Citizen urban planning articles and a reaction

[S-Man]

I heard Ottawa passed Brad Lamb a note before study hall.

It read: "Do you like me?", with a box to check for 'yes', and another for 'no'.

[kevinbottawa]

Take tip from Windy City

By Anthony Furey,Ottawa Sun

First posted: Tuesday, August 14, 2012 07:56 PM EDT | Updated: Tuesday, August 14, 2012 08:05 PM EDT

Anyone in Ottawa who loves their city needs to embrace the current wave of condo construction. Opposing it means you don’t believe Ottawa has a future.

This is one of the few things I took away from my trip to Chicago last week. As most people do when they travel, I invariably compared my hometown to my vacation city.

I’m not interested in adopting their policy that no hot dog within the city limits can have ketchup on it. And while I like the idea of solar powered trash compactors replacing garbage cans, I’d like to study the numbers first. But what I am sold on is their can-do attitude toward literally reaching for the skies.

Waiters, hotel staff and people on the street speak passionately about the development around them. One would think that the stomping ground of Obama and Rahm Emmanuel would be anti-development, no? That there would be poverty protesters permanently camped outside of every proposed lot. Yet our tour guide spoke with disappointment when explaining how a 150-storey residential tower was sidelined due to financing. People look up — literally and figuratively — to the tall buildings that make up the skyline.

Granted Chicago developments have not been without controversy. But there is a marked difference between the general attitudes. If you believe in your city and think it’s great — as many residents of major American cities do — you’re not going to be surprised when people want to move there and companies aspire to build.

These days some Ottawans say the word “condos” with a high-and-mighty snort. Such snootiness is childish. The best recipe to be a small-time city is for its residents to be small-minded. Be careful what you wish for.

Wednesday’s Sun lists the various Ottawa condos that have been met with some degree of opposition. The most common concern is height. For buildings with storeys ranging from 17 to 28. Good grief.

I get that Ottawa is still a low density city, but eventually we need to take off the training wheels, and most of these developments do just that. Here are some truths to keep in mind:

Don’t pay attention to Ottawa’s poverty protesters, who want condos halted in favour of homeless shelters. They only focus on the negative and think life is a zero-sum game. They think success for one means failure for another. It’s a sad approach to city living.

Some people — I’m thinking of those Glebe residents opposed to the Lansdowne Park redevelopment — want the full benefits of living in the city (including the increases in property value, added amenities) hand in hand with the benefits of a small town (undeveloped, lacking density). You can’t have it both ways.

If you think that no developer or no one at City Hall has thought about the required infrastructure upgrades that come with the addition of large buildings, think again. If you NIMBY the building out of your community, you become lower priority for ancient water main replacement.

Lastly, but most importantly: Development means people believe in your city. There’s a major capital outlay when it comes to starting a development. Most developers heavily research a neighbourhood’s prospects. Most buildings don’t get their financing until a large majority of their units have been pre-sold. That means hundreds of families decided to call Ottawa home. Hundreds of people believe in the future of your neighbourhood.

Sure, there are caveats to all of this that Ottawa’s Debbie Downers will focus on. Unless it’s written in your sales contract, there’s no guarantee your unit will look like it does in the picture. There’s also the issue of developers heading to the Ontario Municipal Board to overturn municipal decisions. But these should be dealt with as they arise, not used as easy outs to decry condos entirely.

I believe in Ottawa. Do you?

http://www.ottawasun.com/2012/08/14/...rom-windy-city

Condo fear of heights

By Jon Willing,Ottawa Sun

First posted: Tuesday, August 14, 2012 07:37 PM EDT | Updated: Tuesday, August 14, 2012 09:45 PM EDT

Don’t say downtown has a Peter Pan syndrome, because Jordan Charbonneau insists his community isn’t afraid to grow up.

“I wouldn’t use the word afraid,” Charbonneau said. “There is certainly some suspicion, though, that we need to grow up all the time.”

Charbonneau said the Centretown Citizens Community Association’s apprehension has less to do with height and more to do with aesthetics.

“Something original would be nice, as opposed to the concrete and plain glass steel towers,” he said.

Charbonneau, president of the association, pointed to two high-rise developments downtown that he considers unique: The posh Merit condo on Lisgar St., across from City Hall, and the Performance Court office tower on Elgin St. which will incorporate the historic Grant House.

