Paul Ellingham calls it “a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.”
Two full city blocks in the heart of the university district, up for grabs to the highest bidder.
Now, the landlord heading up the drive to sell the properties as a package deal at auction says the city can play a key role in helping to shape the site’s future.
Ellingham has a meeting scheduled with Coun. Mark Whaley and possibly other city officials on Monday. Ellingham would like to see the properties — 39 homes in the blocks bounded by Hickory, Hazel, Hemlock and Balsam streets — rezoned to allow for a mixed-use development, which could include residential, retail, commercial and even educational space.
Ellingham said large developers who have expressed interest want some assurance that the site would be zoned appropriately for prospective projects.
Whaley said his role on Monday will be to listen to Ellingham and learn more about his intentions.
“We need to assess what his vision is,” Whaley said Sunday. “If it’s true that Paul Ellingham has created an opportunity to consolidate all these pieces of property, it puts him in a powerful position to move the community forward in a positive way.”
Ironically, Ellingham says it’s the city which put him and other Northdale property owners in the position to sell in the first place. Ellingham says the group’s decision is a response to Waterloo’s new rental housing bylaw. Critics fear the new rules will further depress property values in the area, and Ellingham said many landlords don’t want to deal with the regulations and fees that accompany the changes.
An auction originally planned for last month was postponed as Ellingham attracted more properties. Now, Ellingham said the auction is on hold until they see whether the city will act to rezone the area. He said the property owners are on board to sell as a group until the end of October.
If developers interested in a multi-use project don’t get the assurances they’re looking for, Ellingham said the properties could be snapped up by developers interested in constructing apartment buildings geared toward students. Ellingham said his preference would be multi-use.
“We’re now recognizing that mixed use is the way to go,” he said. “It’s, environmentally, the most responsible kind of zoning.”
The ward’s councillor, Jeff Henry, said the city has retained a consultant to conduct a land use plan and complete a community improvement study for the Northdale area. That process, expected to last a year, will yield proposed zoning and improvement plans for council to consider, Henry said in an email.
The two blocks in question sit directly across from the site of Wilfrid Laurier University’s new Global Exchange facility, announced last month. Whaley pointed out that Laurier also owns the former Northdale Public School, which abuts the parcel of land on the other side.
“We need to be open to all possibilities, and understand that this is a really important building block to the future of our city,” Whaley said.
by Brent Davis, The Record