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  #321  
Old Posted Aug 4, 2015, 4:52 AM
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Sorry but has anyone mentioned the SandMan hotel they are building on Centennial parkway? It is to be a six storey hotel with wood being the frame of the structure, first of its kind in Ontario apparently.
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  #322  
Old Posted Aug 4, 2015, 1:35 PM
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Speaking of restaurants closing, there's a For Lease sign in the window of Boo's Bistro. It wasn't there on Friday.
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  #323  
Old Posted Aug 4, 2015, 2:28 PM
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Speaking of restaurants closing, there's a For Lease sign in the window of Boo's Bistro. It wasn't there on Friday.
I've been told it closed due to issues unrelated to how well it was doing in the marketplace of restaurants.

I also heard that Zum Linder has recently closed.

On a happier note, a new restaurant is coming to James N. I think it's #229, but trying to get details.

EDIT/UPDATE: The new resto is called Lake Road, at 229 James N. Opening in the autumn. Owners also own Twisted Lemon.
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  #324  
Old Posted Aug 4, 2015, 3:02 PM
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EDIT/UPDATE: The new resto is called Lake Road, at 229 James N. Opening in the autumn. Owners also own Twisted Lemon.
Awesome. It also looks like the Rainbow Bridal space on King has been rented so it will be interesting to see what's opening in there. It's a massive space.
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  #325  
Old Posted Aug 4, 2015, 3:36 PM
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Speaking of restaurants closing, there's a For Lease sign in the window of Boo's Bistro. It wasn't there on Friday.
NOOOOO!! Tell me it's not true - that's my favourite restaurant in the city.
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  #326  
Old Posted Aug 4, 2015, 8:14 PM
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Originally Posted by Markus83 View Post
Sorry but has anyone mentioned the SandMan hotel they are building on Centennial parkway? It is to be a six storey hotel with wood being the frame of the structure, first of its kind in Ontario apparently.
Thats been mentoined on the forum somehwere i recall. It includes a dennys and moxys last i heard.
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  #327  
Old Posted Aug 5, 2015, 4:56 PM
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Chester's is changing owners

Chester's Beers of the World is changing hands. The new owner is going after the 20-somethings, who in his words "drink like fish"

More here, from The Spec: http://bit.ly/1NakM6Z
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  #328  
Old Posted Aug 5, 2015, 8:11 PM
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Thanks King10!
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  #329  
Old Posted Oct 15, 2015, 7:58 PM
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New retail business on James South.
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  #330  
Old Posted Oct 15, 2015, 11:43 PM
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Originally Posted by Markus83 View Post
Sorry but has anyone mentioned the SandMan hotel they are building on Centennial parkway? It is to be a six storey hotel with wood being the frame of the structure, first of its kind in Ontario apparently.
It has its own thread here http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/show...parkway&page=3
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  #331  
Old Posted Nov 12, 2015, 9:13 PM
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City tops $1B mark in construction permits four years in a row
(Hamilton Spectator, Steve Arnold, Nov 12 2015)

Construction in Hamilton has topped $1 billion for the fourth straight year.

In a news release Wednesday afternoon, the city's chief building official Ed VanderWindt said the milestone was passed this month.
To the end of October the city reported sales of building permits for construction valued at more than $978.8 million. Another $21.2 million was added Nov. 9, bringing the annual total to just over $1 billion.

This is the fifth time in the past six years the city has topped the $1-billion permit mark — and there's still just over seven weeks left in the year.

Mayor Fred Eisenberger said the blistering pace of local building is a testament to the city's economic development strategy.

"A lot of it is due to business expansion and that is exactly our strategy to grow business in our community," he said. "This is exactly what we want to see."

The year-to-date numbers are still heavily weighted toward residential construction — 84.4 per cent. In fact industrial, commercial and institutional building is down more than 51 per cent for the year. Despite that, almost $230 million worth of industrial-commercial permits were sold.


Read it in full here.
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  #332  
Old Posted Nov 13, 2015, 3:45 AM
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Of course Eisenberger thinks this is all his doing? How about releasing not the unemployment rate, but, more importantly the employment rate. Hamilton has a major poverty economy, most people are just out of the system, now collecting some form of assistance, program whatever. I lived on a street downtown where everyone was on disability. The employment rate matters more.
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  #333  
Old Posted Nov 13, 2015, 8:14 PM
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How about releasing not the unemployment rate, but, more importantly the employment rate...The employment rate matters more.
As of Oct 2015, Hamilton’s participation and employment rates had dropped by 0.4% since Oct 2014 (to 63.5% and 60.0% respectively).

For comparison's sake, as of Oct 2015, Toronto’s participation and employment rates had grown by 1.7% and 1.2% respectively YOY (to 67.9% and 63.0% respectively).

Longer-term, things become a bit more stark.

