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Urban Development and Proposals Discussion

cameronhowe said:
Personally, I would rather my tax money be contributing to preserve and restore the Hudson's Bay building than building the arena tbh (and I say this as someone who isn't anti-arena).
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Me as well. I cannot overstate how critical saving that building is (IMO) to the future health of downtown.
 
Correct me if I'm wrong, but the floorplate doesn't seem to be unusually large? Not more than any other skyscraper office building downtown. I get that it's big but I'm not quite clear on what makes it such a barrier.
 
Im not sure but I bet there will be answers at that talk taking place there this month. I wish I could go but I have a work conflict.
 
BigWoofer said:
Correct me if I'm wrong, but the floorplate doesn't seem to be unusually large? Not more than any other skyscraper office building downtown. I get that it's big but I'm not quite clear on what makes it such a barrier.
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And we have not built a new office skyscraper in years. And all the residential conversions are with small floorplate buildings.
 
cameronhowe said:
Personally, I would rather my tax money be contributing to preserve and restore the Hudson's Bay building than building the arena tbh (and I say this as someone who isn't anti-arena).
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The arena is a revenue generating asset. Rent from the Flames, concerts, the just announced World Cup of Hockey. And the potential of the team leaving would be a huge economic hole in the city. I think that's unlikely but a risk. Not opposed to some government contribution, but it can't be the city investing $300M to build something that generates very little revenue.
 
Figuring out what it should be is most of the battle. It is large enough that only very particular clients would want a full floor. and even then, they'd likely want to lease 2 floors, and make it double height, to be able to actually use most of the floor plate.
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My personal choice would be a new campus for AUA - with a couple of extra floors added to the top of it. Realistically from a financial perspective I think it would make a good 'Art Central' type venue with a collection of smaller vendors, using up the bottom three floors (due to all three having external or +15 access) Upper floors, could be mixed usages like dance studios, and maybe some office for small creative community businesses.
 
AUArts for an institutional use makes the most sense, but would require a substantial public investment maybe in the $200 . Once you start reconfiguring, you have to get everything hazardous out, try to fix weird elevation changes. And probably double height each thing. $150mm to start? $300 per square foot original configuration.
 
trtcttc said:
There's also a bunch of these similar buildings all around the country. So far, there's been no plans announced for any of them. The main successful reuse of these large floor plate buildings was The Post in Vancouver, but office demand is obviously way, way down. Residential conversion will be quite expensive with this space.

Maybe we'll get a downtown Costco/IKEA combo. Those seem to be the only large retailers left these days and require little HVAC and finishings. Calgary could use another Ikea and there seems to be unlimited demand for Costcos.
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You might get an inner city Costco, IKEA, or even a combo someday but it would never happen in a reuse of The Bay building. They'll want a new building with underground parking and loading docks.
 
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