Halifax Regional Council has recently approved a slew of developments within the downtown, south end and Quinpool areas of the city. All the developments are either high rises or exceed previously stated limitations on height in the city. The 8-storey development on Wellington Street exceeds the 6-story height limit despite the local outcry. The most […]
City planning
Posted inNews + Opinion
The pigs have flown: Cogswell redevelopment to go ahead
After more than a decade of lagging attempts and false starts, the Cogswell Redevelopment plan is onto the last leg. The 90 percent plan was presented to city council on Tuesday and passed unanimously after some housekeeping amendments were added by councillor Waye Mason. The quick turnaround from last week’s release of the updated plan […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Centre Plan takes centre stage
If you go to the very back of Halifax’s 306-page Municipal Planning Strategy, you’ll find a 12-page list called Municipal Development Plan Amendments in Chronological Order of Ministerial Approval. That’s a mouthful, so I like to call it “the special snowflake list.” For example, height precincts may allow for a maximum building height of 35 […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
HRM development’s critical masses
The sound of drills, the sight of construction cranes and the annoyance of closed sidewalks: This scene is familiar to anyone who’s spent time in Halifax lately. It’s getting hard to walk anywhere in the urban core without seeing some sort of high-rise construction. There’s plenty of speculation about the cause of all this building, […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
A tale of two convention centres
The Globe and Mail published this Animated view of Halifax’s Nova Centre yesterday with its story about the convention centre. Unlike the video, the story looked at the pros and cons of the centre, including developer Wolfgang Thiel’s issue: Thiel Group took the Nova Scotia government to court last year arguing that the Nova Centre’s […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Developments would be towering over the Common
[Image-1] Two closely-linked developments at the intersection of Robie Street and Quinpool Road are currently working their way through the municipal planning process labyrinth. It’s early days, but what’s being proposed could dramatically alter one of Halifax’s most visible corners. The Armco-owned APL Properties Ltd. is trying to build two towers, 12 and 28 storeys, […]
Posted inLifestyle
Skate park too extreme for Dartmouth?
It’s going to be built, but how the Dartmouth skate park will be used still remains up in the air. Just last week the city awarded Ocean Contractors Ltd. the $448,000 tender for the project, which will be built on the Dartmouth Common, across from the Sportsplex. That’s pretty exciting for Greg Baller. As an […]
Posted inArts + Music
Game on: the Play conference
Michael Gordon, a senior city planner from Vancouver, isn’t your typical government bureaucrat: He skateboards to work, thinks parkour is cool and wishes kids could play more in the streets. The Dalhousie School of Planning is bringing this free-thinking government employee to Halifax on March 19 in hopes that he can teach us a thing […]