Cross-posted from Eye Daily.
In an effort to break into the urban market, big-box stores are learning to adapt to the big city, a trend that has yet to make it’s way to Toronto, reports the Toronto Star in its Condo Living section. In Vancouver, for example, a new Costco store recently opened under Concord Pacific Place, a new residential condo in the city.
“Installing a resized, redesigned version of their stores in the base of a condominium building gives the retailers an affordable, acceptable entry into urban markets while allowing city dweller access to big-box prices,†writes Paul Marshman, the author of the article.
Apparently, planners here and elsewhere are hot on the idea. You get multiple uses on one piece of property, increased density, plus convenient, one-stop shopping at low, low, prices without having to make a trip to the suburbs (mega parking lots not included.) But just because a development is dense, doesn’t automatically mean that it’s good. Developers, and even many councillors and planners, have been using the word “density†lately to win over the public to new developments. But beware the buzz-word — there’s much more to good development than density.
You may be able to forgo the car and walk to big-box stores built downtown (which, I agree is a good thing), but that doesn’t mean that these kind of stores won’t cause the same harm that they have elsewhere. With all the talk of attracting jobs to the city, is the kind of low-wage employment that large-scale retail tends to provide what we want? Councillor Paula Fletcher, who’s currently faced with the prospect of not being able to do anything to stop a traditional, suburban style power centre from being built in her ward, was planting the seeds of her malcontent in council this week by speaking repeatedly of value-added jobs.
And just because a Wal-Mart, for example, is located downtown doesn’t mean that it’s not going to wipe out other small, locally-owned businesses, or stop having its cheap products shipped from factories with questionable working conditions half way around the world.
All this talk of big-box stores on downtown streets is reminiscent of debate last summer and fall of a Home Depot possibly setting up base in the heart of the Queen Street West shopping district (now Adam Vaughan’s ward). Marshman talks to the vice-president of development for RioCan Real Estate Investment Trust, the company rumored to bring a Home Depot in. No contracts have been signed, he says, but “RioCan would consider including ‘an urban prototype’ of a big-box retailer if it fit the Queen St. neighbourhood,†Marshman writes. Meanwhile, “[Wal-Mart] spokesman Kevin Groh says the big-box giant is still working on a urban store prototype, but a push into cities is part of Wal-Mart’s overall plan.â€
Photo of apartments atop a Best Buy outlet in Chicago by Peter Wynn Thompson Photo from the Toronto Star.
