Burnaby Updates

[officedweller]

Originally Posted by Spr0ckets

Edit : I've just read your link and it seems to confirm the same. The city wasn't too keen on that idea although both Translink and Ivan Cambridge were or are really pushing for it.

I just posted it to indicate what Ivanhoe Cambridge's favoured scenario would be.

[Sheba]

Burnaby wasn't (and still isn't) keen on it, hence renders like this where you only see buses on Central and not Beresford. I'm not sure how many buses will pull into the bus loop vs only doing pickups and drop offs on Central at the ends of the station (and use Imperial and Willingdon to loop around).

Originally Posted by Waders

Picture from Via-Architecture

[cairnstone]

Originally Posted by Spr0ckets

Given that the space is too small for a Walmart (or say, a Costco), and that finding anchor tenants of that size is never an easy task, it wouldn't surprise me to see that space sitting idle and empty for quite a while yet.

In fact I'm willing to bet that the old Best Buy space on Kingsway and probably the old Staples location, get new tenants before that Target space gets filled.
I think the mall would be better served breaking it up into smaller lots and finding smaller tenants than hoping for an anchor tenant.
It might even open up an opportunity to completely revamp and redevelop that whole Central boulevard side of the mall, east of the office towers to go along with all the redevelopment of the towers and Skytrain station that's already happening on the other side of the street.

The target south side of the mall most likely will be redeveloped from ground up as it offset of the main mall and does not link well for walk traffic.

[Spr0ckets]

Originally Posted by retro_orange

True. Maybe Metrotown has been secretly incognito about their redevelopment and will surprise us in the near future! With new taxes and market conditions, it would be great if Metrotown built affordable rental apartments, office space and family sized market condos. It would be great to redevelop the parkade and Target to the east and cover up the bus loop in a similar concept to Plaza 88 in New West which would help integrate the skytrain with the mall. Plus all the surface parking to the north of the theatres. Feasible?

Those are owned by Concord Pacific (formerly it was Sears who sold it to them).

And they have different plans for the entire parking lot along with the Sears store itself (7-10 mixed use - office plus residential towers with street level retail), which are currently percolating (very slowly) with a rezoning application at the city and trying to work out easement issues with the rest of the mall (Ivanhoe Cambridge).

It's a little complicated, but the long and short of it is that it definitely will get redeveloped eventually,.....only not likely any time soon or in the near future.

At least not before Concord Brentwood gets off the ground (IMO).

[Spr0ckets]

Originally Posted by officedweller

I just posted it to indicate what Ivanhoe Cambridge's favoured scenario would be.

Yeah I saw that.
It's a tough sell given what the city's position on Beresford is and their vision for that side of Central Boulevard.

I have to admit though, I did understand some of their logic for wanting to move the Bus Loop to that side and agree with some of the arguments they made (like how much harder the current configuration makes it for elderly and disabled people using the Skytrain and the buses to get back and forth, for instance).

[retro_orange]

Originally Posted by Sheba

Why would they keep it secret for this long? The Target space has been a big money pit for them - you'd think they'd want something in there in less than a year.

As much as I'd love to see it happen, I don't know if it would be possible to demolish the entire east parkade. If you look closely you'll see the third tower along Bonsor (from Central Blvd) has a podium that's attached to it, as is the mall itself. Would it be worth the effort to try to remove the parkade without damaging either of those buildings?

The Sears redevelopment would be roughly from McKercher Ave over to Nelson - I'm not sure if it starts from the driveway next to Sears or from the overhead walkway to nowhere. Either way that's a lot of surface and underground parking that will be going and the mall already can't afford to lose any. It's not just at xmas that the parking lots fill up.

The Sears proposal has office space, Station Square has office space, the towers along Beresford have office space and there's the third Metrotower (which still isn't full). So I really can't see more office space being built at the mall itself after that. Maybe in the future they'll add some when Kingsway is fully redeveloped.

It's a completely different layout to New West Station / Plaza 88 (which I go to regularly btw). I haven't heard about any plans for the land under the Skytrain tracks so I suspect they want to keep it as a strip park, which isn't a bad idea.

I wouldn't call it a secret so much as still in thought process limbo. I was thinking maybe it would be possible to build a midrise on top of the eastern parkade, depending on how much strengthening it would need. Maybe office isn't feasible but how about some light industrial hidden in there somewhere. We can always use more apartments to replace all the low rises that are being demolished in the area.

As far as demolishing the parkade with the threat of damaging adjoining buildings wouldn't be an issue though, they demolished most of Station Square that was directly attached to 2 condo towers and the parkade in DT-NW is directly adjacent to old crumbling brick buildings that were untouched. The surface parking would also be replaced with underground parking several levels deep, potentially adding additional parking capacity to whats existing as a flat pad. It would have to be phased anyway.

