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Downtown Markham

Northern Light said:
Open House for the new Secondary Plan was last night.

yourvoicemarkham.ca

Your Markham Centre

The City of Markham is updating the Markham Centre Secondary Plan to make sure its vision is keeping pace with the current context and the community’s desires for the area. The update will provide a planning policy framework that builds on success and guides the City to realize its highest...
yourvoicemarkham.ca yourvoicemarkham.ca

The latest 'Development Concept' was up for discussion, I believe.

It was updated in November '22:

Click to expand...

Glad to see some progress, if only we can get to the damn secondary plan sooner and get things moving.

I'm happy that they know key connections are the Yorktech, Clegg and Sciberras extensions, the sooner they can get that going, the easier for people to move around. Unsure about that IBM/Warden intersection, it feels it's going to be as useless as the Embassy Suites intersection (on Hwy 7) which I think it's an absolute waste and traffic killer. It shouldnt be there on trigger for cars turning westbound on Hwy 7, they have plenty of options, pedestrian triggered, Im okay with.

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Downtown Markham Retail Update

To start off, lets look at the latest list of retail and office locations in the 3 main complexs of Downtown Markham.
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Here is a few photos of Downtown Markham, and it's current retail landscapes:
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Above is a picture of the Nexus building. We can see a convenience store, a bubble tea shop, a art studio, and a restaurant. We can see that the BBQ Chicken place, and the convenience store, takes up multiple units, a very common occurrence in this building. The convenience store has recently been served a Notice of Distress as of October 26.
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Moving north up Birchmount, still looking at the Nexus complex, we can see a medical clinic by the name of Downtown Markham Health, which takes up at least 7 units on Birchmount Road and Verdale Crossing.
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The south side of the Nexus complex has 3 empty units - two that has a building permit that dates back to 2018. The other unit has another Notice of Distress, dating back to 2018, and the other unit is a new shop selling winter apparel catering to snowboard riders. Also to note, the west side (The back of the building), also has multiple retail units, which from the last time I have checked, was all empty.
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Now, let's move on to the Signature Building. For the most part, this side of retail is much more healthy. From the retail list above, everything is the same except for Copper Branch, which is now a Grande Burrito. This building has a backside with retail units which are all empty, but it seems like those are not for lease yet, and might be waiting for Gallery Square to be completed for them to have retail in it.
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Now lets move on to the last, and biggest complex, the Origin. New retail locations that are not on the retail list above is Glamour Aesthetic Clinic (where Subway used to be). Most retail units are taken here, aside from one on the north side.
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Last update is Me Va Me, as they have also received a Notice of Distress recently.
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To summarize, there is a lot of units taken up, and a lot of them are busy. But a lot of them tend to be empty half of the time, and many of them are taking up multiple units in each complex, showing a possible lack of demand for retail here. As more people move in, I can see it getting better. But for right now, it's clear that a lot of retail here are struggling.
 
Surprised MeVaMe has survived this long... one of the original tenants since the beginning.

Pho Ahn Vu should have opened shop here instead of Peach tree! $20 Pho fits the clientel
 
Before the Cineplex and Marriott buildings were built up, we were told that most of Downtown Markham would be completed by 2030/2035. I can see why a lot of retail is struggling right now, there hasn't been any new buildings constructed in the area since Cineplex opened up. Three new buildings finally under construction - apparently one of them with a food hall so I'm curious to know how much that will thrive since the overall progress of this project has been super slow.

Downtown Vaughan has gotten much more buildings up compared to Markham with their development beginning much later than Markham's. The area surrounding Scarborough Town Centre is going under massive redevelopment and they already got 2 projects under construction with a number of development applications submitted within the area. However for Downtown Markham, there's only one active application within the area while more activity is happening outside of the Downtown Markham Core than inside it (UnionCity, Panda, and Uptown).

What is actually going on?? It seems like selling one big parcel to one development company was a huge mistake
 
NIMBYenthusiast said:
Before the Cineplex and Marriott buildings were built up, we were told that most of Downtown Markham would be completed by 2030/2035. I can see why a lot of retail is struggling right now, there hasn't been any new buildings constructed in the area since Cineplex opened up. Three new buildings finally under construction - apparently one of them with a food hall so I'm curious to know how much that will thrive since the overall progress of this project has been super slow.

Downtown Vaughan has gotten much more buildings up compared to Markham with their development beginning much later than Markham's. The area surrounding Scarborough Town Centre is going under massive redevelopment and they already got 2 projects under construction with a number of development applications submitted within the area. However for Downtown Markham, there's only one active application within the area while more activity is happening outside of the Downtown Markham Core than inside it (UnionCity, Panda, and Uptown).

