[Albertasaurus]

The Bay building is that rare site I would hate to see Truman pick up. They do good stuff but they suck when it comes to heritage protection.

I am optimistic that the building will be saved. It would be such an outrage if it weren't saved that I can't see any developer being willing to risk their reputation by demolishing it.

 

[Mountain Man]

The facade will be saved, I'm sure the rest of the building will be completely gutted though. Maybe this can become Calgary's version of the Hearst Tower....

 

[1875]

Frank Lonardelli is the Visionary Reshaping Calgary's 17th Avenue S.W. - Avenue Calgary

The CEO and founder of Arlington Street Investments and his team created eight new development sites that will transform and densify the corridor.

www.avenuecalgary.com

 

[Albertasaurus]

Frank Lonardelli is the Visionary Reshaping Calgary's 17th Avenue S.W. - Avenue Calgary

The CEO and founder of Arlington Street Investments and his team created eight new development sites that will transform and densify the corridor.

www.avenuecalgary.com

Interesting article. I still can't wrap my head around how Arlington are so passionate about 17th, and yet for their most important site they are building arguably the most bland and underwhelming new build in the entire downtown area.

 

[haltcatchfire]

I don't see the vision.

 

[Mountain Man]

Bit of a fluff piece, wonder how much ASI paid for it lol.

 

[CBBarnett]

Frank Lonardelli is the Visionary Reshaping Calgary's 17th Avenue S.W. - Avenue Calgary

The CEO and founder of Arlington Street Investments and his team created eight new development sites that will transform and densify the corridor.

www.avenuecalgary.com

I find it interesting when a developer really centralizes their efforts to a single corridor or area to legitimately try to change it. Kind of makes sense so they can benefit from their cumulative investment and understanding of the hyper-local market. There's probably others, but it seems like Sarina on 33rd seems to be quietly doing the same thing, plus that Leonard Group's focus on 34th Avenue.

 

[trtcttc]

Interesting article. I still can't wrap my head around how Arlington are so passionate about 17th, and yet for their most important site they are building arguably the most bland and underwhelming new build in the entire downtown area.

Being passionate and wanting to do something vs executing are different things. By their own admission, they had no experience before they started. At least their adding to retail and apartments to 17th.

 

[CalgaryTiger]

Francesco is a good development, Enzo is good too, and I don't really mind Fifth but I'm heavily skeptical of what is to come. They have pulled back a little with the one at 17th and 7th (new Lululemon). Then of course there's Sentinel... I wonder why they wouldn't do something similar to Francesco there... I don't think they believe in that section of 17th and 14th as much would be my guess.

 

[trtcttc]

Definitely don’t want to lose the Bay building. I hope some entity steps forward soon with a plan to reimagine/refurbish. I’d even be ok with a redevelopment that retains a large part of the structure & exterior. For example, the renovated Bay building becomes a podium for a residential tower.

What is the upper levels of that building used for? Too bad we have such an abundance of office space. In Toronto's King West, there's some nice re-use of older buildings into renovated office space. Nvidia occupies one at the corner of King and Spadina. Shopify's Toronto HQ is also an adapted space where they kept some of the facade and built a modern office on top.

 

[Surrealplaces]

I'm not thrilled with the Sentinel design, but I've been very happy with the additional of Fifth and Enzo. Both have added good retail and street frontage, and managed to add residents at the same time. Time will tell with Francesco's, but already it looks like a win, losing a parking lot fronting the avenue, and replacing with street frontage retail, all while adding another 220 units at the same time.

 

[Tarsus]

The Fifth has totally changed that intersection, yeah, the materials may not be the greatest, but the retail it’s been a bit of a game changer. So far, Enzo looks great. As for Sentinel, we can’t win them all.

 

[outoftheice]

The article makes it sound like Arlington materialized out of thin air. Where did they get initial capital from to start buying up all these random lots in the first place?

 

[potatopizzafan]

The article makes it sound like Arlington materialized out of thin air. Where did they get initial capital from to start buying up all these random lots in the first place?

From his LinkedIn

"Frank is a “serial entrepreneur” who has been investing and developing Real Estate since he was 25 years old and built and sold two of his former companies to public entities by age 35."

Sounds like he might have acces to a Scrooge Mcduck style swimming pool

 

[Surrealplaces]

This may have been posted before, but I'll post it and then create a database/map entry for it. A 6 story proposal for Centre street and 30th ave N. 89 units.

DMAP