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RBC Centre
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Location: Wellington St W.,
Developer: Cadillac Fairview
Architect: Kohn Pedersen Fox (KPF) Associates Architects and Planners, based in New York; Bregman + Hamann Architects of Toronto; and Sweeny, Sterling, Finlayson & Co. Architects
Inc. of Toronto.
Planning Docs:
Website:
Designation: Office, Retail
Status: Under Construction
Expected Occupancy: Summer 2009
Height: 600ft
Floors: 42
Size: 1.2 million-square foot
Value: $400 million
canrob's post.
Cadillac Fairview tower to end Toronto dry spell
First major office project in 14 years expected to spark downtown development
ELIZABETH CHURCH
REAL ESTATE REPORTER
Cadillac Fairview Corp. Ltd. will announce today that it is ready to start building a new tower in Toronto, ending a 14-year drought in major downtown office construction in Canada's largest city and kicking off an expected wave of activity in that market.
The new tower will be located west of the financial district at Simcoe and Wellington Streets and will be built as part of a new Ritz-Carlton hotel and condominium project that will rise beside it on the site.
Cadillac Fairview, along with a handful of rival developers, has had plans for a Toronto tower on the books for several months, but was unwilling to break ground without first leasing a sizable block of space. "No one is going to put up a building in Toronto without a major tenant," one real estate executive said recently. "Everyone is being extremely cautious in this market."
The Royal Trust unit of Royal Bank of Canada is widely expected to be the lead tenant of the project, sources in the industry said, with final approval of the deal reached last week.
Royal Trust currently has its name on one of the towers of the Toronto-Dominion Centre, another building owned by Cadillac Fairview, the commercial real estate arm of Ontario Teachers Pension Plan.
Today's announcement will likely be the first of two or three new Toronto office developments to be announced this year.
Telus Corp. also is in the final stages of negotiating a leasing deal with privately owned Menkes Developments that would see its name on a new tower to the west of the Air Canada Centre, real estate sources say. That tower would be next to the railway lines and would be linked to Union Station through an underground tunnel. The move would give the Vancouver-based company a new, higher profile in the Toronto market.
A spokeswoman for Telus said the company cannot comment on the matter while negotiations are still taking place.
Today's announcement by Cadillac Fairview marks a turning point for Toronto and the beginning of what one real estate executive called a "mini development wave" in a city that has seen little new downtown office space in recent years.
"In the Toronto core the race is now on," Blake Hutcheson, president of CB Richard Ellis in Canada said recently. Higher rents and lower vacancy rates are creating a market where office construction in downtown again makes sense, he told an industry forum earlier this month.
Demand for office space in Toronto's financial core spiked in the first quarter, numbers from Cushman & Wakefield LePage show, sending vacancy rates down to 6.7 per cent from 7.9 per cent the previous quarter, the biggest drop in five years.
"We haven't seen this kind of confidence in a number of years," said Paul Morse, the firm's senior vice-president in charge of leasing.
The newest building to go up in Toronto's financial core is the mid-sized Maritime Life Tower constructed by the former O&Y Properties Corp. in 2003. A few others also have been built on the edges of the downtown's central office area, but the bulk of downtown construction in recent years has been in the city's booming condominium market.
The last major office building to rise in the downtown was the Bay Wellington Tower of BCE Place, finished in March, 1992.
Plans for this latest building were outlined by Cadillac Fairview last fall in a bid to get the jump on rival projects. They call for a 48-storey, $400-million project with 1.2 million square feet of space, slightly smaller than the city's current bank towers. More details of the project are expected in an announcement from the company this morning.
For months, three or four possible new office projects have jockeyed for position -- and major tenants -- in a race to be the first project out of the gate.
Brookfield Properties also is on the hunt for tenants so that it can begin construction on a revised version of its long-dormant Bay-Adelaide Centre.
This didn't take long! Let's hope the Telus and BA announcements follow shortly.
