Calgary announces plans to convert 3 downtown office buildings to homes, hotel units
CBC
The city of Calgary has announced its plans to convert three downtown towers into residential housing and hotel units.
One new project was introduced at an event on Wednesday – The Dominion Centre will be refitted to create 132 new homes, with a minimum of 25 per cent to be rented at affordable rates.
Updated plans were also given for two previously announced projects.
A second phase of the Palliser One project will convert 206,000 square feet of office space into 219 homes.
Together with phase one, 395 one or two-bedroom units will be built from vacant space in the Palliser One building, making it the largest office conversion project to date in Calgary.
City officials also announced the Element by Westin project will shift to creating hotel units.
That project will see approximately 168,000 square feet of space filled with 226 guest rooms and other hotel facilities.
"We had built a downtown that worked well at a very specific point in time. That point in time no longer exists," said Calgary mayor Jyoti Gondek.
"So the more mixed-use we do downtown, the better able we are to combine housing with employment hubs, with recreation and all of the other many, many things people do in their daily routine, the stronger our downtown will become."
The city invested approximately $50 million into the three projects, compared to a private sector investment of $194 million, according to Gondek.
A total of seventeen downtown conversion projects in the city's pipeline would create 2,300 new homes.
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