HOOPP Realty Inc. and Tonko Realty Advisors Ltd. celebrated the completion of Willingdon Business Park on September 23 with the announcement that Terasen Gas Inc. is leasing 50,000 square feet on two floors in the ninth and final building for a new customer care centre.
Originally owned by Webb & Knapp (Canada) Ltd., the park saw its first building completed in 1985 when the Still Creek area was home to rail yards and auto wreckers (not to mention the province’s biggest crow roost). Slough Estates Canada Ltd. bought the park three years later, selling its interest to HOOPP in 2004 for approximately $80 million. HOOPP led development of the final two buildings, LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) gold structures designed by CEI Architecture Planning Interiors.
Terasen plans to be operational in its space by early 2012, retrofitting it in the meantime to host up to 200 staff, positions repatriated from customer care centres in Eastern Canada.
The move parallels Terasen’s development of a 25,000-square-foot care centre in Prince George that will host more than 100 staff, also positions repatriated to B.C. The project is part of the ongoing renaissance of Prince George’s downtown.
Burnaby Mayor Derek Corrigan was courting business in China during the opening festivities for Willingdon 8 and 9, but the project reflects comments he made to commercial real estate association NAIOP the previous week, in which he touted Burnaby as a place to do business.
With highways running through the community – the Trans-Canada is a stone’s throw from the final Willingdon building – Corrigan noted that his priority is creating access to Burnaby. With projects such as Willingdon, those roads lead somewhere, and with vacancies relatively low in comparison to other suburban centres, businesses are clearly travelling them to what Burnaby offers.
Speaking of highways, transportation was not only on Corrigan’s mind at the latest NAIOP meeting but those of four Fraser Valley mayors who spoke later the same day to the Urban Development Institute.
Most of the mayors noted the number of highways running through their municipalities, and each argued that the highways led – if nowhere else – to their front doors.
But the first half of the discussion about development opportunities seemed sidelined by the issue of transit, and what TransLink was doing for municipalities after they had given so much in tax revenue to TransLink.
Rick Green, mayor of Langley Township, noted that his municipality remits $12 million a year to TransLink but receives precious little despite the presence of Gloucester Industrial Estates and Trinity Western University.
Langley Mayor Peter Fassbender and Coquitlam Mayor Richard Stewart urged greater planning to ensure that transportation infrastructure looks 30 to 40 years ahead while implementing cost-effective solutions now. Stewart said transportation policies and design must be aligned.
The comments were an apposite follow to Corrigan’s presentation earlier in the day.
Dubbing TransLink “the monster that ate Vancouver,” Corrigan said municipalities shouldn’t be expected to bear the brunt of costs for construction of the Evergreen line and possible expansions to UBC and as far east as Chilliwack.
“It’s not supportable; it’s not sustainable – by the business community or by local government,” he said. “Because we can’t do it on the basis of property taxes.”
Were you one of the kids fascinated by the colourful oily shimmer of soap bubbles?
RBC Economics seems to feel the Vancouver housing market is hosting an equally fascinating bubble, noting that house prices are nearing record levels of unaffordability while the market’s fundamentals don’t indicate a heart-breaking price collapse.
While the report raises a red flag regarding the Vancouver housing market, considering it “the most at risk” of a bubble and consequent house price correction, it’s hard-pressed to prophesy one.
“This does not imply that a collapse is imminent because supply (both in the existing and new home sides of the market) is well contained at this point,” report author Robert Hogue notes.
The comments tend to bear out Tsur Somerville’s observation, reported here last week, that Vancouver’s housing markets have never (in recent memory) been affordable but that it hasn’t stopped people from buying here.
Indeed, two-storey homes make nonsense of traditional notions of affordability by requiring 82.6% of household income. Comparable properties in Toronto require 60% of household income – below even the 25-year Vancouver average of 62.4%.
The most affordable housing in Vancouver remains a “standard condominium,” with an average price of $388,800 and a claim to 42.2% of household income.