These condo malls are a hot commodity in Vancouver.... one has to wonder if it'll work in middle of nowhere Balzac. It does have good proximity to the NE....
Yet, there is strong demand among Chinese and South Asian entrepreneurs to own, rather than lease, their business locations. “I would say there is a big appetite for this kind of concept,” according to Mr. Chohan, who says buyers at Westwood Square paid from $850 to $1,100 a square foot for units ranging in size from 55 square feet to about 550 square feet. Cecilia Tse, senior vice-president, Asia Pacific, for Colliers International in Vancouver, says investors from mainland China snapped up 95 per cent of the retail condo units offered for sale in Aberdeen Square, a 160,000-square-foot, six-level retail and office extension of the Aberdeen Centre in Richmond, B.C., that was completed this past summer. Owned and developed by Fairchild Group, the retail aspect features more than 300 stores averaging 400 square feet each. Among the exceptions is a much larger 7,000-square-foot space that Colliers sold to an investor once Royal Bank of Canada agreed to sign on as the more traditional, well-branded tenant.
that picture made me think of a farmers market with handknitted tea cozies, hand carved crib boards being sold out of little tiny cubicles, and homemade cookies and jams being sold.
I'm wonder if both could exist in the same place, with asian and white business owners running little shops.
I've always liked this kind of open air market/mall concept...to bad it's nothing something that can be more integrated into the urban part of the city, even if it was somewhere around Centre Street/16th. Although I guess everyone wanting to drive and find parking is the reason it's out in the middle of nowhere.
If they approve this though, they better be approving the race track!
Locals entrepreneurs should get a first crack at real estate. Somehow I think retail business from Vancouver (er, Richmond) and Toronto (er, Markham) are tying up all the reservations.
