Recession hits Ritz-Carlton West Georgia project
Bruce Constantineau
Sun
The idle site at Georgia and Bute streets. Photograph by: Jenelle Schneider, Vancouver Sun files
Prolonged inactivity at the $500-million-plus downtown Vancouver Ritz-Carlton hotel-condo project has fuelled speculation the ambitious development is all but officially dead.
Holborn Group president Joo Kim Tiah said buyers who purchased condos in the project will receive letters this week updating them on the project’s status but wouldn’t provide further details.
“The buyers take precedence over the media and I don’t want them reading something in the paper before they hear it from me,” he said in an interview Monday.
Construction of the 1133 West Georgia site was halted last fall — supposedly to give Holborn Group time to redesign the parkade portion of the 60-storey, Arthur Erickson-designed twisting tower. But the subsequent global recession and downturn in the Metro Vancouver real estate market have combined to put several proposed condo projects on temporary or permanent hold.
About half of the 123 Ritz-Carlton condos were sold in the tower that was scheduled for completion in 2011. Condo prices ranged from about $1.4 million to $28 million — a record Vancouver condo asking price for a two-level unit that was to occupy 7,400 square feet of living space. A 127-room luxury Ritz-Carlton hotel was supposed to occupy the first 20 floors of the building, with condos taking up the top 40 floors.
When Ritz-Carlton announced plans to enter the Vancouver hotel market about 18 months ago, company vice-president Michael Beckley said the hotel chain had considered the Vancouver market for several years.
“Toronto and Vancouver have been in our sights for quite a long time, so we’re very happy to have such a great location,” he said at the time.
Ritz-Carlton was to manage the entire building, with the condo portion to be called Residences at Ritz-Carlton. Condo owners were to have access to hotel amenities like 24-hour room service, a concierge, housekeeping service, and staffing for special entertainment events.
Holborn Group bought the West Georgia property from Cadillac Fairview about four years ago and demolished a partially built concrete structure that sat derelict for years.
The site is essentially an empty hole now following a decade of failed attempts to build a private members’ club and a strata-title office building.
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