Spacing reader Darwin O’Connor pointed us towards a developing story on development: Home Depot has pulled out of the Queen-Portland construction site. From the Toronto Star:
Home Depot Canada is paying an unspecified amount in cash to terminate its lease on a site along Queen Street West in Toronto being developed by RioCan Real Estate Investment Trust.
RioCan said Thursday it intends to continue with the Queen and Portland development project, which has caused discomfort among artists and others in the trendy district uneasy about a big-box store.
Canada’s largest REIT said it is “reviewing the possibility of repositioning the retail portion of the development to reflect a new retail footprint.”
21 comments
Turns out the economic downturn is good for something!
Just what I was thinking. That means all local groups have to do is pile up enough legalities to take to the next downturn: never more than ten to fifteen years.
Home Depot usually does well in areas with older housing as there is a lot of renovating going on. I guess area homeowners will get to continue schlepping over to Keele & St. Clair to get their new toilets and drywall instead. If done right, this could have been an opportunity to showcase how a “big box” type store could fit into a traditional commercial environment, along the lines of the Canadian Tire and Best Buy on Dundas. Mabye they can lure the Winners store from Spadina & King instead.
While many here would really prefer to see ‘independent’ retail at this location (myself included), I very much doubt that is in the cards.
Rumours before Home Depot signed on had Sobeys very interested in this space, and RIO CAN is almost always a ‘chain’ retailer.
I think there’s real room for concern that we might end up with something more detrimental to the community in some ways, as Home Depot really didn’t directly compete with many of the existing stores in the area.
By contrast, a large food retailer, chain restaurants or even a discount department store could be much more troublesome competition for area stores.
Why not put in a decent grocery store and a flagship LCBO? Oh, and maybe an Ikea or Costco. Wait, why not Rona? Then we can keep it Canadian.
Whatever they chose, there’s going to be a big impact on the local mom&pop hardware stores and all the vastly over-priced furniture and artsy stores in the area.
Why does it have to be a big box? Does it have to be a big box store? Why not reinstate the fine-grained commercial/residential mix that makes this area so special in the first place?
Also remember that there are 4 small storefronts at street level on this property. The entrance to the Home Depot would have been as wide as all the other stores on the strip. It would then lead up to the big indoor retail space behind the smaller retail stores.
I would contest that the Home Depot would have put the 3 or 4 Home Hardware stores on Queen and Dundas out of business. One of them closed recently, just a block away, to avoid the hassle of competing. But I agree it could have been an example of big box fitting into a smaller scale retail ‘hood.
I suspect that Home Depot would have created much more traffic than currently comes into the area. Potentially, a store like Winners could attract much more of a walk-up crowd. A Sobeys, Loblaws or Dominion/Metro wouldn’t be too bad either, but grocery chains do create lots of traffic.
I think we can expect to see an empty site with plywood hoarding (much like Dundas Square) for a long, long time…. long time.
Not so fast, Paul. 50% of condos have been sold and not all retail chains are suffering: some of the lower-end chains are booming. The LCBO idea is a decent one since in any economic downturn booze sales always go up.
I’ve never minded Home Depot coming in to this development that much. Unlike the Leslieville debacle, this was going to be a big box retailer moving into an urban form that was somewhat suited to the site.
It would not even be unprecedented: HD has other urban stores like in Vancouver, New York and San Francisco (and is already at Gerrard Square), and RioCan is a more creative developer than “SmartCentres”, who only know how to build big boxes surrounded by parking.
I used to cut across that parking lot walking home from work and would welcome a proper grocery store. There is NOTHING around within walking distance if you want more than a litre of milk and a couple of apples. The Kitchen Table at King and Tecumseth is grossly overpriced and the Square Fruit at Queen and Euclid, while great for last-minute produce, just doesn’t stock much. Otherwise there’s nothing until you get the the Price Chopper at Queen and Gladstone.
And an LCBO too, please. Right now I have to go to Dundas & Dovercourt or Chinatown or Liberty Village.
