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General Urban Kitchener Updates and Rumours
the $1M+ minimum bid...is that a reasonable price to pay for a less encumbered property?
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Maybe. The location is good. If the building is structurally sound (ie the sagging floors can be relatively easily replaced), and if the soil remediation had already been done (which it hasn't), $1M would be a reasonable asking price, at least.
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Am I correct in remembering that there were reports/concerns a number of years ago that contamination on the site may have migrated?  If that were so, one could imagine a need for multi-millions in remediation.
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I think you're remembering correctly (at least I'm remembering the same as you: that might not be the same thing). The contamination is believed to have migrated, and soil and air testing is being conducted at sites nearby to monitor. Everything has suggested it will be significant remediation.

I can't see the building being worth a million even if it were relatively structurally sound, which is in question anyway, and with all remediation done. The location is pretty good, but it's deep in a residential neighbourhood where getting much done will be a slog (if one wanted to add anything at all, the site is officially zoned residential as someone else pointed out). Actually developing it would be significant costs.

It would be lovely if I were wrong, and someone buys it to turn it into something. Particularly with the state of the land, I'm not optimistic.
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If someone developed that into a multi-residential condo with little parking, I'd line up to buy a unit. But again, I can't imagine neighbours, despite living next to such a large building, allowing any more than 3-4 units being built there, because "fears".
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(11-11-2016, 11:54 AM)Viewfromthe42 Wrote: If someone developed that into a multi-residential condo with little parking, I'd line up to buy a unit. But again, I can't imagine neighbours, despite living next to such a large building, allowing any more than 3-4 units being built there, because "fears".

If it's zoned for more and the builder can manage the construciton/renovation I don't think the neighbour's fears will matter.

I think the building could work with more units if it's at risk of collapsing, there's a nice building on Mansion and Chestnut in Kitchener that is a bit bigger than this one.
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You would think that, and yet so often that's proven to be a very false hope.
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Yeah, I guess it has happened with that building on Walter street... damn shame really.
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It's why it's important to comment on the Kitchener Residential Intensification in Established Neighbourhoods Survey. As is, their proposals for "gentle densification" are largely seeming to only allow building things that are *less* dense than what's already there, completely counter to the idea of gentle densification, while requiring any residential home build on a non-greenfield site to go through the same council approval process that something like 1Vic has to go through. It is, to put it mildly, insane. But just like down south, where we got Trump when 49% of voters didn't vote, it will happen if everyone just sits back and watches.
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(11-11-2016, 05:13 PM)Viewfromthe42 Wrote: But just like down south, where we got Trump when 49% of voters didn't vote, it will happen if everyone just sits back and watches.

Sorry to go off topic, but their voter turnout was actually 57%.  Their presidential election turnouts tend to be in the 55-60% range, admittedly substantially lower than our federal elections (68% last year).
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Sorry, it's updated as of 2:55pm yesterday (based on CNN) at 55% of eligible voters, a 20-year low, with Obama's share of eligible voters in 08 at 33.7%, then at 30.6%, and Hillary getting just 26.5%, meaning more than 1 in 5 of the votes Obama got to become the first African-American President, Hillary couldn't get to come out to become the first female President.
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Yeah ... the problem is that they have no equivalent of Elections Canada, so all redistricting, voting and data is patchwork at state or even county level. CNN is estimating based on the census; the 57% I posted above is from http://www.electproject.org/ which also uses the census data, but then adjusts for prison and probation populations (not eligible to vote) as well as estimated overseas populations (eligible to vote but not in census). There simply won't be any definitive number.

In my mind there is no question that having a single national, impartial elections agency is the better way.
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Unlikely that a national agency would be approved in the US, as so much administration is at the state level.

I'd like to see statewide agencies operating with a federally-mandated standard of operation. That's doable with the current framework.
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According to the J&P Grocery instagram account, there will be a mezzanine overlooking the main floor grocery area, with a Smile Tiger cafe on it. That's pretty big, and very welcome! I wonder if it will be more of a stand selling brewed Smile Tiger coffee, or an actual "branch" of Smile Tiger. I'd love to see more of them Smile. They're easily the best coffee in town.
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City staff is recommending the option to sell the former Royal Canadian Legion at 48 Onta St. N.


http://m.kitchenerpost.ca/news-story/699...mer-legion
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