The community association last week launched an Ontario Municipal Board appeal of council’s decision to allow Claridge Homes to build a 27-storey condo at 96 Nepean St. The group argues the building is too big for the property and poorly designed.

Charbonneau said residents accept there will be tall buildings downtown, but they don’t appreciate council allowing developments that dismiss community design plans and zoning rules. At least, he suggested, new developments should fit in with the neighbourhood and be environmentally friendly if they seek to alter the rules.

“We don’t want to be seen as opposing all development,” Charbonneau said.

Alta Vista Coun. Peter Hume, council’s planning chairman, wonders if it’s time to diversify City Hall’s panel of professional design experts, which reviews and critiques development concepts.

Because height tends to be controversial in Ottawa, perhaps it’s time to add a professional specializing in tall buildings to the panel, Hume said.

Part of the problem sits at ground level, not necessarily in the sky.

Downtowns of other cities see thriving retail, such as grocery stores, on the first floor with a condo tower built on top. Placing amenities at ground level creates a buzz and turns massive condos into small destinations.

In Ottawa, Hume said there aren’t many development concepts that include that ground floor retail component.

“It happens all over the place. We just can’t seem to do it,” Hume said.

A refresh of the city’s planning policies will bring more certainty to neighbourhood zoning rules, something community associations badly want.

“We are as tired as anyone else with these prolonged conflicts,” Hume said.

Hume says there are good reasons council endorses applications for downtown buildings taller than what zoning rules dictate.

For one, bringing more people to live downtown could energize the core. Hume recognized downtown Ottawa is criticized for virtually shutting down after 8 p.m. With a larger consumer base, more amenities and attractions could follow.

But the most cited reason for downtown intensification is reducing traffic and decongesting city buses. People with downtown jobs who also live — and hopefully shop — in the core aren’t a drain on the transit network if they can easily walk or cycle.

“That’s the person we want,” Hume said.

GROWING UP

187 Metcalfe St.

Claridge Home’s Tribeca 28-storey project will have a built-in grocery store. In recent months, city politicians heard concerns about ground subsidence possibly linked to the work.

96 Nepean St.

The 27-storey Claridge development came under some scrutiny when the owner of Place Bell worried infrastructure was being stretched too thin in the core because of the condo boom. Engineers, however, signed off on the plan. The local community association is appealing the development to the Ontario Municipal Board.

Lisgar/Cartier St.

Charlesfort Development’s 20-storey condo across from City Hall is called the Merit. It’s one of the more unique designs for downtown condos, resembling New York’s Empire State Building.

203 Catherine St.

Council approved Lamb Development’s 23-storey SoBa project, even though the community wasn’t happy about the size.

428 Sparks St.

Windmill Development’s 21-storey Cathedral Hill condo will be nestled beside Christ Church Cathedral. Some residents in neighbouring buildings expressed concern the tower would block their views.

324-328 Gloucester St.

A 17-storey condo by Lamb Development will be at the corner of Lyon St. and be called Gotham.

http://www.ottawasun.com/2012/08/14/condo-growing-pains

[S-Man]

I accept, as many others on this forum do, that the most recent Nepean tower that was appealed to the OMB was too similar in appearance to others approved recently in the exact same area. Height was not an issue for me. This is what the association president says, and I can sympathize.

But within the CCCA I am sure there are knee-jerkers who got used to nothing being built during the flight to the suburbs in the 70s, 80s and 90s (Diane Holmes being the worst culprit), and want their not-touched-since-1970 zoning to remain.

Hence the opposition to the SoBa, whose height was actually approved in a community design plan, but people who thought "it was too tall" appealed it to the OMB anyways. Then you have Sparks Street, with the "blocked view" condo dwellers. So, suffice it to say there is still a hell of a lot of rampant NIMBYism, and that takes away from those who want better street interaction or better design, but don't really concern themselves with height.

I have to agree that much, but not all of the opposers to development in and around the city cite height and zoning as their main concern as a way to conceal they just don't want any development in their area at all. BANANAs hiding behind NIMBYs.

[J.OT13]

I concur with the design problem. This tower is way too similar to the other two, exact same proportions on detailing and the building itself, only with a contrast black and white theme instead of masonry and colour.

