Recent Developments Suggest No Burning Desire to Be Downtown

Wednesday, August 11, 2010 03:45 AM

The future of the downtown can be measured in a couple of recent decisions by the City Council in Prince George.

One was the moving ahead of a new hotel to be located on the western edge of the Wall Mart- Canadian Tire, Home Depot- West Gate shopping center at the corner of Marleau and Highway 16 West Frontage.

The number of rooms and the location, along with yet another facility nearing completion near the intersection of 97 and highway 16 indicates to a normal thinking person that the down town core in the city is not the flavour of the month, much less year.

The approval of the expanded dance, late night pub across from the CN Center was a positive move.

It now gives people an opportunity who recreate in the area, perhaps playing hockey or Lacrosse, to wind down, have a pint, a bite to eat and catch some of the local entertainmentbefore heading home.

It was a bold move by Jordy Hoover who must be considered as the top operator of first class pubs in this community. It isn’t down town however, nor should it be. It is sitting at the perfect location for use by area residents who not only don’t like the down town atmosphere but also the distance.

A Performing Arts Center, (which by the way has a long way to go before it sees the light of day) or a wood innovation center clearly are not the conduit that investors are looking for in the future before they risk their money in the core.

I’m Meisner and that’s one man’s opinion.

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Posted on Wednesday, August 11, 2010 03:45 AM in Views by Ben Meisner

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Comments

Posted by: gus on August 11 2010 8:52 AM

I do not know how recent you want to make it Ben.

Gaming Centre. There were three "incentives" at least for it to stay downtown that I believe to have existed.

1. City built underground parking;

2. Gaming Commission would not allow it to be built as an extension to the Casino

3. The owner thought that those frequenting the bingo hall at that time would continue to frequent the new place

The number of users appeared to drop and the Gaming Commission allowed the construction of the facility next to the Casino.

With those two "incentives" removed, the parkade meant squat.

On top of that they were supposed to build six housing units as a condition by the City for being "permitted" to build there. That meant squat as well. There was no performance bond required for that as there is for landscaping, for instance.

So much for "incentives".

It is simple. If the business does not work in a particular location it is a no go. Period.

Posted by: Palopu on August 11 2010 12:02 PM

Anyone know how well the Bingo is doing in its new location???

Makes it a little more difficult to access where it is. Also patrons have acess to 500 slot machines.

My prediction is that the Bingo will decrease over the years, which means that those organizations that get their funding throw contributons from the Bingo will be going short of money.

Posted by: Tyson_6795 on August 11 2010 6:15 PM

It's Spelt Centre not Center... Sorry it bugs me, but yes i agree

Posted by: Eagleone on August 11 2010 9:29 PM

The city focus should be on the neighborhoods and not subsidizing the downtown for ever with tax dollars that should be reinvested into the neighborhoods. PG has great neighborhoods and there is no reason why we should be ignoring this advantage when we further develop.

I'd like to see more focus by the city on how value can be returned to property owners in the Hart. Clearly the Hart, which has a third of the cities population has been subsidizing the city since its inception.

Posted by: gus on August 12 2010 5:09 AM

Are you sure that it is neighbourhoods that are the ones that are not already subsidized much more heavily than the downtowns and more dense areas of cities?

If you take the assessment of the CBD (C-1 zone) of downtown and total the service infrastructure cost as well as maintenance cost and compare that to the same assessed value in a SFD subdivision (there are very few apartments in the Hart, if any) the cost of servicing and maintenance will be considerably higher in the residential subdivision.

Then factor in that the business property tax is over two times the rate as residential and that they are subject to other levies more so than residential subdivisions and I think what you will see is that the downtown is subsidizing the residential districts in the city.

If you think I am wrong, do the calculation. And, of course, the more the downtown fills in, the more that part of the city will be subsidizing the rest.

Looking at it that way, you can hopefully see that there is a very valid reason from a tax and efficiency point of view to densify the downtown of the city.

Not only that, but there is an equal rationale to infill the existing residential subdivisions to create higher densities and lessen the ratio of the cost of infrastructure and maintenance to the value of the housing stock serviced.

In other words, sprawl is very costly. You want to reduce taxes? Reduce sprawl and increase density.