[Sheba]

Originally Posted by retro_orange

I wouldn't call it a secret so much as still in thought process limbo. I was thinking maybe it would be possible to build a midrise on top of the eastern parkade, depending on how much strengthening it would need. Maybe office isn't feasible but how about some light industrial hidden in there somewhere. We can always use more apartments to replace all the low rises that are being demolished in the area.

As far as demolishing the parkade with the threat of damaging adjoining buildings wouldn't be an issue though, they demolished most of Station Square that was directly attached to 2 condo towers and the parkade in DT-NW is directly adjacent to old crumbling brick buildings that were untouched. The surface parking would also be replaced with underground parking several levels deep, potentially adding additional parking capacity to whats existing as a flat pad. It would have to be phased anyway.

Thought process limbo - fair enough. Why they wouldn't make more of an effort is still a mystery. The Sears redevelopment taking aeons makes far more sense.

Your comparisons to parkade demolitions isn't really comparable. The Front St parkade in New West is pretty much free-standing, with a few ramps and then walkways / stairs connecting to some of the buildings. Removing that without harming any of the buildings (although some of them could stand to be 'harmed') wouldn't have been that difficult (except for traffic...). For Station Square it was attached to 1 tower, while the other tower was only joined to the first by a wide walkway. Admittedly yes it was a large connection to the first tower but if you look at google maps you'll see that 2 1/2 walls of the tower were untouched. The medical clinic there was open the whole time.

They could easily demolish about 2/3 of the east parkade. Is it on solid ground or is there already underground parking below it? I would love to see it go, but honestly in the future the amount of parking is going to shrink - will the city allow that much parking to be removed?

As a side note, parking at the mall is pretty well used for the most part. Weekends it's busier and for sales on holiday long weekends it's a gong show. The quickest way to get from one end of the mall to the other is to go outside from over by Superstore and walk across to Sears. On a sales weekend it's a given that drivers will ask if I'm walking back to my car as they desperately circle looking for somewhere to park. The entire month of December is like that too.

Sooo... I really can't see anymore parking being removed without being replaced. There's already underground parking, so unless they can expand that sideways (and I'm not sure they can) the only option I can see is to build up - aka a parkade.

[retro_orange]

Originally Posted by Sheba

Sooo... I really can't see anymore parking being removed without being replaced. There's already underground parking, so unless they can expand that sideways (and I'm not sure they can) the only option I can see is to build up - aka a parkade.

My target was to ultimately have more parking by the end of this by having to sacrifice no more then a third at a time while any phase was under construction.

Start with replacing a portion of a flat pad surface parking lot with a multi level parkade beneath a mixed use tower, you could easily double the parking in the entire project and contain it in the first phase, the new multi level buried parkade could open to cars while the tower above is still being constructed. Once complete, move on to the eastern parkade phase or covering the bus loop with a midrise, no need to move it.

As for the eastern parkade you could get away with only closing the top level or two of parking while the new building is constructed above, eliminating the need for any major demolition in that part. Also maintaining that parking indefinitely beneath the new construction. (hiding it and possibly adding more)

Granted i am only in favor of all this parking talk because this is the suburbs. A great idea for designing the parkade aspect of projects is to design them so if the need for parking subsides in the future, part of the parkade can be easily converted to light industrial uses or affordable office space. (small manufacturing, computer servers, warehouse or rented storage space among other things) Which is why I don't think any parkade is a total write-off (hopefully part of the Plaza 88 parkade will be readapted one day in the future, enabling it's facade renovation)

[cairnstone]

Metrotown is made up of several phases and it would be highly unlikely they would build on top of the 5 level parkade. I doubt it will be cost effective and you will still be stuck with an old parkade that does not work well with the mall. As trends go malls are getting away with less parking as the cities are forcing transit.

If you look at the long term trends, the mall will be a disappear as we see it today. Shoppers look at stuff in the mall and then order online. Canada post makes more now from parcel than letter carrying.

More and more people are using amazon or other online retailer.

I see mixed use development as everyone wants to have a mall below their home.

Ivanhoe is one of Canadas largest property owners. I dont see them rushing to fill a space. Guilford mall still has lots of space for more brands to move in. With many stores paying below market to make the mall look full.

[Sheba]

This doesn't look like a mall disappearing... That's probably on a weekday during the day - otherwise it's not so mellow.

[cairnstone]

Originally Posted by Sheba

This doesn't look like a mall disappearing... That's probably on a weekday during the day - otherwise it's not so mellow.

