Blatchford Development | ?m | ?s | City of Edmonton

The lack of mid-rise construction in Blatchford falls on the developer. We can see from sales and rentals in a worse version of Blatchford (Griesbach), that demand is there for multifamily.

I'm still not pessimistic about the neighbourhood in the next 10 years. I will admit that the lack of a profit motive from city admin is a big reason why Blatchford has it's issues.

Exhibition Lands should turn out better. I really believe the city should build a barebones LRT stop there (covered by land sale and permits), sell all of the land within 24 months, and let builders do as they please with virtually no zoning restrictions.
 
^^ No, it probably is a construction technical issue with the outside-the-norm community heating/cooling system and other site specific climate factors. Not to make it a valid excuse but most contractors presumably would rather go with what they know versus what they are forced to learn. I imagine there are a lot of eyes on the townhouses and what they can offer in the way of experimental successes with new systems.
 
archited said:
^^ No, it probably is a construction technical issue with the outside-the-norm community heating/cooling system and other site specific climate factors. Not to make it a valid excuse but most contractors presumably would rather go with what they know versus what they are forced to learn. I imagine there are a lot of eyes on the townhouses and what they can offer in the way of experimental successes with new systems.
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What does Encore know that every other builder seems to be struggling with?
 
archited said:
^^ No, it probably is a construction technical issue with the outside-the-norm community heating/cooling system and other site specific climate factors. Not to make it a valid excuse but most contractors presumably would rather go with what they know versus what they are forced to learn. I imagine there are a lot of eyes on the townhouses and what they can offer in the way of experimental successes with new systems.
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The big technical issue has been that the infrastructure had to be in place. The energy centre had to exist and heating/cooling lines had to be installed before any build could take place. The energy centre's construction was tied to the drainage pond's construction which was tied to soil remediation. Once it was in place, there was a phase of testing its operations on a limited basis.
 
Barnaby said:
What does Encore know that every other builder seems to be struggling with?
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Crimson Cove and NX don't seem to be struggling with it either. Landmark came in very confident with its own net zero approach.

Even Mutti doesn't seem to have struggled with it any more than they've struggled with anything else to do with the general concept of a house.
 
Barnaby said:
The lack of mid-rise construction in Blatchford falls on the developer. We can see from sales and rentals in a worse version of Blatchford (Griesbach), that demand is there for multifamily.

I'm still not pessimistic about the neighbourhood in the next 10 years. I will admit that the lack of a profit motive from city admin is a big reason why Blatchford has it's issues.

Exhibition Lands should turn out better. I really believe the city should build a barebones LRT stop there (covered by land sale and permits), sell all of the land within 24 months, and let builders do as they please with virtually no zoning restrictions.
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Griesbach is seen as one of the most attractive neighborhoods in all of Edmonton though. It’s significantly built out. Has a ton of retail…both in walkable midrise podiums, and in big box centres… and has a great reputation for safety and quality of homes. Arguably the midrises continuing to succeed there makes blatchford look worse in terms of demand/desireability.

I’m with you on Exhibition
 
thommyjo said:
Griesbach is seen as one of the most attractive neighborhoods in all of Edmonton though. It’s significantly built out. Has a ton of retail…both in walkable midrise podiums, and in big box centres… and has a great reputation for safety and quality of homes. Arguably the midrises continuing to succeed there makes blatchford look worse in terms of demand/desireability.

I’m with you on Exhibition
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It's important to remember how long Griesbach took and that it was not built from scratch. I remember plans for it being discussed in the late 90s and the land was transfered to the developer in 2002, so it has atleast a 10 year head start on Blatchford. It also had a significant amount of old base housing that could bring people in immediately and was used as low income rental stock while other stuff was developed. So people were already in the neighbourhood and builders didn't have to take the risk of being first in the market.
 