As I stated before, in terms of height, my problem isn't the 27 stories as a number, but the fact that it's the exact same height as everything else. Cutting down a few floors (or raising the height of the ones nearer the CBD) would create a bit of much needed depth to the skyline.

[McC]

anyone else find it very odd to read this TRUST YOUR GOVERNMENT sentence in a Sun Opinion piece?

"If you think that no developer or no one at City Hall has thought about the required infrastructure upgrades that come with the addition of large buildings, think again."

How often does Furey give bureaucrats the benefit of the doubt? only when it suits his argument? (Not a regular reader so this is an honest question)

[S-Man]

I think he means planners and staff - the sewers and roads guys and their opinion on whether infrastructure can handle the population increase - and not so much the city manager/councillors.

[kevinbottawa]

Below is a story about Minto re-entering the Ottawa condo market. And here's a pic of the sports bar overlooking the stadium in the south tower at Lansdowne. (perhaps more of a party room?)

Jumping back in ‘with all guns blazing’

After eight years away, Minto is set to launch two condo tower projects in a busy fall season

By Patrick Langston, The Ottawa Citizen October 4, 2012

It was just a matter of time.

The Minto Group, a pioneer condo developer in Ottawa and a longtime presence in Toronto’s booming highrise condo market, is starting to build towers here again after a lengthy gap. Its Minto@lansdowne project, a multi-faceted residential project that’s part of the massive Lansdowne Park redevelopment, includes two condo towers along with other residences. In Westboro, the company is partnering with Canderel to build UpperWest, a 25-storey tower. Both projects launch in the coming weeks.

Minto has kept its hand in the Ottawa condo market with low-rise projects such as Ampersand in Barrhaven over the past few years. However, it’s been eight years since its last highrise undertaking, the Metropole, a high-end, 33-storey structure in Westboro and still Ottawa’s tallest residential building.

Doesn’t that make the company a Johnny-come-lately on Ottawa’s well-entrenched highrise condo scene?

No, says Minto’s executive vice-president Paul Rookwood. “We (first) wanted to build up a solid approach to design, including green design. We’re now at the point where we’re ready to re-enter the Ottawa market. Our game plan is to come out with all guns blazing on primo sites.”

Rookwood adds that the City of Ottawa’s commitment to densification, the relative affordability of condos and the easy commute to work for those who live downtown all give the condo market the long-term viability Minto was waiting for before jumping back into it.

Adds Minto CEO Roger Greenberg, “For the longest time, the condominium market in Ottawa was quite slow, quite small and so there wasn’t really a lot of depth, a lot of opportunity for us.”

Ottawa’s increasing condo sales over the past several years convinced Minto that it was time to make its move. But “we said, ‘let’s be careful about launching, make sure we have a good product,’ ” says Rookwood.

He’s confident that, despite the recent slowdown in Ottawa’s overall real estate market, the company’s blend of quality buildings and excellent locations will ensure its successful re-entry.

Minto, recently named Builder of the Year at the Ontario Home Builders’ Association Awards of Distinction, will unveil more information about its two new condo projects at a VIP launch in October. A public launch follows in November. For more information, and to resister on the preview list, visit minto.com/buy-a-condo-in-ottawa/projects.html.

For now, Minto describes UpperWest on Richmond Road as a 20-storey tower atop a five-storey residential and parking podium. It will feature 199 one- and two-bedroom units, many with a den, starting in the mid-$200s.

Minto@lansdowne includes 239 units spread over a nine-storey tower and a second, 18-storey tower atop a two-storey residential podium. There will also be condo townhomes and terrace homes. Tower prices will range from the low $300s to over $1 million.

Both buildings will be targeting LEED gold certification in keeping with Minto’s commitment to sustainable design and building practices. (LEED stands for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design.)

Like most urban condos in Ottawa, the two projects are aimed at move-down and first-time buyers, young professionals and investors.

Minto, which says it has condo plans for a couple of other Ottawa properties, is re-entering an intensely competitive market (see the accompanying condo roundup for a taste of who else is building what and where).

This year, for example, Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp. reports a record 2,089 condo starts to the end of August. All but seven of those units are condo apartments.

However, Patrick Meades, managing director of the real estate consulting firm PMA Brethour Realty Group, cautions that current starts don’t equate to current sales because developers typically delay starting construction until they’ve sold 60 per cent or more of their planned units. That can mean a delay of anywhere from six to 18 months between sales launches and the start of construction, he says.

