CentreVenture head 'cautiously optimistic' about downtown development
Winnipeg's downtown development arm has several projects on the go, but pandemic is wild card in outcomes
It's a little too early to assess whether some of CentreVenture's projects will move from planning to construction, but for others, shovels are in the ground and will be completed.
The City of Winnipeg's downtown development company has several proposals on the go, but like so many initiatives, the uncertainty generated by the ongoing health emergency has created question marks where optimism was once in abundance.
"We don't know for sure whether some of the projects in the early stages will go ahead," said CentreVenture president Angela Mathieson.
"Cautiously optimistic" is where Mathieson now places her view of the rest of 2020 and beyond and it's a message she will deliver next week to the city's standing policy committee on innovation and economic development.
"We are lucky in the sense that in 2019 the downtown was becoming a seriously interesting place to invest," Mathieson said, believing the health crisis and subsequent economic fallout has now pushed some work into a "a matter of when."
All ahead full
Despite the structural collapse of a heritage building that was to be part of the project, a mixed development of 60 apartment suites and some non-for-profit commercial space at ground level will go ahead on Princess Street and could be ready by early 2021.
Mathieson says the Ace Art gallery will take much of the main floor of the project, called the Carriage Works Project.
The Paulin Street Village Development, a redevelopment of the old Paulin biscuit factory (a heritage building) on Ross Avenue and a parking lot on Pacific Avenue, is going ahead and will eventually become approximately 220 new rental apartments.
Mathieson says Winnipeg developer Mark Hofer is not stopping with his plans on the project, so "that's good news."
Design and plan ... then watch the market
A CentreVenture-guided project on Waterfront Drive and Galt Avenue isn't as far along as some of the others.
RNDSQ, a development company based in Calgary, has plans for 145 apartment units with some commercial space on the main floor, but Mathieson says it's still in the planning stages, and as such, is subject to a little more uncertainty.
"That's the reality. They are currently in the design and planning stage until they have a better understanding of the market," Mathieson said.
CentreVenture's largest and most ambitious project is also in the "design and plan" stage.
The Market Lands project is tapped to replace the Public Safety Building and Civic Parkade (now in varying stages of demolition) with a large apartment complex and mixed retail, and cultural spaces.
Where Mathieson is "cautiously optimistic" where downtown development is going, she's "very optimistic," on the Market Lands project, which will feature 50 per cent low-income housing and should qualify for federal dollars from the National Housing Co-Investment Fund.
CentreVenture was supposed to update city council on the project in April, but Mathieson says the pandemic emergency pushed that briefing forward to June or July.
Another project milestone Mathieson is able to report is completion of the removal of hazardous materials from the former St. Regis Hotel on Portage Avenue.
CentreVenture was obligated to take back the property from Ontario company Fortress Real Developments of Richmond failed to follow through on a plan to build a parkade and commercial complex on the site.
At one point CentreVenture hoped to sell the building as it stood, for redevelopment, but is now marketing the property as a clean site and demolition of the old hotel will begin soon.
As a partial reflection of uncertainty of the value of the downtown property, CentreVenture has written down a loss totalling $1.535 million off its books for the St. Regis.
"We made a decision to write it down...to be a reflection of what is closer to market value," Mathieson said.