(11-09-2014, 05:16 PM)KevinL Wrote: [quote pid='2362' dateline='1415504415']
Right now, walking onto the ground floor of the retail space you see massive openings to bring the atrium light to Stantec's basement garden area (surrounded by their office space). Nice as the garden is, I'd prefer to see the ground floor made into a solid whole and completely reconfigured to give better layout to retail space and hopefully make it street-facing (at least along Frederick). Stantec's departure would allow this to go forward, and I hope the mall's owners are considering it.
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The owner of that building is Dundee REIT (aka DREAM) They also own 22 Fredrick and the Galleria at Frederick & Weber. Dream bought them from the previous owner a couple years ago.
From my experience working at the Galleria, the building hasn't been well maintain and there are a lot of issues. I'm not sure if it's the same for the other buildings, but judging by the major work that's being done to the parking structure at Market Square and the general "retro" look of the mall itself.. I would guess so. The constant noise and dust from the long term parking repair work might be one of the reasons pushing Stantec out.
Like Stantec, my work (150 +) is moving out of the Galleria next year and relocating to Waterloo. Losing us + Stantec will be a big hit for Dream and downtown in general. It was probably a bad call on Dream's part to purchase these assets from the previous owner. I hope they start investing way more money into these buildings.