Sales, says Meades, “are looking somewhat positive right now, though builders might do a teaser and then pull back (from a full launch).”

Both Ashcroft Homes (The Next) and Richcraft Homes (Edge) did that this summer, hosting VIP launches and then delaying public launches by two or more months.

There are, however, at least eight launches planned over the next couple of months.

We need a lot more condos, especially clustered around public transit hubs, if we want to solve problems like urban sprawl and the overuse of cars, according to David Gordon, who teaches in the Queen’s University urban and regional planning program.

“A cluster of condos within 500 metres of transit stations is the best practice in urban planning,” he says. He points to Toronto as a good example.

Gordon is less than impressed with the design of Ottawa condos. “All they know how to build are cereal boxes. The Metropole is kind of interesting, but most in Ottawa are basic.”

Neighbourhood opposition, meanwhile, has become almost an accepted fact when it comes to condo development. In Kanata’s Beaverbrook area, for example, the Morley Hoppner Group has modified its proposal for a condo at 2 The Parkway three times, initially proposing 16 storeys and, in its latest bid, 10 storeys.

And while Ottawa city planner Stanley Wilder says the condo scene is hopping, he points to a serious problem.

“Unfortunately, there’s a big hole because we’re not meeting the needs of families. We’re building for empty nesters, single individuals, investors, but for a young family that wants to give up its car and raise their kids downtown, you need more than just a studio (unit).”

In the suburbs, where singles and towns have traditionally been the order of the day, builders are adding some condos to their lineup. Phoenix Homes is launching Hillside Vista in Orléans this fall while both Campanale Homes and Cardel have low-rise condo projects on the go in Barrhaven and Orléans respectively.

The city’s densification policies mean we’ll see more suburban condos, says Greg Graham, president of Cardel Homes’ Ottawa operations.

As well, the federal government’s recent clawback on maximum mortgage amortizations from 30 to 25 years could force more first-time buyers anxious to live in the suburbs to consider condos rather than pricier townhomes or singles.

However, Graham says suburban condos will continue to be primarily low-rise because the province’s building codes restrict wood construction to four stories. Building six or seven stories in concrete pushes the unit price so high that condos quickly become uncompetitive compared to larger, and therefore more appealing, stacked townhomes.

The condo resale market continues to thrive, according to veteran real estate professional Marnie Bennett of Bennett Property Shop Realty. Although the Ottawa Real Estate Board’s figures for August show a 2.8-per-cent slippage in units sold year-to-date compared to last year, Bennett says that’s in part because units have jumped in price, so the number of units available below $175,000 has plummeted compared to previous years. That, she says, skews the statistics, and sales are up at nearly all other price points.

Bennett says the resale market increasingly consists of newer units with all the amenities. That makes condos built in the 1970s and ’80s tougher to sell. She advises anyone wanting to sell an older condo to do so quickly, before the competition from newer units becomes even fiercer.

With files from Anita Murray
© Copyright (c) The Ottawa Citizen

http://www.househunting.ca/ottawa/Mi...614/story.html

[KHOOLE]

What will be the going rate for a VIP Suite with a view at the Rideau@Lansdowne?

Is a casino planned for the top floor?

Never mind! Out of my league!

[McC]

Maybe I'm slow, but I just discovered this website, and thought I'd share these three posts to give a taste:
5 ways condos can rock: http://yowlab.wordpress.com/2012/08/...ndos-can-rock/
5 ways condos can suck: http://yowlab.wordpress.com/2012/08/...ndos-can-suck/
5 issues condos face: http://yowlab.wordpress.com/2012/09/...s-condos-face/

I realize these aren't in the Citizen, but maybe someone with thread title editing powers could consider rebrand this to simply "Urban planning articles and reaction" for broadened applicability?

[McC]

Back to the Citizen:

Delay in plan for Centretown redevelopment nothing to do with developers’ complaints, Hume says


By David Reevely, Ottawa Citizen November 19, 2012


Delay in plan for Centretown redevelopment nothing to do with developers’ complaints, Hume says

FoTenn Consultants partner Ted Fobert told the Citizen last week that the city’s proposed plan for Centretown south of the business district won’t give developers the flexibility they’ll need to promote interesting architecture and surrender slices of land for public uses like plazas and pocket parks.
Photograph by: Pat McGrath , Ottawa Citizen

OTTAWA — An alternative vision for Centretown’s redevelopment presented by Ottawa’s most prominent urban-planning consultancy is a naked attempt to push through a specific set of rezonings that the city would never approve one by one, downtown councillor Diane Holmes said Monday.

