MichaelS
Senior Member
The details of how it will be spent will be interesting to see. 7,000 homes by 2027 is a lot to bring on.
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Urban Development and Proposals Discussion
- Thread starter Surrealplaces
- Start date
DougB
Active Member
Yeah...no chance the actual number will be even close to 7K
Government has no advantage in building houses over the private sector
Mountain Man
Senior Member
The advantage is for the private sector contractors who pad their pockets with "extras"
Beltline_B
Senior Member
In most cases, I agree, but it depends on how the money is put to use.
The question is how exactly is this $228 million going to be put to use. Streamlining the approval process is something that needs to be done regardless of this funded money. Incentivizing secondary suites isn’t a bad idea necessarily, except that the real beneficiaries will be people who are already single family homes.
I’d rather see the money was going towards attainable and affordable housing projects. Even student housing for the campuses, that would help take some students out of the rental market.
trtcttc
Active Member
the amount divided by 7k is about 32k per unit, which means they're going to use this money to fund certain projects (like what the city is doing with office conversions) instead of building it themselves. They'll just end up "attributing" 7000 units that were helped in part by this funding to say they met their goal. These announcements just seem like election vote buying, it is not sustainable to just have governments subsidize homebuilding on a long term basis.
I think a big impediment to our housing situation is the concentration of jobs in a few big cities which drive up housing prices in those areas while the smaller cities continue to lose their working population. We then bring in immigrants to fill those jobs through provincial nominations but in a couple of years they move to the big cities and rinse and repeat. We see how housing in the US is broadly more affordable, that's not because New York is cheaper than Toronto but that if you're priced out of New York, you can move to Chicago and find a job, have a very similar quality of life. In Canada, our industries are so concentrated that for many industries, it's Toronto or bust. While I'm happy with this free federal money, it's just very short term (much like their pandemic spending) and are direct subsidies instead of investments that will lead to more long term growth.
darwink
Senior Member
The money isn't just for government subsidized units, it is to incentivize the city for changing rules to allow more private housing production too.
Otherwise, if you were to design a targeted program, the communities which restrict development the most and create a housing crisis through over regulation would end up recieving the most money.
So this turns it on its head: less government control means more money.
MichaelS
Senior Member
It could go towards some growth infrastructure and bring one some new greenfield communities, that would be a way to scale up the amount of housing.
darwink
Senior Member
I suspect a big portion will go to attainable homes to scale up both its existing program and for rentals. A significant number of confidential reports have been going to council and I doubt they’ve all been about the project in the west end.
Urban Outdoorsman
Active Member
haltcatchfire
Senior Member
Ground level retail / mixed use with increase from 10m to 12m? Giddy up!
trtcttc
Active Member
Surprised they didn't go for a more ambitious proposal considering it's facing a retirement home with a pretty wide lane that there wouldn't be as much residential pushback. I see Hillhurst block up the street is still under review, any idea why it's taking so long to get approval in this area?
Chowda7
Active Member
City seeks applications for historic site in city centre
The City wants to breath new life into the Historic Fire Hall No. 1 and North-West Travellers buildings on the corner of 1 Street S.E. and 6 Avenue S.E. and reimagine the site as an arts and culture hub and iconic destination in the city centre.The City released an Expression of Interest in...
Duck Lightning
Active Member
The Northwest Travellers Building I can understand being used for Arts and Culture but filling Firehall No.1 with art just seems like a waste of space.
Mountain Man
Senior Member
Art Central V2.0?
