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Oakridge looks to transform 1950s mall into a small city

July 23rd, 2012 · 19 Comments

The Canada Line continues to work its magic up and down the tracks, encouraging office builders to locate nearby, prompting condo developments here and there.

The latest site to re-consider itself is the Oakridge shopping mall at Cambie and 41st. A report going to council tomorrow recommends letting Oakridge go through with another rezoning process (after just having completed one in 2007), as the owners, now partnered with Westbank and Ian Gillespie, contemplate something much denser than they did six years ago.

The proponents and staff are also talking about something much more than a simple mall expansion with a few towers in one corner. They’re talking about re-making that whole site, with roads through it, parks, a library, and a feeling of not a mall.

It won’t be a quickie. That community is famous for its turnout to neighbourhood planning meetings. But it will be a fun watch, to see what they come up with in the end.

 

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  • Bill Lee

    Library? There already is one branch of VPL downstairs.
    In 1959 it was an outdoor mall with the anchor tenant Woodwards having several shops, massive food store where you could use credit cards (Woodward’s of course) to buy food!!
    Other stores were the white goods store and linens.
    Then it was rebuilt as a covered enclosed mall without the little external walkways,
    Then it was rebuilt as a two storey mall.
    They it was rebuilt as a larger mall with an office tower, killing Mary Speedy in the process.

    Now they want to fill up the whole block?

    Even now there are teardown/rebuild signs across the street along 41st (ex-Wilson Road) all the way to Oak Street for towering Jewish rest homes.

    Is this to match what catty neighbours call the “Great Wall of China” towers on the south west side?

    Somehow I don’t see fewer cars, but more precious/status cars taking little boxes home.

    Bula wrote in article “Oakridge is currently renovating one corner of its site, to accommodate the city’s first Crate and Barrel, which is supposed to open by Christmas.”
    But CB2 is already failing on Robson Street.

    And there have been a lot, a lot, of failures in that mall, besides Woodward’s.

    Btw, what is Ivanhoe spelled Ivanho[e acute] in the printed dead trees version?

  • tedeastside

    a city? don’t cities need jobs? because the only job growth in Vancouver is in $9/hour range

  • Joe Just Joe

    I won’t get too involved in this discussion but will state that as other malls region wide get redeveloped over the coming decades, they would be well advised to use what is envisioned here as a blueprint. While the density proposed at Oakridge is higher then would be suitable at some other malls the ratio of mixed uses is able to be replicated elsewhere.

  • Michelle

    All Developers former and present financial ontributors to the Vision Wagon of Clowns… Unite! 🙂

  • brilliant

    Whatever. The real estate meltdown already in progess will put this on ice. Even Visions favouritest developer won’t escape the day of reckoning.

  • Roger Kemble

    I approve . . .

  • Tessa

    I was trying to find an item on the agenda for this. Is something like that available? Can you link to it?

  • rf

    Uh Bill…you don’t have to be jewish to live in those rest homes. I’m not going to cast stones from my glass house but…

    I sincerely like this idea. I’ve lived in the area for a little while. One thing is for sure….there’s really no “neighbourhood.”
    Unfortunately, when you have that many elderly people in one area, it’s difficult to get stratas to spend the money to take care of the structures. It’s an odd sound when you hear so many millionaires cry poverty!

    There are derilict bungalows all over the place . It’s time to renew the area.

    Oakridge is a ‘fatiguing’ mall at best. It could be so much more.

    Dig it up!

    The Mall complex is the closest thing

  • Joe Just Joe

    Tessa, think you are looking for

    http://vancouver.ca/ctyclerk/cclerk/20120725/documents/ptec4-OakridgeCentreRedevelopment.pdf

    Lots of additional info at PlaceSpeak

  • Joe Just Joe

    Read for the documents at the below page if you still want additional info

    https://www.placespeak.com/topic/525/oakridge-centre-online-open-house/

  • Bill Lee

    Then we have Brentwood doing the same thing, large living towers, 6 residential towers (2 as tall as 60 stories) and a 25 story office tower above the existing mall. on the present (to be re-configured) mall.
    [ Issues early on: http://www.burnabynewsleader.com/news/137996948.html ]

    And the luxury crowds will go to the new YVR mall next to the Delta hotel.

    And Metrotown Mall will get a reconfiguraton.
    And you can bet Surrey will do a better job with some new brownfield central mall.

    Chunky Woodward originally blackmailed Vancouver to put up his Oakridge and then, as a private company, lost it to the banks.
    We didn’t lose many “shopppers” to the suburban malls as people thought.