^I wouldn’t be surprised if Sobey’s has looked or will look into it — they’re doing really well at fitting in properly scaled full-grocery stores into urban areas around the city. Loblaws, on the other hand, has their huge warehouse space at Bathurst and Lakeshore that they don’t seem to know what to do with, as the model of giant stores downtown doesn’t work so well (see Maple Leaf Gardens too).
RioCan has confirmed that although they are no longer in a leasing relationship with Home Depot for the Queen and Portland development site, development plans are proceeding as approved in keeping with their original timelines.
RioCan is sensitive of the surrounding community’s concerns about the introduction of a big box retail outlet in the neighbourhood, and have advised my office that the roster of potential leaseholders for the site may result in a better fit with the neighbourhood.
I will continue to share information as it becomes available.
The development, as approved, includes three storeys of retail, with four storeys of residential on the Richmond Street side of the building. The Queen Street side will include small retail spaces on the ground floor, with a larger retail store on the second level, and a residential terrace on the third floor roof. The Richmond Street side will include retail and/or gallery spaces, with the residential units above. The three levels of underground parking will include two levels of commercial parking. The design of the building on the Queen Street faà §ade must meet the requirements of the Queen Street heritage conservation district, which set out guidelines around height and design.
^ What Shawn said.
Of the “big 3”, Sobey’s is the only one that seems to embrace the idea that bigger is not necessarily better. Probably this is more from a shopping experience / convenience perspective (remember the ads showing people waiting for a shuttle bus in a big-box store?), but this has significant urban design / urban form implications as well that work to their advantage when developing new sites (the proposed Regent Park store being an example).
Loblaw’s trails the pack… they have a business model that assumes they can only compete with Wal-Mart by selling all sorts of non-grocery crap … clothing, furniture etc. … and of course this results in monster stores that are a blight on the neighbourhood and that are a pain in the ass to shop in. If they truly wanted to compete with Wal-Mart in the grocery business, they would stick to groceries and create a more pleasant and more convenient shopping environment.
The LCBO has plans for a new location at King + Spadina – perhaps that could get relocated into the largest LCBO this side of Yonge!
Toronto actually has a big-box Sobey’s (complete with awful southwest-style oversized facade looming over a sea of parking), just southeast of Eglinton and Laird. But around the time that opened, they also opened a very small neighbourhood store in the Yonge and Davisville area. They really do adapt their stores to the surroundings, which seems to be so rare these days.
A well designed urban Home Depot (or Rona) would be great. One of my favourite stores downtown is the Winners in College Park. It’s not a typical Winners, but still a great place to get the things you need.
Small business is good, but not really for hardware from my experience anyway. You have no selection, pay more, get no delivery, and have difficulty returning anything.
Further to the brightside, a total of 6 billboard structures were destroyed when this property was borded up and made ready for development.
1. Three Pattison Pillars along Queen West, which were granted variances in 2005
2. A double-sided CBS 10’x20′ along Queen (used to advertise a neon Bacardi White)
3. A single-sided CBS 10’x20′ at Portland and Richmond, facing east.
4. A illegal Pattison 10’x20′ fascia sign on the east-facing wall of the abutting Queen Street property.
All gone.
There is a small Home Hardware near my place that I would pick over a megastore any day. Obviously no lumber or big bulky items (appliances, sinks etc.), but the selection isn’t bad and the prices are OK.
Rona at least has a range of store types, including some smaller streetfront stores (e.g. on Queen Street in the Beach, across from the Fox theatre).
–plus I should add that the service at Home Hardware is 10x better.
For those in the neighborhood, there is always Jacobs Hardware with great service.
What’s the status now? Anyone have the scoop?
I’m praying that a decent grocery store opens up. More likely a big-box, they’re the only ones that can afford to rent that type of space. An LCBO would be great as well. Although, I’m not sure we need anymore drunks on that corner, the Beer store may be enough.