Amid a wave of contentious new Centretown condominium developments, another proposed building has stirred debate over its lack of planned parking spaces and the fallout that could create in the vicinity.
A 251-unit condo complex is planned for the southwest corner of Lyon and Gloucester streets. The site’s Toronto-based developer is asking the City of Ottawa for bylaw exemptions that include building to 17 storeys instead of the 12 the space is zoned for.
The project is also being designed to accommodate just five visitor and 85 tenant parking spaces, which worries some area residents.
“There really does need to be visitor parking provided on-site. That’s just the way our community works,” said David Gladstone, a member of the Centretown Citizens Community Association, at a recent meeting. “You’re not going to be ensuring that the community is well served by not providing enough parking on-site so that problems are shifted off-site.”
Shifting a potential parking problem “off-site” means visitors would park their cars along surrounding streets, says a CCCA resolution that urges changes to the development plan. Cars already fill those streets to capacity, the approved motion states, and the space restrictions along the curbs will only be worsened with the upcoming segregated bike lanes on Laurier Avenue.
Brad Lamb, the CEO of Lamb Development Corporation, says his building will not cause parking issues for the building’s future residents. He says he knows from experience that the people who will live in the small apartments his complex will feature will be unlikely to have cars.
“We design buildings around the parking,” he says. “It’s not going to be a situation where someone’s going to buy an apartment of 500 square feet and try to ram their car in along Lyon or Gloucester. It’s just not reality.” Lamb points to the small number of parking spaces as one of the building’s environmentally-friendly attributes. “The most polluting carbon dioxide pigs on the planet are automobiles,” he says.
“People want things to be green, but they won’t actually live a green life and get rid of their car. We’re offering people a building downtown so you can walk to everything.”
CCCA vice-president Jordan Charbonneau agrees with Lamb up to a point–many downtown residents don’t commute by car.
He says that if the city makes a concession to the developer on the parking issue, Centretown should get improved services in return.
“Reducing parking is not such a bad thing, keeping in mind that our population is aging and that over the years we will be needing wider sidewalks or accessibility for vehicles for people who are wheelchair-bound,” he says. “Beyond just the new citizens of Centretown, we should be getting something like parks or bike lanes or affordable housing.”
Over all, Charbonneau sees development as a good thing–regardless of how many parking spaces or floors the building has.
“A high pace of development in the area does have its negative effects but it shows that people are willing and want to come to Centretown to live,” he said.
“The area is revitalizing. And this building is just one example of that. We should be encouraging more development – obviously with moderation – to ensure our community is a vibrant one, now and into the future.”