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Russell

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Tout ce qui a été posté par Russell

  1. Russell
    I passed by here two weekends ago and compared it versus Time Out Market. While Time Out has a great diversity of restaurants, and differentiates against the usual food court fare, it is still a food court, just a classy one with replaceable vendors who have non-distinguishable signage. No surprise it is backed by institutional capital with low risk tolerance. The Central is a genuine food hall. It is a better version of the Dekalb Market in Brooklyn or a modernized version of San Telmo in Buenos Aires. Between the counter seating to the exposed MEP/HVAC and the geometrically diverse spaces, it feels and is authentic. It should be busy weekdays and at night, activating the area. SDA swung for the fences and hit a home run. Both will do well as they are improvements to the norm. They complement each other for different clientele. But when i visit montreal, i am only stopping at one food hall. Looking forward to seeing what PVM does to amplify the offering.
  2. Russell
    This building cannot come down quickly enough. Westmount always needed a little gentrification LOL
  3. Russell
    The curtain wall on Bleury is pretty atrocious. I know its for a hotel...but really. is this the best they could do?
  4. Russell
    Brivia going big. I mean when they bought the dirt on Rene-Levesque everyone said Brivia-who? Give Kheng Ly total credit for taking a massive bet on Montreal when it was incredibly unpopular to do so. They have refined their sales tactics over time and delivered architecturally appealing residential towers to downtown Montreal. Excited to see their vision revealed. This site is not easy to develop so lets hope there are 1150 residential users ready to move in.
  5. Russell
    I expect that this project is due to Cominar relinquishing control and bringing in a capable developer to construct the tower. They have a very disciplined and non-egotistical CFO (Heather Kirk) and a 100% interest would be too risky for even their balance sheet. Spreading the risk and the reward is a smart move.
  6. Russell
    Bentall Kennedy the owner of the site will certainly develop this property as rental apartments. They also have the right to demolish, partially demolish or over-build the larger-floor plate property where Herzing College is located - i know first hand that the rent is very low for the college and other parts of that building. Total allowable density is in the range of 200,000 - 350,000 sf subject to what they maintain. The park in the front may still be maintained if they only do an over-build structure, however they could also create a new street-wall that encourages commercial space with higher pedestrian traffic. When Bentall acquired the site in 2012 they attributed value to the potential density. That density has since become significantly more valuable and now they are prepared to act. No doubt that they will construct a modern property that interfaces elegantly with the Grey Nuns property.
  7. Russell
    I think for this petition to gain force the City of Longueuil will need to revisit its urban plan and demonstrate how it will densify the stations and perhaps utilize value-capture to pay for its extension. based on its current population, the area served by this line does not justify a public subsidy.
  8. Russell
    This project will likely be a twin-tower rising over a podium base. Could be both condos or rental + condo. Maximum density is 921,000 SF and max heights of 40 storeys.
  9. Russell
    Great looking project. Maybe with the proceeds the Domtar folks will re-clad their 1960's brutalist building.
  10. Russell
    i think it is pretty clear that the bridge wellington station services the baseball stadium that coderre wants to build on the Canada Lands site. but there should also be a station at Ottawa/Wellington to service cite multimedia and local residents from McGill to de la Montagne who want to head north into DT.
  11. Russell
    the site was sold to the pointe-zero group from tidan. big number so they will need to do something large or of high quality to justify the price tag.
  12. Russell
    These organizations have a point, that the relocation of RC from la cite des ondes and pulling the other broadcasters with them will be devastating economically to the Centre Sud borough. Unfortunately, Radio-Canada represents all Canadians and does not exist for the sole economic benefit of the Centre-Sud borough in the same way Bombardier does not exist to create jobs for Mirabel or Ville Saint-Laurent. As such, the borough and related organizations in concert with the City of Montreal should be coming up with innovative ways to retain the public broadcaster within the borough, such as buying the land from RC and redeveloping it in a profitable way, while finding them a suitable site on publicly owned land or expropriated land around Papineau or Frontenac metro stations. There was an RFP, pity if they did not formulate a response.
  13. Russell
    i guess affordable housing cannot afford to provide windows to its residents. this is quite bad.
  14. Russell

