London Free Press Building Redevelopment

[Spoofy]

London Free Press Article about the London Free Press Building Redevelopment

Glad to see the site being redeveloped! Shows the shift in culture with the building going from being used for newspapers, to being used for technology start-ups!

Similar idea to this is Communitech in Waterloo.

This is a great spot for redevelopment, and with the current trend of tech companies coming to the downtown, this fits right in.

[Dupcheck]

Nice. We need forward thinking incubators like these.

[Djeffery]

As the CTV news report said tonight, it's a very ambitious timeline considering the Free Press hasn't moved out yet. Will look nice when it's done though, so much better than the mausoleum look the place has now.

[kaiserLDN]

Great idea. I like it. Considering its Farhi though I would like to see work being done on the building to believe it will happen. I have seen him with great ideas before with a project and nothing ever happened.

[jammer139]

Another plan in the works - https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/londo...unch-1.5934538

[inimrepus]

https://lfpress.com/news/local-news/...press-building

I can't wait to see the next parking lot in London!

[jammer139]

Hopefully someone buys the property from the Landlord as it will stay a parking lot for as long as he owns it.
The parking lot south of the convention centre is still for sale for $41M and the parking lots on the east side of the convention centre are also still for sale at over $10M each.


Good thing we won't be hearing from the complainers that there is no parking downtown now. Oh Wait!!!

[CanadianTalk]

I always laugh when I see people complaining that there is not enough parking downtown. I have never had any problems trying to finding a parking spot downtown, even when attending the big events at Victoria Park in the summer. You may not always be able to park right in front of where you want to go and yes, you may have to park a bit farther from your destination and .... walk a little bit. Oh the horror.

Downtown does not need any more surface parking lots. Period.

Edit: Of course I'm referring to people who are able to walk. I recognize that some people do need accessible spots, and those will always be an option as there are many along the streets in the downtown.

[bolognium]

The only people that complain about parking are the entitled suburban motorists that have been conditioned to expect subsidized free parking within 20ft of their destination.

Downtown is a sea of empty surface parking lots, and it's only during events that they even come close to capacity. Adding more surface parking for the handful of peak hours during a Knights game is the definition of smooth-brained.

Hopefully council finally stands up to Farhi and denies this demolition permit. How many times do we have to hear this turd give the same tired speeches about how he plans to build something magnificent, but a building is standing in his way? Or how he can't rent out his cavernous vacant properties, but this one new surface parking lot will be the silver bullet.

Allowing him to demolish this building for a temporary surface parking lot just enables him to keep playing Monopoly with our downtown real estate. Right now that building is losing him money, and if he is able to turn it into a cheap surface lot he'll just keep gobbling up properties to sit on and demolish. Everyone understands his game, but no one has the guts to put their foot down.


Edit:

Literally everyone is aware of this pattern. A quote by Coun. Stephen Turner in this article that jammer139 posted in another thread recently:

"We've been down this path a few times before," said Turner in an interview with CBC News last week. "A property owner says 'I'm going to tear a building down to make something even bigger and grander,' and then that never happens, whatever the reason is.

"It happens too often, it's a bit of a bait and switch and I don't think council should have any tolerance for it."

So why the fuck does council appear to have a massive tolerance for it? This fat idiot is a cancer.

[jammer139]

It would be good debate to start talking about a vacant building property surtax on top of current property taxes. Start making it painful to sit on vacant buildings and do nothing might speed up the process of these properties changing hands to real developers and builders.

[bolognium]

Exactly! We need to disincentivize and discourage people from speculating and holding downtown properties. Stop extending surface parking lot permits. Put a vacancy tax on underutilized and neglected buildings. Get these properties into the hands of developers that actually do something positive for our downtown.

Also fuck his hat. His face already looks like a freshly squeezed out poo, but that hat. Oh my god I hate him

[ssiguy]

This kind of building seems perfect for an institutional campus from either Fanshawe or Western.

London will never get rid of it's parking lots while one person owns nearly all of them and has no intention of development. What the city needs to do is to begin to ban parking lots. A special levy just means Farhi will increase the parking prices making downtown even more unappealing for non-transit users.

The city should put an immediate BAN on all new parking lots meaning this cannot be used as a parking lot. As for all the current parking lots, you cannot force anyone to put up a building on their own property, however, the city does have the right to tell owners what they can and cannot use that property for..............it's called zoning.

This is where the city has the power. They can't force Farhi to put up a residential or office tower but they tell him what he cannot do with that property. In other words the city can change the zoning to disallow all parking lots........they can have their empty lots but cannot make any revenue from it from parking. In other words the land still has to pay it's property taxes but can't raise revenue from it. In other words these empty lots become money pits essentialy forcing the owners to sell or develop.