“It’s quite clear that this is a very specific proposal for very specific properties,” Holmes said of the 100 pages submitted to the city by FoTenn Consultants on behalf of a dozen of the biggest names in the development industry, from Minto to Charlesfort. The FoTenn filing is a “review” of the final draft of the city’s plan for Centretown south of the business district, a long-term vision for everything from bike lanes to parks to the heights of buildings along particular streets.

It’s that last thing that’s so contentious. The city’s plan calls for buildings over 25 storeys at the north and south ends of Centretown, shorter but still tall buildings along Bank Street and in a couple of other pockets, and height limits of nine storeys or less just about everywhere else.

In an interview Friday, FoTenn partner Ted Fobert told the Citizen that those limits won’t give developers the flexibility they’ll need to promote interesting architecture and surrender slices of land for public uses like plazas and pocket parks, on which the city’s plan depends. So FoTenn’s proposal calls for looser rules generally and for buildings as high as 14 storeys along roads that it would designate as major avenues in the making: Kent, O’Connor and Metcalfe Streets.

But the giveaway, in Holmes’s view, is a list of half a dozen properties that FoTenn says deserve special consideration, no matter what the rest of the plan says:

167 O’Connor St.

330 Gilmour St.

315 McLeod St.

261 Somerset St. W.

359 Kent St.

381 Kent St.

The property at 330 Gilmour St., for instance, is the former headquarters of the Ottawa Board of Education. Ashcroft, one of FoTenn’s clients, has owned it for years and has tried to build a 20-storey condo and a nine-storey retirement home but been frustrated by the city’s refusal to permit anything taller than seven storeys.

“We’ve been through an extensive process on that site and I’m not prepared to just throw it out the window now,” Holmes said. “Some of those are parking lots they want to develop, and they should be developed, but not with just anything.”

The city’s version of the “community design plan” has been scheduled to be presented to city council’s planning committee on Dec. 11. That’s being put off, said the committee’s chairman, Councillor Peter Hume, but not because of the developers’ proposal.

“I can categorically say that no unilateral changes will be made on behalf of the city,” Hume said. The problem is that the city’s big vision, prepared by another consultant, George Dark, wasn’t perfectly translated into legal language by the city’s planning department. Since Hume is “absolutely 100-per-cent certain” that the plan will be appealed to the Ontario Municipal Board, he and Dark and the city’s planners want to make sure the two documents are a perfect match. It’ll probably take a couple of months, he said.

Dark will read the FoTenn document, Hume allowed, and if he’s persuaded that any of it has merit, he’ll bring it up. That would trigger another round of discussions with residents on a fresh draft of the city’s plan, Hume promised. Dark hasn’t told him he sees anything that needs changing, though.

Hume agreed with Holmes that it’s obvious what the point of FoTenn’s involvement is, though he was gentler about it: “They’re advocating for the interests of their clients, which is what they’re paid to do and what we expect them to do,” he said. “Our interest isn’t in individual properties. It’s in a vision for the community as a whole.”

dreevely@ottawacitizen.com

ottawacitizen.com/greaterottawa
© Copyright (c) The Ottawa Citizen

[Luker]

While im skepitcal of the developers desires; I am sure that a uniform 9 storey height limit outside of a few small 'pocket' areas is also not the correct legislation for the NCR and a growing metropolis of over 1.3 Million people.

What is everyone else's thoughts on the MCDP and the general height limit classificaiton/categorization zones.

[waterloowarrior]

It's too bad about the Citizen's Facebook commenting system, it's killed a lot of discussion on most of the planning stories and blog posts

[RTWAP]

Originally Posted by Luker

While im skepitcal of the developers desires; I am sure that a uniform 9 storey height limit outside of a few small 'pocket' areas is also not the correct legislation for the NCR and a growing metropolis of over 1.3 Million people.

What is everyone else's thoughts on the MCDP and the general height limit classificaiton/categorization zones.

