urban examples. We are going from 0 buildings to 1 (Kaufman) to 3 (Kaufman+One Victoria+City Centre) so while the increase sounds like a lot, density is still extremely low in that area as far as downtown urban districts are concerned. We will need the other City Centre tower as well as the two towers in One Hundred Victoria before we start seeing critical mass. The transit hub will help a lot as the fact that a trip to downtown will be a breeze away when the LRT is in place. Then we'll see a clear pickup.