Construction of the next phase of the Park House Condominium project could begin as soon as next summer, according to A & T Project Developments partner Frank Quinn.
Development of the four-storey, 32-to-40-unit apartment/condo building on Sixth Avenue downtown is on schedule, he said.
"We're pretty aggressively proceeding with the next two phases," Quinn said. "All the design work is done for buildings two and three."
Preparation of architectural drawings for the second phase of the project are already underway, he said.
As of Tuesday, only 10 of the 37 units in the phase one building have sold, according to data released by Team Powerhouse Reality, which is handling the sales. A further 13 units have been rented, leaving six units for sale and eight available to rent.
The units for sale were first listed online on the Canadian Real Estate Association's Multiple Listing Service in May 2020.
While pre-sales started out a little slow, Quinn said, once the building was complete the sales and rentals have picked up.
"Normally, you hope to fill a building within two years of completion. We're right on track for that," he said.
The project originally called for a total of four apartment/condo buildings on the site, built on top of the new city parkade next to city hall. A & T Project Developments gave up the building rights for the proposed fourth building site, to allow room for development of the YMCA of Northern B.C.'s childcare and early learning centre.
The City of Prince George received $4 million in grants to build the 85-space child care centre at the site. Construction of the centre is expected to begin this year.
The proposed central courtyard area connecting the buildings of the Park House complex will be developed alongside the YMCA development, Quinn said.
"When you have a big site like this, you can really think about the space between buildings," he said. "We had an opportunity to develop a really cool community realm."
Quinn said giving up the company's option on that parcel was expensive for the company, but they felt the daycare and early learning centre would be a good fit for the project and downtown.
The combination of the Park House project, YMCA facility, downtown student housing project, new city pool and new hotel developments downtown will see a significant change for Prince George's downtown, Quinn said.
"We do work in a lot of communities... every community has its challenges in the downtown," Quinn said. "We see, over the next five years, a lot more people living downtown."
Quinn declined to comment on the controversial parkade project, which serves as Park House's foundation and provides parking for the buildings. See related story.
"As with every development project we undertake, we are accountable to our client. Our client for the Parkade was the City of Prince George," Quinn wrote in an email to The Citizen. "They have a full and detailed accounting of every cost incurred on the Parkade. We understand many of those documents have already been shared with the public. We have no further information to offer at this time and will continue to cooperate fully with our client, the City, if any further details are requested from them."