Location: Wellington St W.,
Developer: Cadillac Fairview
Architect: Kohn Pedersen Fox (KPF) Associates Architects and Planners, based in New York; Bregman + Hamann Architects of Toronto; and Sweeny, Sterling, Finlayson & Co. Architects
Inc. of Toronto.
Planning Docs:
Website:
Designation: Office, Retail
Status: Under Construction
Expected Occupancy: Summer 2009
Height: 600ft
Floors: 42
Size: 1.2 million-square foot
Value: $400 million
canrob's post.
Cadillac Fairview tower to end Toronto dry spell
First major office project in 14 years expected to spark downtown development
ELIZABETH CHURCH
REAL ESTATE REPORTER
Cadillac Fairview Corp. Ltd. will announce today that it is ready to start building a new tower in Toronto, ending a 14-year drought in major downtown office construction in Canada's largest city and kicking off an expected wave of activity in that market.
The new tower will be located west of the financial district at Simcoe and Wellington Streets and will be built as part of a new Ritz-Carlton hotel and condominium project that will rise beside it on the site.
Cadillac Fairview, along with a handful of rival developers, has had plans for a Toronto tower on the books for several months, but was unwilling to break ground without first leasing a sizable block of space. "No one is going to put up a building in Toronto without a major tenant," one real estate executive said recently. "Everyone is being extremely cautious in this market."
The Royal Trust unit of Royal Bank of Canada is widely expected to be the lead tenant of the project, sources in the industry said, with final approval of the deal reached last week.
Royal Trust currently has its name on one of the towers of the Toronto-Dominion Centre, another building owned by Cadillac Fairview, the commercial real estate arm of Ontario Teachers Pension Plan.
Today's announcement will likely be the first of two or three new Toronto office developments to be announced this year.
Telus Corp. also is in the final stages of negotiating a leasing deal with privately owned Menkes Developments that would see its name on a new tower to the west of the Air Canada Centre, real estate sources say. That tower would be next to the railway lines and would be linked to Union Station through an underground tunnel. The move would give the Vancouver-based company a new, higher profile in the Toronto market.
A spokeswoman for Telus said the company cannot comment on the matter while negotiations are still taking place.
Today's announcement by Cadillac Fairview marks a turning point for Toronto and the beginning of what one real estate executive called a "mini development wave" in a city that has seen little new downtown office space in recent years.
"In the Toronto core the race is now on," Blake Hutcheson, president of CB Richard Ellis in Canada said recently. Higher rents and lower vacancy rates are creating a market where office construction in downtown again makes sense, he told an industry forum earlier this month.
Demand for office space in Toronto's financial core spiked in the first quarter, numbers from Cushman & Wakefield LePage show, sending vacancy rates down to 6.7 per cent from 7.9 per cent the previous quarter, the biggest drop in five years.
"We haven't seen this kind of confidence in a number of years," said Paul Morse, the firm's senior vice-president in charge of leasing.
The newest building to go up in Toronto's financial core is the mid-sized Maritime Life Tower constructed by the former O&Y Properties Corp. in 2003. A few others also have been built on the edges of the downtown's central office area, but the bulk of downtown construction in recent years has been in the city's booming condominium market.
The last major office building to rise in the downtown was the Bay Wellington Tower of BCE Place, finished in March, 1992.
Plans for this latest building were outlined by Cadillac Fairview last fall in a bid to get the jump on rival projects. They call for a 48-storey, $400-million project with 1.2 million square feet of space, slightly smaller than the city's current bank towers. More details of the project are expected in an announcement from the company this morning.
For months, three or four possible new office projects have jockeyed for position -- and major tenants -- in a race to be the first project out of the gate.
Brookfield Properties also is on the hunt for tenants so that it can begin construction on a revised version of its long-dormant Bay-Adelaide Centre.
This didn't take long! Let's hope the Telus and BA announcements follow shortly.