SarcasticMarmot said:
It's important to remember how long Griesbach took and that it was not built from scratch. I remember plans for it being discussed in the late 90s and the land was transfered to the developer in 2002, so it has atleast a 10 year head start on Blatchford. It also had a significant amount of old base housing that could bring people in immediately and was used as low income rental stock while other stuff was developed. So people were already in the neighbourhood and builders didn't have to take the risk of being first in the market.
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Yeah, early Griesbach was a visit on my Human Geography and Planning field school well over a decade ago when it was a strip on the central east side and was overwhelmingly single detached housing. It had been going for several years at that point and was beginning to show its promise. It had almost no mid-rise at that point, negligible commercial presence, and was overwhelmingly single detached houses in an area that had previously been base housing. Many buildings on the south and west sides were still pending asbestos remediation and demolition. Decontamination of the rifle ranges in the NW corner was still ongoing.

CLC's planners had related how the builders basically fought them every step of the way and wanted to just grunt out some standard issue suburbia and that there'd been a phase where it was hard to get them to build anything at all until it eventually became clear that houses built there could command higher prices and turn higher profits. They also bemoaned lost opportunities like limited capacity to build anything that could truly be considered "transit oriented". And there was still a lot of criticism out there of how much more houses cost there than in all of the new "grunt and spray" style suburbs that had been splattered across North Edmonton and perception that it was out of touch with the car-centric needs of "real Edmonton".

This was with CLC having ample experience running redevelopment projects and working with a development plan that was rather more conservative and having an initial build area that was converting residential to residential. To this date, a common criticism of Griesbach (especially with the decommissioning of the NE block of PMQs due to decaying water infrastructure) is its lack of affordability.
 
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I didn't take a picture, but the Pilot townhomes have a very strong visual presence from Kingsway Avenue. It's good that they're well designed; they could really help boost the perception of Blatchford once they're finished and occupied.
 
CplKlinger said:
I didn't take a picture, but the Pilot townhomes have a very strong visual presence from Kingsway Avenue. It's good that they're well designed; they could really help boost the perception of Blatchford once they're finished and occupied.
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I'm perfectly content that my house is visually blocked from Kingsway because it means not really hearing Kingsway, but there is something to be said for having that build, and especially the rapidity with which it is proceeding,, on display. There's certainly no shortage of people out there whose impression of Blatchford is one of a few years ago.
 
IanO said:
Sure, but build a two storey on top of it like in MTL and many other places.

A single storey is a total waste and will tremendously limit the potential of this site, its goals and the densities needed to support actual, walkable, retail.
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I agree with you, but to your point, where do you stop? Could there not have been additional units built atop any of the townhouses? Bungalows would be offensive if Edmonton was severely lacking land. This isn’t the case.
 
MattPT said:
I agree with you, but to your point, where do you stop? Could there not have been additional units built atop any of the townhouses? Bungalows would be offensive if Edmonton was severely lacking land. This isn’t the case.
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His point is that you need a minimum amount of density to support a walkable neighbourhood, which is the goal of Blatchford. Yes Edmonton has plenty of space for bungalows, but they should be built in other areas that don't have this objective.
 
Thanks for stating the obvious, but these are not your typical bungalow. IF they have separate entrances that allow for a secondary basement suite I don’t see a problem with them being included to attract a different buyer. Is it mandatory for the other townhouses to have multiple occupants? Absolutely not. So what is the difference between a couple living in a three story townhouse or a couple living in a bungalow that occupies a negligiblly larger land footprint? Or a single person living in a multi story townhouse vs a family of three living in a bungalow?
 
These are 1 bedroom units though, while all the other townhouses in the area are 2 or 3 bedroom. Sure a couple could live in those, but they will generally be occupied by families of 3-5 people, while these bungalow units will be limited to 2 people. Also if you check out the floorplan, the basement access is in the middle of the main floor so there would be no way to add a separate entrance for a suite. No mention of garage suites either which I think is a miss, that would be an attractive option for a retired couple to have some passive income.

That said I don't think a few of these in the area will be a problem, as long as it doesn't become the majority.
 
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