Retail-residential at station
Wendy Mclellan
Province
An artist envisions the bustle of shoppers and homeowners in the integrated transit-residential development.
A $250-million development in New Westminster‘s neglected downtown area may be the catalyst the Royal City needs to rejuvenate its historic centre.
The project, called Azure at Plaza 88, includes 800 suites in four residential towers set atop 170,000 square feet of retail shopping. The entire complex is to be integrated with the existing New Westminster SkyTrain Station on Columbia and 8th Street.
“The city is quite anxious for us to begin because they would like to revitalize Columbia Street,” said Mike Degelder, president and CEO of the Degelder Group, the Vancouver general-contracting company that assembled the 2.1-hectare site over a six-year period.
“The city is hoping the project will be a catalyst to get redevelopment going.”
Construction on the first two towers is scheduled to begin in February on the site, which stretches from Columbia to Carnarvon Street between 8th and 10th Streets. Shops will be built along the SkyTrain ticket platform, which will become an open street rather than developed inside a mall.
SkyTrain passengers will be able to get off the train and shop before heading home — and residents of the towers will be able to commute to work and do their shopping on the way home without going outside.
Degelder said the residential units in first tower are nearly sold out, and the second tower is 50 per cent sold.
The city has not yet given final approval for the other two residential towers or the retail development. The project, which is being co-developed with Charter Pacific Developments, will take about three years to complete.
Degelder said the company is in the final stage of negotiations with Save-On Foods as an anchor tenant in the shopping complex, which will also include a “well-known” drugstore and a liquor store.
SkyTrain president and CEO Doug Kelsey has been working for nearly a year to bring retail shops to SkyTrain stations around the Lower Mainland in an effort to better integrate the stations with the surrounding community. He said he is “very close” to finalizing agreements with some retailers.
“From our perspective, it’s a clear example of needed rejuvenation in the area,” said Kelsey. “This moves it from a transit station to a community-based station and takes it beyond just running trains. I think it’s excellent for the community.”
New Westminster Mayor Wayne Wright hopes the Degelder development will trigger further redevelopment in the area.
“This new transit village to be built around the New Westminster SkyTrain station, with the mix of residential and retail, should be the catalyst for redevelopment of Columbia Street which was once the area’s major shopping district,” he said.
© The Vancouver Province 2005