Yes a mall can be full. That would be a weekend as a special event is going on. Put a full mall does not mean sales. Was working in
metrotown today at a Women's clothing store and the manager indicated sale are below goal and below last years sale. Malls will not disappear but will evolve

[Spr0ckets]

Originally Posted by cairnstone

Yes a mall can be full. That would be a weekend as a special event is going on. Put a full mall does not mean sales. Was working in
metrotown today at a Women's clothing store and the manager indicated sale are below goal and below last years sale. Malls will not disappear but will evolve

That may be true in general but that doesn't seem to be the case with Metropolis.

They did more sales per square foot last year than they did in 2014 and 2013 and this is despite the loss of a major anchor tenant in Target the year before, and a slowdown in the general Canadian Economy at large.

Further to which, they get the third most annual visitors per year in all of Canada (after West Edmonton mall and Eaton Center in Toronto) and are in the top 10 for highest annual sales per square foot (3rd in Vancouver after Pacific Center and Oakridge. And it only trails those two mainly because it has a larger gross square area footage, by far, which brings the average down), which is nonetheless impressive when you consider it was one of the few in the top 10 located in a suburb (as opposed to a downtown core) and not just a suburb but the one with the lowest average annual per household income in greater Vancouver.

It doesn't hurt that it's located right next to the 2nd busiest Skytrain transit station and a bus loop (both of which see an average of about 78 million transit users per year passing through them and frequently into the mall itself ).

The point being that Metropolis stature and role as a major commercial and retail center in the GVA isn't diminishing or going away any time soon.

[RichmondOval]

Originally Posted by cairnstone

Yes a mall can be full. That would be a weekend as a special event is going on. Put a full mall does not mean sales. Was working in
metrotown today at a Women's clothing store and the manager indicated sale are below goal and below last years sale. Malls will not disappear but will evolve

I do think there will come a day where retail will evolve, however I do not think it is happening now or anytime soon. I work at Oakridge mall, and the annual amount of sales we have are on a sharp upward trend since 2010. Of course, this may be because of the shift in demographics near Oakridge mall.

[hollywoodnorth]

Metrotown Development Plan Update

he City is embarking on a community planning process to update the Metrotown Development Plan. The first phase of this process is to obtain public input on the preliminary vision, principles, and land use framework, as presented in the adopted Council report from May 9, 2016.

This Plan update process provides the opportunity to create a true downtown for Burnaby; one that enables the highest order of land use and development supported by social, recreation, entertainment, and cultural amenities important to all of Burnaby’s residents, businesses and employees.


https://www.burnaby.ca/City-Services...an-Update.html

[Pinion]

Originally Posted by Spr0ckets

and not just a suburb but the one with the lowest average annual per household income in greater Vancouver.

Since when was this Burnaby? Last I heard it was Richmond, and we all know how little it means in Chinese areas anyway.

[Spr0ckets]

Originally Posted by Pinion

Since when was this Burnaby? Last I heard it was Richmond, and we all know how little it means in Chinese areas anyway.

I should have said, 'one of the lowest' in Greater Vancouver, but certainly in Burnaby, the Metrotown area ranks as one of the lowest if not the lowest in all of Burnaby.

You're right in that Richmond is nominally the lowest in greater Vancouver (per this Vancouver Sun report :http://www.vancouversun.com/news/van...922/story.html), and yes, "annual lowest average or median household income" is a pretty meaningless term in a suburb that's almost 80% immigrant with a large portion of that being Chinese, but the Metrotown area is not that far behind (or ahead?) in terms of their own median figure.

[logan5]

Originally Posted by hollywoodnorth

Metrotown Development Plan Update

he City is embarking on a community planning process to update the Metrotown Development Plan. The first phase of this process is to obtain public input on the preliminary vision, principles, and land use framework, as presented in the adopted Council report from May 9, 2016.

This Plan update process provides the opportunity to create a true downtown for Burnaby; one that enables the highest order of land use and development supported by social, recreation, entertainment, and cultural amenities important to all of Burnaby’s residents, businesses and employees.


https://www.burnaby.ca/City-Services...an-Update.html

A little vague when it says 12+ stories. Need to know what densities they are giving out. Same as before?

[mgbcca]

Shot from yesterday, of Milano Burnaby

[OfficeProcrastinator]

I'm not too familiar with Milano's location, is that large wall the highway?

[Sheba]

Originally Posted by OfficeProcrastinator

I'm not too familiar with Milano's location, is that large wall the highway?

It's at 2450 Alpha Ave (south of Brentwood Station) and that wall is the back of the buildings next door.