An 8-storey midrise proposal located at the corner of James Street North and Ferrie Street East appears to have been abandoned by developer JvN/d after the project rezoning approval was appealed to the Local Planning Appeal Tribunal.
The project was innovative for it’s new financing structure that would allow buyers to purchase “lots” of 250 square feet each in order to create a unit size that worked for their family and their budget. As well, the lots would be available in different levels of finish, allowing Hamiltonians with incomes from $25,000 to purchase them if they could put in sweat equity to complete the unit.
Despite unanimous support from the City of Hamilton Planning Committee, the project was appealed to the Local Planning Appeals Tribunal. HamiltonForward contacted both the LPAT case coordinator and JvN/d seeking info on who initiated the appeal, but as of writing have not heard back.
However, a possible appellant would be either the North End Neighbourhood Association (NENa) or their Chair, Herman Turkstra. Turkstra is an experienced municipal lawyer who is a senior partner of the local law firm Turkstra Mazza. Over the past few years, the North End Neighbourhood Association has made concerted efforts to stop any “ad-hoc” rezonings or official plan amendments in the North End, and has called for the City to respect and enforce the 2005 West Harbour Setting Sail Secondary Plan and James North Mobility Hub Study.
It’s not clear what issues would be brought up at an LPAT hearing, but based on the E-Status page of the appeal, the case description reads OPA 242, West Harbour Secondary Plan indicating that the appellant might argue the proposal should be rejected based on non-conformance with the West Harbour Setting Sail Secondary Plan.
The listing for this site appeared on realtor.ca within the past few days with an asking price of $2,900,000 through the Cushman and Wakefield brokerage.
This proposal if built would’ve risen 27 meters in height, contained a maximum of 91 units over 6,000 square metres of floor area, and included 384 square metres of commercial space spread across 4 retail units. As well, the project included 5 live-work units on the Ferrie Street East frontage. The floor space ratio (FAR) would be 3.82, just under the as-of-right 4.0 FSR. It would’ve included 32 resident parking spaces, and 9 visitor spaces.
HamltonForward is keeping an eye on this property, the LPAT appeal, and the future development of the site.
Northeast-facing aerial rendering Northwest-facing aerial rendering Retail space rendering
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As Chair Person of the North End Neighborhood Association for the past two years (not Herman Turkstra) I can say that our association is not the appellant. We are an association not a corporation therefore legally we cannot be an appellant. Regarding all planning initiatives in the North End our message to the City has been consistent for many years. We support the City’s secondary plan Setting Sail. Please contact me if you have any questions. Thanks Curtis Biehler