What an embarassment by City Hall - anybody remember the picture with Mayor..they should now take a picture of him removing the sign...

So how about the property on Victoria and 7th? I seem to recall hearing that there was a high demand on that project which resulted in the developer deciding to build a larger building.

I think a covenant is kind of useless. It needs a performance bond or irrevocable letter of credit.

The 7th and Victoria property should have reverted to its former zoning after a fixed period of time expired and a bill sent to the successful re-zoning applicant for all the expenses accrued to the City (i.e. us, the taxpayers).

There are other properties that were rezoned in the past (like the empty weedy lot across from the Library) and where the City incurred valuable time and effort and the developer never had any intention to follow through instead of just trifling and speculating.

http://www.ghiai.com

Click on the canuck flag, then on news, then scroll down to the bottom, as you read the rest of the self adolatioon on the way there.

Believe it or not, the link below this is PG downtown. His notion of a 13 year downtown revitalization project as it is referred to on his site. To see it in the context of the web site, click on projects, then urban planning, and move through the images there.

http://www.ghiai.com/10urban/concept01.JPG

It does fall under the "believe it or not" category. Actually, I think it is in the wrong category. He has a utopia-archi-fiction category where it belongs.

http://www.ghiai.com/10urban/10-pg01.jpg

I had a look at the website(thanks owl)and I must say it is a more than a bit bizarre!
It also left me with an uneasy feeling about what I was looking at but I am not sure why?
Very weird presentation!
What's up with these guys?
Very little info actually, but they obvioulsy think they are something very special!
How the hell did they sell the city on this one??
And Ghia hasn't paid for the property yet?
hmmmm.....

I have three phrases for you...

... Metropolis Project... Cameron Street Bridge ... Election Scam.

It reminds me of that line by Ben Kanobi in Star Wars (with a few small changes):

"Who's the greater fool? The fool or the fool who votes for one?"

{url]http://www.ghiai.com/contact.htm[/url]

His Canadian headquarters is in PG .... no physical address though.

My take on it, from what I can see on the site, which I explored when his name first came up, is that he comes from a relatively well-to-do family in Iran or Persia as some like to think of it. However, they backed the Shah who was deposed. The architeture of his father in Iran dates back to the Shah era.

The sons studied Architecure in the US. The presentation models are very surealistic, going along with Giai's Salvador Dali like moustache. To call him eccentric would probably be an understatement. There is one, maybe even two, town house development(s) on the site which comes from San Francisco. That looks quite convincing to me. But the rest reminds me of conceptual studies one would do in Architecture School in the middle year(s) of study.

http://www.ghiai.com/contact.htm

Elect me I have plans to build a 30 story 5 star hotel on 5th and Victoria street.

PS Can you front me the money to pay for the lot and the upfront capital as well as tax favors to make the project go ahead....

The property at 5th and Quebec or some of the property that the City owns between the Kings Inn book store and the Restaurant that recently closed should be used for the housing development for the people that they presenlty wish to locate at the old Backpacker Motel property.

As you can recall the old liquor store on 6th was renovated and now houses people who cannot afford regular housing. To locate a new facility right across the street from this one would keep these types of buildings in the same area, keep them out of residential areas, and guess what? We already own the property so it wouldnt be a problem to locate there.

Do you think this Mayor and Council are forward thinking enough to build the shelter on this property, or will they try to get some developer to use the property and force the shelter into a residential area.

I wonder what they will do? Duhhhhh

Okay... so does the City have an unlimited supply of "covenants" ?? Or do they just take one off one property (ie. PGGGC) and put it on this vacant lot across from the Post Office ??

I can imagine there is a storage closet at City Hall with the sign "Covenants" on the door... probably not too far down the hall is that other closet that is noted as "Zoning Amendments".

Blessings

Ah, someone doth bringeth out ye olde ark of the covenant joke.

Rather appropriate since it TOO is shrouded in mystery.

Did anyone read Giai's words in the newspaper this morning? He states he cannot get anyone to build it.

I always thought that before one builds anything in this city one needs some plans to bring to City Hall to get a permit. In this case, I believe, that would include a development permit which, I believe, means the design panel has to have a short peek at it.

In addition, I am not sure whether Giai would have a license to practice architecture in BC, so he would have to employ the services of an architect and some engineers to stamp the drawings and oversee the construction so that they can sign the certificates required to be deposited at City Hall.

Then we have the case of the one on 7th and Victoria which apparently has "drawn a lot of interest". When one goes to buy a condo in most other communities, one can walk into a sales office, look at the drawings, see which ones are sold, find out the price of the ones which are not sold and go from there.

Then we have John Major's 6 units that I believe he had to put into the gaming centre building in order to get Council approval to build. It needed to be a “mixed” development. He is reported to say something like “They are all as good as sold. We have not asked anyone for their money, but they are all spoken for.”

The Ark of the Covenant is right. Those who are proposing, and in the case of John Major a pretty sure bet to build, are all shrouded in mystery. Why? is the question. Why so much secrecy?

As for a 5 star hotel in PG ….. who would keep a hotel like that with say 100+ rooms at an average of $250/nightg occupied 80% of the time?

Yes, we need more hotel space from the looks of it, but those in the hotel business need to look at the business case for building one. Look at the Sheraton 5 points which is finally about to open this weekend I believe. It took a year longer than it should take to build something like that.

The Inn’s recent attempt at building a major addition did not get approved, likely because the business case could not be made. Then the Sandman is not building just yet.

We need such hotels for events such as Forest Expo every two years. But that is not going to keep a hotel in business. We do not have space for major conventions. We are taxed when they get to be bigger than 500 or so, I believe.

If we want hotels, we need to build convention space to fill them or provide some other service that will cause people to come here. We need to build the infrastructure for tourism in the outlying areas and then provide local accommodation for the transition of arriving and departure nights, and, if the city was lively enough rather than closing their sidewalks at 5pm and on weekends, a reason to stay here for an extra night or two.

Who builds convention space? Cities. Provinces. Rarely hotels on their own, other than in concert with government partners. So, we need to build real convention facilities. The Civic centre is not large enough. To do that, one has to make a business case for it again. To do that one has to look 5 to 10 years down the road since that is how long venues for typical associations are planned ahead and confirmed.