    And Thomas Fung 馮永發 (Thomas Fung Wing Fat) won’t give up his ownership of the Canada-RAV Line with properties on the station at Aberdeen Mall, and Cambie and Broadway.

    Meanwhile over in Caulfield…

  • Bill Lee

    And there is the supermall in Delta on the lands north of the ferry slips.

    And Nordstrom creates new buzz in Pacific Centre downtown as Holt Renfrew withers under the third generation of Westons.

    Oh where will our shopping dollars go?

  • Julia

    How will this impact existing neighbourhood retail in Marpole, Kerrisdale, Cambie Village, South Main and South Granville?

    It won’t be good… that is for sure.

  • Silly Season

    Having grown up literally a half block from Oakridge, I can remember when it was an ‘open air’ shopping centre, with fountains in the central promenade area. And there was a bitchin’ selection of ‘Archie’ and ‘Millie the Model’ comics at Kresges, too!

    I’m kind of excited to see what people could come up with, vis-a vis ridding the neighbourhood of the fortress-like facade. A park?! A “square?” Green space?!

    Might it be a model for how to define and form other “neighbourhood squares?” in the future? One hopes the architectural community comes to the table with some spectacular designs—after talking and consulting the locals, of course…

  • Trish French

    The Oakridge Centre Policy Statement was adopted by City Council in 2007 after a several year long planning and consultation process. To see the plan, go to http://vancouver.ca/commsvcs/guidelines/O002.pdf. The quickest overview is in the Appendix showing the 2006 illustrative concept.
    The Policy Statement is not a legally adopted zoning or Official Development Plan, but it sets out a v ery sound framework to add density, a mix of uses, and community amenities onto the site. The critical thing is a site layout that connects it better to the surrounding community through inclusion of a new cross-site street and linkages. It was a very tough slog, because Ivanhoe Cambridge had a lot of mandatory conditions related to how much disruption there could be to the functioning of the mall during development.

    I am sure Ivanhoe Cambridge and Westbank are going for more density and height, but I hope the core idea–that Oakridge needs to be knit into the community rather than remain as a little fortress–is vigourously pursued.

  • gmgw

    @Julia #13:
    Neighbourhood retail (I assume by that you mean small, independently-owned shops) is already dying just about everywhere in the city, so this development probably won’t make a lot of difference either way.
    gmgw

  • Higgins

    This project will go ahead, despite any or/ if any NIMBY dissent. Vision & comp. will have this term only to put the stamp on it. Ian Gillespie is a known Vision donor, if you didn’t know by now…
    I know, I’m exaggerating, ha, ha…

  • Bill Lee

    fabulavancouver just re-tweeted

    COPE ‏@COPEVancouver
    @COPEVancouver concerned new mini-city at Oakridge will be unaffordable and exclusive http://cope.bc.ca/2012/07/24/cope-concerned-new-mini-city-at-oakridge-will-be-unaffordable-and-exclusive/ … #vanpoli @Tim_Louis
    Retweeted by Frances Bula

    [ text ]
    “COPE Concerned New Mini-City At Oakridge Will Be Unaffordable And Exclusive

    Tomorrow, Vancouver’s Vision-led city council will receive a recommendation from city staff that would lead to a miniature city being constructed on the Oakridge Centre site. If Oakridge is to be redeveloped, COPE says the city must require the creation of affordable housing that is within reach of all income levels, costing no more than 30% of residents’ incomes.

    COPE’s Tim Louis said, “They’re going to build a 28 acre miniature city at Oakridge. If it’s like any of the other developments that have been approved in recent history, it will be a miniature city for the rich only. They’re only promising to build market units.”

    Vision Vancouver’s focus on market-rate housing has decreased affordability in the city. At other large rezonings, including the Rize tower, Shannon Mews, Olympic Village and Little Mountain, the city has missed the bare minimum requirement of 20% affordable units in large developments.

    Louis continued, “We’ve seen this far too many times over the past few years. We need affordable housing now.””

  • neil21

    Is this the same Ivanhoe Cambridge who think a mall http://www.bclocalnews.com/news/134459573.html rather than a new town http://weburbanist.com/2012/05/22/mexican-venice-the-man-made-island-city-of-mexcaltitan/ http://www.cnu.org/sprawlretrofit http://blog.smallstreets.org/post/15325308564/lets-visit-a-car-free-village-built-from-scratch is a good use of the lands of the grandchildren of Tsawwassen?