    950 Beaumont - 6 étages

    Russell a répondu à un sujet de UrbMtl dans Complétés

    a couple comments on this thread: all real estate professional call the area midtown. it effectively wraps around the mountain. after that we have laval, west island (or split between St-Laurent and the Deep West), east end, north shore and south shore. the politicians of st-henri really dropped the ball here. the 450 jobs would have generated massive economic spin and spurred local housing growth and higher property taxes, and frankly it is sad that the architecture on beaumont has been dumbed down to accommodate a cheap call center operation. unfortunately no one really wants to live along beaumont, and i doubt the employees are going to be kids living with their parents in TMR. mark_ac...one of the principal drivers of the relocation of back office financial services out of downtown is a combination of functions where there is no client facing activities and much higher city taxes...the UDI has an interesting report on the increase of taxes and the effective lack of increase in net rents to drive property values. Fast forward a few years and taxes in "midtown" will catch up as the area gentrifies, then the overall gross rent gap will shrink between downtown and midtown and other client-facing companies may head back downtown where the amenities are superior & concentration of businesses (clients) higher. no need to panic here, just supply and demand working invisibly.
  15. Russell
    it is clear to me that Alain de Sousa is being given very bad advice or is tremendously misgoverning his own electorate. For some reason, the goal of running a metro north to bois franc is a priority (with an extension to Laval inevitable), yet his office node at cavendish and cote vertu is getting decimated with a 30% vacancy rate and an eventual closure of the Sears DC and store creating a huge redevelopment opportunity. Instead of heading north, he should be recommending that the orange line pivots west (or the creation of an LRT) towards his major commercial tax base, with an eventual link through Liberty/NEXUX, the Technoparc and finally the P-E-T Airport. So instead of eventually getting Laval a boost, he could entirely be reinforcing his boroughs economic dominance as the primordial suburban employment node. In addition, he calls himself the "greenest" mayor, and this extension would reduce the requirement for exterior parking lots, and densify his borough. Not that an extension north would not be beneficial as a spur line (something that we should be considering along multiple segments of the city), but that is all it should be until Laval pays the CMM its fair share of the previous orange line extension.
  16. Russell
    I totally respect the city planning department, and politicians are allowed to change their mind, but zoning processes should not take into consideration "current market conditions" when the downtown node is supposed to be the nexus of business competition. why exactly should the city care if another office tower gets built and attracts tenants from other towers or elsewhere? who is to say it even will be constructed when other superior projects are still on the sidelines. who are they trying to protect, and if so, why are they doing it? lets just keep in mind that city politicians and bureaucrats are not playing sim-city trying to build some idyllic downtown, and in fact ACPNC, the land does not belong to the city but to private individuals and corporations. These are real dollars invested, and although there is tremendous risk in development, the process involved needs to be far more predictable to ensure more investors are attracted to the city. To believe for a minute that government cannot be a positive or negative agent of change is bullshit, there are hundreds of companies who refuse or refused to establish in QC while everyone knew we had corrupt officials at the highest levels. I am not suggesting that Bergeron has been corrupted, but clearly the lobbying group of heritage activists, existing property owners and others have effectively changed his mind starkly in a rather unusual way. This begs more questions, not round-about defenses.
  17. Russell
    this is a quite painful outcome. just because a project is zoned for high rise office does not mean that it will get built as some sites are simply "inferior" to others and the tenants that kick off these projects make the call. What the zoning allows is flexibility for the owner to pursue the strategy that yields the best result. what coderre and bergeon has done is effectively reduced the value of the property and investment, seemingly on a unilateral basis. this hurts business confidence for investors just as the market is demonstrating a resurgence for investment in montreal (Tour KPMG/Westmout Square etc). It is interesting to note the "market forces" commentary, especially as the SHM begins construction on its own "speculative" office project at Ilot Balmoral.
  18. Russell
    maybe the city should just try and hire a reputable broker to sell the land at its highest possible price based on current zoning with no municipal interference?
  19. Russell
    For soon to be vacant assets, in a tough office leasing market, to sell for $250 psf is an extraordinary amount. Clearly Carbonleo has tenants lining up for this project, which is also extraordinary in consideration of the retail sectors multiple closures, bankruptcies and withdrawals. Got to give these guys credit where credit is due.
  20. Russell
    The feds should attempt to create an underground passageway to Place du Canada and eventually east/west so that the 750 Peel Site becomes part of the network.
  21. Russell
    for the waldorf project, it is not the hotel that is the issue, it is selling the luxury condo suites. the ritz have many sales to go but the depth is not there for a project of that scale.
  22. Russell
    this part of the project must be the rental apartment component. it is backed by pension fund capital who will own the apartments upon completion, so no need for a construction lender.
  23. Russell
    I think the parking lot is to be shared for the wilder and ilot balmoral office requirement, but also allows the other municipal lots to be built upon (pres-kennedy/bleury). The high turnover and cost of festival (night/weekend) parking rates may allow the underground construction to be economically viable, because six levels gets very expensive. I also thought that the ONF needs some underground installations to protect their library of film reals, so it may be that the bottom level or two are bunkers.
  24. Russell
    SRC will need to reimburse costs for the next round of tendering. They are burning the site. What a waste of money indeed.
  25. Russell
    Umm, does anyone believe in property rights? Btw, the biermarkt building is owned by developer of icone. They own it, they do what they want with it. This is not sim city.
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