Raise the Hammer

This is a point that I've made several times, and can't be over-emphasized: it is not that vast areas of the lower city are being demolished or upgraded and the occupants evicted or forced out by higher rents.

What is happening now is confined to a very small portion of the downtown (a very few blocks between James and Wellington and Main and Barton) and virtually all the development is happening in buildings that had been left vacant and providing accommodation for almost no one. Sean gives a number of examples and there are many more. Not to mention the vast areas of land that have been left vacant for decades (entire blocks in some cases).

As mentioned by city staff on the downtown revitalization walk, the buildings on King St between James and Wellington in what should be the bustling high value core of downtown have been mostly empty above the ground floors for decades. And even city incentives have not been enough to get the landlords to fill them with tenants.

We're not talking about a densely populated bustling and vibrant mixed use Jane Jacobs style urban tapestry, we're dealing with a large area that has lost the vast majority of residents and businesses (and many buildings) in the last few decades.

The real displacement risk is coming from a shortage of rental apartments and increasing demand which is leading the commercial owners of large 1960s-1970s era apartment buildings to renovate and jack up the rents. The high demand is due partly to the improving fortunes of Hamilton (more attractive), but primarily to the fact that very few large rental buildings have been built in the past 30-40 years and existing buildings have been converted to condos. In addition, almost no new social housing has been built downtown.

This will actually be helped by increased supply of rental apartments in the new building next to the re-developed federal building and other new rental and condo buildings which will also decrease demand and profitability for increasing rents in old buildings. More new social housing and a policy to enforce a certain percentage of geared to income units would also help.

But keeping downtown largely empty, run-down and with few shops and services is not a social policy: it is just abandonment and leads to a lower quality of life for everyone.

Comment edited by kevlahan on 2015-08-26 10:06:22