General Urban Kitchener Updates and Rumours

[ZEBuilder]

This looks fantastic.

Dare I say with The downturn in condo interest that we could risk having an overcompliment of condos in KIT?

Would it have been better served with a cluster of townhouses mixed with mid rise larger apartments?

Unfortunately costs are too elevated for it to make sense for a developer to do that, some developers may sit on a loss but others are just going to sit. While yes there is a downturn in the condo market it doesn't mean rental has ground to a halt. Developers have been shifting condos to rentals in many places, condos are still selling just brutally slow compared to the peak. 

Rental buildings are still being built relatively quickly even in KW, right now you have SYLK T1, 1001 King, first 3 Metz buildings, 1295 Bleams, 50 Otterbein, which are all rentals some of which should be coming to the market soon.

[panamaniac]

Haha westwardloo and panamaniac you two saying "One can dream" and "One wonders..." and "One hopes..."  I'm picturing you like friends on a back porch at sunset on rocking chairs smoking cigars stroking your chins musing about the world

One has one's standards, in one's English usage as in all things ....

[tomh009]

Rental buildings are still being built relatively quickly even in KW, right now you have SYLK T1, 1001 King, first 3 Metz buildings, 1295 Bleams, 50 Otterbein, which are all rentals some of which should be coming to the market soon.

Add Vertikal (looks like first tower should be ready for occupancy relatively soon) and Eureka to that list.

[ZEBuilder]

Rental buildings are still being built relatively quickly even in KW, right now you have SYLK T1, 1001 King, first 3 Metz buildings, 1295 Bleams, 50 Otterbein, which are all rentals some of which should be coming to the market soon.

Add Vertikal (looks like first tower should be ready for occupancy relatively soon) and Eureka to that list.

Eureka is 1001 King.

There's also the project on Dellroy which just started, there's 4 apartments going up at Fairway/Eden Oak, 1442 Highland just occupied. Vive is working on permits for 332 Charles. Rental is still a very healthy market.

[tomh009]

Construction fencing up at 140 Sydney St S, the former Polwood Cabinets factory. This shows now as being City of Kitchener ownership. Too small for parkland (0.5 ha, 0.22 acres), could this be another Kitchener Housing project? Or is this expropriation for the Schneider creek naturalization?

   

[ZEBuilder]

Construction fencing up at 140 Sydney St S, the former Polwood Cabinets factory. This shows now as being City of Kitchener ownership. Too small for parkland (0.5 ha, 0.22 acres), could this be another Kitchener Housing project? Or is this expropriation for the Schneider creek naturalization?

The city has owned that for a while now. 

The properties they currently own for the Schneider Creek project are, 124 Ottawa St S, 405-409 Nyberg St, 170 Borden (demolished in January), and 59 Bedford. They also own the parking lot on Kent next to the creek and the parking lot on Courtland across from Schneiders.

They are still trying to purchase 150-160 Borden, 123 Ottawa St S, and 134 Sydney St S for phase 1 of the project, phase 2 may need 116-118 Kent but they could likely get away without it.

[Square]

Construction fencing up at 140 Sydney St S, the former Polwood Cabinets factory. This shows now as being City of Kitchener ownership. Too small for parkland (0.5 ha, 0.22 acres), could this be another Kitchener Housing project? Or is this expropriation for the Schneider creek naturalization?

The city has owned that for a while now. 

The properties they currently own for the Schneider Creek project are, 124 Ottawa St S, 405-409 Nyberg St, 170 Borden (demolished in January), and 59 Bedford. They also own the parking lot on Kent next to the creek and the parking lot on Courtland across from Schneiders.

They are still trying to purchase 150-160 Borden, 123 Ottawa St S, and 134 Sydney St S for phase 1 of the project, phase 2 may need 116-118 Kent but they could likely get away without it.

The 405-409 Nyberg St. buildings are boarded up and have fencing up.

[tomh009]

The properties they currently own for the Schneider Creek project are, 124 Ottawa St S, 405-409 Nyberg St, 170 Borden (demolished in January), and 59 Bedford. They also own the parking lot on Kent next to the creek and the parking lot on Courtland across from Schneiders.

They are still trying to purchase 150-160 Borden, 123 Ottawa St S, and 134 Sydney St S for phase 1 of the project, phase 2 may need 116-118 Kent but they could likely get away without it.

Will all of these be used for the creek naturalization, either for the creek itself or surrounding parkland?

[KevinL]

That's certainly my understanding, unless there is a large enough parcel remaining from one or more of these that could be resold for development.

[ZEBuilder]

As of right now the floodplain extends well beyond the limits of the creek. Given today's planning rules you wouldn't be able to develop any of the properties the city has purchased without the implementation of a special policy area (like uptown). 

The city and GRCA are planning on implementing a special policy area in the vicinity of the creek allowing for development meaning in theory the city could sell the large enough parts back to developers. However the special policy area is mainly to allow properties closer to Borden to redevelop since those are the properties most impacted by the floodplain (all of MTD), lands on the opposite side of the creek such as 134 Ottawa are partially impacted so it would also benefit them.

With that said its unlikely the city will sell the land given the inevitable demand for parkland with the density planned for Borden/Mill.

[tomh009]

I was walking through Cedar Hill this morning and passed the site of the old water tower at 100 George St.  When it came down I believe there was talk of turning the property into a parkette or public gardens but that obviously hasn't happened yet.  Has anyone heard anything about this site?  Presumably it is (or was?) owned by the Region?

A few years have passed, but construction is now well under way at the old water tower site (100/102 St George St). Based on the building permits, Habitat for Humanity is putting four semi-detached units (two buildings) on this site. So, we get a few more units of affordable housing. Not max density for this site maybe, but four larger units is a good complement to the smaller affordable units being built elsewhere.

[Lebronj23]

Is anyone getting updated info from this link, site plan applications. There hasn’t been updates since November

https://www.arcgis.com/home/item.html?id...9eb177f64e

[ZEBuilder]

Is anyone getting updated info from this link, site plan applications. There hasn’t been updates since November

https://www.arcgis.com/home/item.html?id...9eb177f64e

They city is making an interactive map similar to the ZBA/OPA one which should be out later this year for site plans.

I don't know why it hasn't been updated though, it could very well be that someone turned off public access for new applications.

[Square]

We now know who bought the Towne Bowl building.

https://www.therecord.com/news/waterloo-...e2005.html

[ZEBuilder]

Is anyone getting updated info from this link, site plan applications. There hasn’t been updates since November

https://www.arcgis.com/home/item.html?id...9eb177f64e

It appears someone from the city lurks on here because it's working again, there's been a bunch of applications since it was last updated but nothing extensive enough for a thread yet. Some of the applications will be going through CoA applications which generally have renders/site plans in the city report. Once they get that far I'll likely make some threads for them.

Here's another link to the SPA data set if that link ever stops working:
https://app2.kitchener.ca/appdocs/openda...e_Plan.csv