Kitchener 10 Duke Street West | ?m | 45s | VanMar Developments | Kirkor Architects

[emphurent]

A new large scale proposal in early stages coming to Downtown Kitchener. 10 Duke Street W has seen a few different iterations that proposed for an addition above the existing building, but the latest seems to be of a much larger in scope. Listed as a Condo development on the developer's website (same developer as Station Park), the first render of the plan recently surfaced in a heritage assessment.

The existing building:

The proposed design is by Kirkor Architects. (Source)

Clean lines in the initial design, but the parking podium should be nixed (let's stop with them already, this is on top of a rail transit corridor.)

and some info:

 

[Pinski]

Site Plan submitted for this one. This has been increased to 45 floors which is becoming the norm in Kitchener it seems. No docs released yet but will post when they come out. I have a feeling this will break the 150 mark given the 6 storeys of commercial in the podium.

“Proposing an adaptive reuse project by incorporating the historical façades from the existing heritage building with a contemporary 45-storey mixed use building containing commercial and office space and 499 residential units.”

 

[CanadianNational]

By gum, another mediocrity. Slightly more svelte than the other SRM lumpenturms about, but still no thrill. I really hope that's not another above-ground parking podium.
Kitchener's not big enough to absorb too many of these without them being a grave, lasting dullness on the skyline.
This tower does not seem to be progressing at the moment though - the historical base building has been boarded up for awhile. Maybe we'll get a redesign out of it.

 

[Square]

Looks like this one and the 55s on King Street are not happening. Vanmar Developments does not have them listed on the web site anymore.

 

[AntonioDavid1]

Yeah these projects are not happening. I wonder what happened? Funding ?

 

[ZEBuilder]

Yeah these projects are not happening. I wonder what happened? Funding ?

The housing market fell apart and condos stopped selling. VanMar has all the approvals for both buildings (save building permits) and are still working behind the scenes on some other projects, the website is not a complete representation of what one actually owns or plans, VanMar is working on a project in Waterloo and it isn't on their website, the website is not the be all end all.

 

[AntonioDavid1]

The housing market fell apart and condos stopped selling. VanMar has all the approvals for both buildings (save building permits) and are still working behind the scenes on some other projects, the website is not a complete representation of what one actually owns or plans, VanMar is working on a project in Waterloo and it isn't on their website, the website is not the be all end all.

Thanks for the insight legend!