What is actually going on?? It seems like selling one big parcel to one development company was a huge mistake
Click to expand...
The one thing that you didn’t mention was the opening of the University in September which will bring several thousand students to the area.
 
rdaner said:
The one thing that you didn’t mention was the opening of the University in September which will bring several thousand students to the area.
Click to expand...
That's outside of the Downtown Markham area. The entire parcel of land designated as Downtown Markham is owned by one developer - Remington Group

The university will be a bit further away from the developed parts of Downtown Markham but hopefully it'll help the retail tenants.
 
Draft Secondary Plan finally came out... you can read the entire PDF here:

All the maps are in the appendix near the end, pages 108+

Reports and Publications | Your Markham Centre | Your Voice Markham

The City of Markham is updating the Markham Centre Secondary Plan to make sure its vision is keeping pace with the current context and the community’s desires for the area. The update will provide a planning policy framework that builds on success and guides the City to realize its highest...
yourvoicemarkham.ca yourvoicemarkham.ca
 
Last edited:
NIMBYenthusiast said:
Before the Cineplex and Marriott buildings were built up, we were told that most of Downtown Markham would be completed by 2030/2035. I can see why a lot of retail is struggling right now, there hasn't been any new buildings constructed in the area since Cineplex opened up. Three new buildings finally under construction - apparently one of them with a food hall so I'm curious to know how much that will thrive since the overall progress of this project has been super slow.

Downtown Vaughan has gotten much more buildings up compared to Markham with their development beginning much later than Markham's. The area surrounding Scarborough Town Centre is going under massive redevelopment and they already got 2 projects under construction with a number of development applications submitted within the area. However for Downtown Markham, there's only one active application within the area while more activity is happening outside of the Downtown Markham Core than inside it (UnionCity, Panda, and Uptown).

What is actually going on?? It seems like selling one big parcel to one development company was a huge mistake
Click to expand...

One big difference between the developments in Vaughan and Scarborough Town, is both have access to TTC network... If DT Markham had a decent transit system, I'm sure this would be built a lot faster than its snail pace now.

However, I'm happy to at least see some progress... Im looking forward to Gallery being built and bringing in some new restuarants and foot traffic.

I was in DT Markham for Canada Day on July 1st and it was hustling and bustling! It was great to see what COULD be once the rest of it gets built out eventually.
 
So I took a trip to Downtown Markham today and was quite surprised how many pedestrians were on the street and the businesses that I was in were busy enough. The University building is about 10 minutes walk east along Enterprise which for me is no big deal. One complex with 500 units is very close to finishing and the University will bring in a ton of traffic for both retail and housing.

The long-term prospects for this area are excellent as there are thousands of units under construction. And I saw a couple of scooters and bikes!
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Markham centre from Highway 7 to the north, Highway 407 to the south, Warden Avenue in the west, and Kennedy Road in the east, is planned to have a docked scooter share system poilt (scooty) sometime this September.

Great for connecting Unionville & York University to the development in Downtown & Uptown Markham.

They are planned to be integrated into Unionville GO station and have Presto integration. Also they are going to be geofenced and won't be able to ride on the sidewalks and on multi-use trails with a max speed of 24 km/h.

City Council would have to vote, but City staff recommended installing bicycle lanes on Enterprise.

MARKHAM CENTRE AUTOMOBILITY DEMONSTRATION ZONE MICROMOBILITY PILOT (10.0) - Development Services Committee Meeting - April 02, 2024

pub-markham.escribemeetings.com pub-markham.escribemeetings.com
 
Last edited:
mossynukes said:
Rome wasn't built in a day
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This will never be Rome.

****

In all seriousness there are good efforts here.........but so many 'details' don't work..........

This image of @rdaner 's to me shows what could be promising urbanity and yet isn't:

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The design language of the podium levels is wrong here, there's no quality retail offer even just in from the actual street and the 3 lanes worth of cars is definitely one too many.

IT could work, it just doesn't. Someone thought through the density, there are some warm tones and varied architectural styles.....of varying quality......but instead of reading as an interesting mews, where maybe you could find a patio off the beaten path, it reads as a minor 'stroad' and an under-achieving architectural jumble.

Too bad. Seriously. It feels close, yet so far from what it could have been. The roadway/driveway is fixable. Some of the retail potential remains with renos, but it will be hard to fully fix this.....
 
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