The city should have a better grasp on a neighbourhood’s commercial needs when approving new developments, says the councillor for Cole Harbour–Westphal.
Lorelei Nicoll asked for a staff report this week looking at options for including retail and commercial policy concerns in any significant development proposals and planning amendments brought to city hall. The councillor also requested staff investigate requiring developers to provide their own commercial space demand studies.
“We have traffic impact studies now when it comes to projects,” said Nicoll, during Tuesday’s council meeting. “A market research study could also strike a balance in what the Centre Plan envisions as complete communities.”
The idea sparked some apprehension from Nicoll’s fellow councillors.
“You’d be asking them almost to prove the business case for commercial,” said Bedford–Wentworth’s Tim Outhit.
“If you ask me, that’s a risk a private developer should have to worry about themselves,” said David Hendsbee, about the costs of carrying empty office space. “It’s a free marketplace. If they want to build and come, so be it.”
A report last winter from Turner Drake & Partners Ltd. found vacant office rates in Halifax’s urban core were “staggering.”
The glut has been caused—in no small part—by HRM’s decades-long push for industrial park growth, which drained the downtown as companies migrated to cheaper office space in areas like Bayers Lake.
That point wasn’t lost on Dartmouth Centre’s Sam Austin, who noted that commercial demand studies in the ‘60s and ‘70s might have stopped some of the BLIP’s disastrous sprawl.
A national real estate market outlook report by Coldwell Banker found office vacancy rates in central Halifax rose to 17.5 percent last year—well above the country’s 13.3 percent average—and could potentially increase to 20 percent by the end of 2017.
Assessing some of those commercial space issues during the development process, according to Nicoll, could allow council to better predict the future of what HRM’s communities need.
“In the area I represent, just within a radius of maybe half a mile, there are five pizza shops,” said the councillor.
“Are we going to determine whether six are appropriate?” countered Stephen Adams.
Nicoll’s motion passed 14-3, with Hendsbee, Adams and Shawn Cleary voting against.
Related Stories
Clinic’s move to Bayers Lake is poor planning, a waste of public funds
This article appears in Mar 23-29, 2017.
The milk has been spilt; get over it. Or you can slurp it up from the floor.
Next, some knob will want to tear it down.
Sheer lunacy. Imagine the bureaucrats trying to make (or even understand) a private sector business case. Months and months of delay only to produce a report full of nonsense. Talk about red tape!
Council members, in the debates about the Armco proposal on Robie and Quinpool (Willow Tree) used the argument of, “we’re not in the business of ensuring the business viability for a developer” in response to the suggestion that cutting the tower from 29 storeys to 20 would make the project untenable. I very much agree with this stance.
But that stance cuts both ways. If Council is going to stand behind the idea that they’re not going to worry about the business case, then this idea of requiring commercial studies is just hypocritical.
Man, I wouldn’t want to work for City “Staff”.
A councilor gets some gas in their stomach and they “ask staff for a report”. So nice to punt the problem to someone else, and cause a lot of useless work that will sit on a shelf.
If you think you have a genius idea, do some work on it yerself before you go to the expense
How about one study per councilor per year. Use it carefully…