I don't have an immediate objection to 25+ storeys at the north and south ends of Centretown, tall buildings on Bank and a few other exceptions, and 9 storeys in between.

That represents considerable intensification from what is there right now.

[umbria27]

I'm not easily outraged, but a policy that now has the city subsidizing extensions to shopping malls is the sort of thing that will do it.

Here's Chianello's article

http://www.ottawacitizen.com/news/Ch...874/story.html

[Dr.Z]

Originally Posted by umbria27

I'm not easily outraged, but a policy that now has the city subsidizing extensions to shopping malls is the sort of thing that will do it.

Here's Chianello's article

http://www.ottawacitizen.com/news/Ch...874/story.html

Terrible journalism. Where is the "there are two-sides to every story" and the City's reposonse or the particulars of the report approving the grant? Was there something there that would've made her story not a story to report and hence it was omitted? Oop, that was speculation, so strike it from the record. I never take one-sided stories seriously and I am beginning to take Chianello less seriously with every article and radio interview: she complained that there was nothing to complain about in the passing of the budget!!!

[TransitZilla]

Originally Posted by Dr.Z

Terrible journalism. Where is the "there are two-sides to every story" and the City's reposonse or the particulars of the report approving the grant? Was there something there that would've made her story not a story to report and hence it was omitted? Oop, that was speculation, so strike it from the record. I never take one-sided stories seriously and I am beginning to take Chianello less seriously with every article and radio interview: she complained that there was nothing to complain about in the passing of the budget!!!

Chianello is a columnist (she replaced Denley). This is an opinion piece. I don't think opinion pieces are obligated to present both sides.

[phil235]

Originally Posted by bradnixon

Chianello is a columnist (she replaced Denley). This is an opinion piece. I don't think opinion pieces are obligated to present both sides.

That is true. Although a good opinion piece would provide the whole picture.

[waterloowarrior]

This program has a slow uptake, but that doesn't mean all CIP incentive programs are bad. They've been used across Ontario since the 70s. Ottawa has another major brownfields CIP, which unfortunately has funded two major power centres (Laurentian Place and the Lowe's on Hunt Club) but also helped for example Centropolis, and a similar program was used for The Currents.

[McC]

I've seen great examples of this elsewhere, like the condo tower and a completely rehabilitated (heritage) YMCA on Burrard near the Wall Centre in downtown Vancouver. From small things like a daycare, to medium-sized things like a local library branch, to big things like rec centres and schools, if we actually meet our urban intensification targets, this will be non-negotiable, as it will be the only way all of these new urban dwellers will have access to these kinds of essential public services/amenities.

City needs better rules for including public facilities in private buildings, developer says

BY DAVID REEVELY, OTTAWA CITIZEN FEBRUARY 26, 2013

OTTAWA — The city has no rules for how to put a library on the ground floor of a condo tower or a public garage at the base of a private office building, says one of Ottawa’s most prominent developers.

Doug Casey, whose Charlesfort Developments has its headquarters over a Starbucks in the Glebe, has asked the city whether he can put together a group of city and private experts to come up with a way of doing it that everyone can agree on so that every such project isn’t a one-off that needs to be scrutinized for every foible, quirk, and weirdly worded clause. He emailed Councillor David Chernushenko and city manager Kent Kirkpatrick about the idea and is waiting to hear back.

Casey recorded the email on the city’s public lobbying registry. Approached by the Citizen, he was worried about looking like he was trying to force the issue.

“I just think the city could really, really benefit from a known way of doing these things,” he said. “When you think of smart growth and all that, there’s a way you can put these things together, but we don’t have a way of doing it now.”

Casey has some experience with this. Charlesfort was part of the redevelopment of a primary school on Crichton Street in New Edinburgh into a cultural centre in exchange for the right to build townhouses on the former schoolyard. In 2008 he proposed redeveloping Old Ottawa South’s Sunnyside library, offering a new and bigger branch if he could top it with a 12-storey condo tower.

“It went over like a ... what you could you make a balloon out of that’s heavier than lead?” said Chernushenko.

Nearby residents figured Casey was just hot for the library’s lot by the Rideau Canal and the idea went nowhere.

Casey said that if there were a clear process, with built-in transparency and ways for multiple developers to offer the city their services, the very idea wouldn’t seem as suspicious.

