Second time is a charm for the developers behind a six-storey building slated for the corner lot on Victoria Street and Second Avenue.
Council has approved a development permit for developer Megadex International Investments (Squamish Corp.) to go ahead with a six-storey, 33-condo and commercial development at 1365 Victoria St.
“I think this building, in terms of the architecture and this layout, sets a pretty high standard for downtown,” said Coun. Jason Blackman-Wulff when he voiced his support for the proposal prior to council’s vote on July 18. “It is really well done.”
Council turned down an earlier development permit application with parking variances for the project on June 20 over concerns that not enough parking was provided.
Commercial units require more parking than residential units, so in response to being turned down by council, the developers changed the design of the building to reduce the parking required.
Originally, the proposal included office space on the first and second floors and thus required a total of 13 commercial parking stalls.
This time, the developer dropped the three planned offices on the second floor and replaced them with three residential units. By converting the previously smaller units to larger ones – from two bedrooms to three – only one more residential unit was added, bringing the total units from the original 32 units to 33.
Three ground floor commercial units and a two-storey parking garage are part of the current plan.
The revised project will provide two motorcycle stalls and 34 parking spaces on site. The developer will provide $24,000 in lieu of four commercial parking stalls, as is allowed by current District rules.
The residential units include one, two and three-bedroom units, most with flex or den space included. The units are slated to be rentals, though no housing agreement is in place.
“There is no assurance of them being rental long term,” District planner Elaine Naisby told council on July 18.
The property used to be the home of the Chieftain Hotel Annex that was connected to the Chieftain Hotel by an overhead walkway. The annex burned down in a fire in 2010.
Mayor Patricia Heintzman said she was concerned that this development was allowed to go ahead on what used to be a parking lot for the hotel. The Chieftain Hotel now has no designated parking, she said.
She questioned how this was allowed happen.
Naisby said that no covenant or safeguard had been attached to the property’s land title to ensure it stayed parking. In other words, the arrangement of it being parking for the hotel was never formalized.