Such a plan would be for parking LOTS and not SPACES so a business that has parking would be able to keep them. Such a system could be phased ibn so, for example, they have 2 years to get rid of all parking lots with more than 30 spaces, then 2 years after that for 20 etc until parking lots are essentially gone or just have small 5 spaces.

Due to half of London being owned by just one person and owning almost all private vacant lots, this is the only way the city can force his hand. Farhi is only interested in money and couldn't care less about the health of the Core and hence only hitting him hard in the pocketbook will force him to sell.

[Djeffery]

On the other hand, is a parking lot any worse than an old decaying monstrosity that the Free Press building is? I don't think that building has a future and the potential value would be in the land without the building on it. Sure, it will sit forever as an empty lot because who really wants to build on that side of downtown anyway? But anyone potentially interested in that site isn't going to want to take down the building themselves either, so they may pass on it altogether.

[ssiguy]

^^^^ If the city were to BAN any new parking lots then it would effectively force Farhi to sell to someone who will develop it.

The only way London's downtown will thrive is if it gets rid of it's parking lots and a change to the zoning will basically force that to occur. This is a win for everyone as it will create more housing, create a more constant urban form, help downtown business by having thousands of new potential consumers, and all this wouldn't cost the city a cent.

[Djeffery]

If someone wanted to develop there, they would make him an offer now. They would make an offer on the empty parking lot next door. That long discussed project directly across the tracks isn't even being discussed anymore. This part of town is not desirable at all. Tented city Salvation Army on one side, Mission Services and the safe injection site on the other, with a majorly busy rail line right long your back door.

This really isn't about another parking lot. There is no demand for parking in that area. Hardly anyone parks in the lot next door. It's about an ugly eyesore of a building that isn't going to be used for anything. My point is, is it better to leave it as is until someone wants to build there, or knock it down and leave an empty lot until someone wants to build there? I'd just as soon it go now.

[Innsertnamehere]

Originally Posted by ssiguy

^^^^ If the city were to BAN any new parking lots then it would effectively force Farhi to sell to someone who will develop it.

The only way London's downtown will thrive is if it gets rid of it's parking lots and a change to the zoning will basically force that to occur. This is a win for everyone as it will create more housing, create a more constant urban form, help downtown business by having thousands of new potential consumers, and all this wouldn't cost the city a cent.

Don't be so sure. Hamilton has a ban on new surface lots downtown and a similar developer to Farhi demolished several buildings 15 years ago and has let the lots just sit vacant and fallow.

[MolsonExport]

Yay!! More surface parking lots!!

What he proposes:


what we get:


I also hate that stupid hat he likes to wear.

[jammer139]

Yeah the owner of the former Great West Steakhouse had a vision of a 25s tower beside the renovated restaurant building. Just like the guy who owns the surface lot on Clarence and had it rezoned for a 32s tower. Neither of them had the financial ability or expertise to actually do it. Would be good to see someone like Tricar or Southside buy those properties and move forward with towers. At least they have the ability to get them built.

Originally Posted by Djeffery

If someone wanted to develop there, they would make him an offer now. They would make an offer on the empty parking lot next door. That long discussed project directly across the tracks isn't even being discussed anymore. This part of town is not desirable at all. Tented city Salvation Army on one side, Mission Services and the safe injection site on the other, with a majorly busy rail line right long your back door.

This really isn't about another parking lot. There is no demand for parking in that area. Hardly anyone parks in the lot next door. It's about an ugly eyesore of a building that isn't going to be used for anything. My point is, is it better to leave it as is until someone wants to build there, or knock it down and leave an empty lot until someone wants to build there? I'd just as soon it go now.

[ssiguy]

Isn't that lot on Clarence a parking lot though? The owner still gets revenue from the parking to pay the property taxes and this would take away that revenue making it a money. The city could also bring in extra fees so they don't end up with what happened in Hamilton.

Until the city says enough is enough to these parking lots, little will get developed.

[Djeffery]

But one could argue that parking lot on Clarence is actually useful. Right behind Vic Park, right along Richmond Row. Of course we would like to see it developed but until either Mr Mustang Sallys parts with it or figures out how to build, it serves a purpose. Maybe he should talk to the Ben Thanh lady who managed to build something lol. To suggest though that banning future parking lots would force Farhi to sell the LFP building ignores the fact he isn't making revenue on it now (he actually has expenses on it now) and he hasn't felt pressured to sell as far as we know. You'd be hard pressed to come up with a legit reason to deny demolishing the building even if you banned a parking lot from going there.