This issue is coming up a lot. The city’s sought private bidders to put up a tower atop a redeveloped Arts Court at the edge of Sandy Hill, which is supposed to bring in $3 million for the project. A long-term redevelopment plan for Centretown, whose final draft came out this month, talks about letting builders construct extra-tall buildings on north-south arteries if they put major public amenities in them. The city incorporated an ambulance station in the Beaver Barracks non-profit housing development on Catherine Street (but only after building a temporary one first and having to tear it down).

What got Casey’s attention is the city’s plan to turn a parking lot it owns in the Glebe, practically across from his office, into a small, multi-level garage. Why not see what developers could do with the site? he wanted to know.

Chernushenko squelched that particular idea: the point is to add parking to the area with as low a structure as possible, he said, so bigger edifices aren’t of any interest. More broadly, he said, public-private partnerships — or P3s — of the kind Casey wants to make easier to put together are usually a bad idea because all risks tend to end up with whomever has access to tax money to cover them.

“I am keen to say that P3s are one of those things that sound better in theory than in practice,” Chernushenko said. “Politically, you just need to suck up the — you need to say, ‘We’re going to find money, raise money, issue a bond, whatever we have to do to build that new library’ or whatever it is.”

Working with developers is attractive because it seems like getting something for nothing, he said, but not if it means fitting an important public institution into whatever it is a developer happens to want to build.

Nevertheless, he conceded, many other councillors don’t feel the way he does and Casey may get a friendlier ear with them.

dreevely@ottawacitizen.com

ottawacitizen.com/greaterottawa

© Copyright (c) The Ottawa Citizen
http://www.ottawacitizen.com/news/Ci...213/story.html

Also, has anyone heard what Chernushenko thinks of the Confederation Line P3? Might have been taken out of context, but that's a pretty blanket statement on his part.

[Dado]

Originally Posted by McC

Also, has anyone heard what Chernushenko thinks of the Confederation Line P3? Might have been taken out of context, but that's a pretty blanket statement on his part.

I can see where he's coming from. All too often the risks are placed onto the taxpayer, or the premium charged to the taxpayer to take on the risk is heavy. This latter seems to be the trend, especially in Ottawa. The servicing agreement for the Confederation line is almost as much as the construction cost. If anything, Chernushenko's argument against P3s applies even more so to projects like public transit.

Adding to the problem is that so many different things get rolled into the 'P3' rubric that it's hard to say exactly what they are.

The worst examples are where a piece of infrastructure is set up as a privately financed P3 in which the municipality leases service/usage on/of from the private sector partner, e.g. if the tunnel were privately financed and the municipality had to pay to send trains through it.


On site-specific P3s, things get a bit murkier. It kind of depends who is leading I think. If the city has a site on which it wants to build some piece of community infrastructure, then frankly a P3 process in which it starts with an RFP to see what the developers come up with is probably fine. Rapid transit stations are an excellent example of where the City should probably be seeing what the development sector can come up with. In this case, the developer has an incentive to propose something worthwhile in order to get the right to develop; strictly speaking it doesn't even have to reduce the City's building costs to zero. On the other hand, if it is developer-driven to try to fit in some piece of community infrastructure that may or may not be needed in order to get exemptions from zoning... that's going to be a lot more problematic because the incentives are structured to cheap out the community infrastructure to the maximum extent possible. Essentially, in the first case, the City is trying to reduce the cost of providing infrastructure and/or get the biggest city-building bang for its buck. In the second, the developer is trying to come up with what amounts to a formalized, legalized "bribe" to make a more profitable development.

If we're going to embark on the latter then perhaps what the City should do is establish some area-specific lists of desired community infrastructure with pre-set qualities. Developers can then scan through the list and put forward a proposal for their site that includes one. The City can then accept or reject or negotiate on the developer's project demands... but the last thing you want is to be negotiating on the community infrastructure itself. That wants to be set, fixed and off the table before any negotiations start. That of course requires the City being proactive, including meeting with local residents and businesses to establish the lists, so it'll never happen. It'll also probably never happen so long as developers have recourse to the OMB, either.


Anyway, in the case of that parkade, I'm actually with Casey. The proposals might have been as simple as putting a retail and office façade on the parkade. On the other hand, the rejection of the Sunnyside Library was quite understandable. Without a previously-established idea of what the City and community wanted for the library, they'd be at a disadvantage in any negotiations.