In Oct 2004, Hamilton’s participation rate was 70.0%, while its employment rate was 66.2% (6.5% and 6.2% higher than Oct 2015, respectively).

In Oct 2004, Toronto’s participation rate was 69.5% and employment rate 64.3% (just 1.3% and 1.6% above Oct 2015 numbers, respectively).
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  #334  
Old Posted Dec 11, 2015, 1:40 PM
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Report predicts economic boom times ahead for Hamilton
The forecast study says the bay area’s 5.6 per cent unemployment rate will fall below five per cent in 2017.

http://www.thespec.com/news-story/61...-for-hamilton/
Hamilton Spectator
By Steve Arnold

Hamilton and the surrounding area is in for a boom of manufacturing jobs and soaring house prices over the next two years, according to a pair of new economic outlook reports.

A joint study by the Ontario Chamber of Commerce and Credit Unions of Ontario, supported by the Hamilton and Burlington chambers, predicts the Hamilton-Burlington-Grimsby area will "experience above-trend employment growth" in the next two years as the troubled manufacturing sector ends its lengthy restructuring.

"We expect some impressive economic performance from the bay area," said Helmut Pastrick, chief economist at Central 1 Credit Union. "The Hamilton area will experience ongoing growth and better growth than we experienced in 2015."

Specifically, the forecast study says the bay area's 5.6 per cent unemployment rate will fall below five per cent in 2017. That drop will be fuelled by the twin forces of more jobs and a lower labour force participation rate. A portion of the area's working age population has opted out of the workforce and this remains a problem in several parts of the country.

The report concludes manufacturing, tourism and transportation services stand to benefit from favourable external conditions such as low exchange rates while domestic sectors such as construction, real estate and retail trade will gain from low interest rates and improved economic conditions.

"This is all good news, it means all indicators are headed in the right direction," said Keanin Loomis, president of the Hamilton Chamber of Commerce. "We are seeing a real reboot of the bay area economy."

As positive as the immediate outlook is, Loomis said he firmly believes a much brighter picture will come into focus when the proposed light rail transit (LRT) system is installed.

"We are poised to really take off when LRT comes into the picture and does what it is supposed to do," he said. "Every single indicator is on an upward trend."

Improved job prospects will also boost the local real estate market.

The chamber report predicts a "slight slowing" in the rate of housing price increases here, although average prices are still expected to hit new highs. For 2015 the report predicts sales of 15,500 units, rising to 17,500 by 2017, with an average price of $500,000.

Housing sales and prices are poised to set new record highs in the Hamilton-Niagara area with a forecast of 28,000 residential units changing hands in 2017, up from the 25,000 units expected in 2015, which itself is a record high. The average residential sale price for Hamilton-Niagara is expected to hit $440,000 in 2017, up from $380,000 in 2015.

New residential construction, measured by building permits, also climbs each year in the forecast, reaching 7,000 units in 2017 — the second highest level to date.

That demand in the resale market will, in turn, stimulate new home construction. The report said the local home building industry is on track for 6,000 units this year, its highest output since 2006.

In a separate report, real estate giant Re/Max predicts people leaving Toronto seeking more affordable housing will continue to drive the local market higher.

"Hamilton's affordability relative to the Greater Toronto Area and good supply of single-family homes continued to drive demand in the region throughout 2015," the report concluded. "The average residential sale price in Hamilton rose approximately 10 per cent year-over-year to an estimated $360,275. Sales were up as well: there were 13,910 properties sold between January and October of this year, compared with 12,504 in the same period in 2014."

Brick bungalows on Hamilton Mountain priced around $350,000 were in highest demand, sought by young families and downsizers alike while in Burlington, the average residential sale price rose just over six per cent to about $573,100.

Conrad Zurini, of Re/Max Escarpment Real Estate, said much of the activity is driven by simple confidence.

"Low interest rates are a side story now. Today it's about rising confidence in the future," he said. "We're seeing employment prospects now that we haven't seen in a long time."

Those rosier job prospects are bringing millennials out of their parents' basements and into their first homes, creating the chance for others to sell and move into larger abodes.

For the future, he predicted the expansion of all-day GO service into Hamilton's east end will drive a real boom market there.

The RE/Max report found Hamilton offers a good selection of townhouses, semi-detached and fully detached homes in the $240,000 to $350,000 range. In the east end, Zurini said, it's possible today to carry a home for $1,300 a month.
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  #335  
Old Posted Dec 11, 2015, 2:57 PM
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Surprising that the article barely touches on the plunging loonie, which is often regarded as a boon for manufacturing.
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  #336  
Old Posted Dec 11, 2015, 8:13 PM
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Surprising that the article barely touches on the plunging loonie, which is often regarded as a boon for manufacturing.
Too bad we have a lot less manufacturing than we used to. A plunging loonie is a lot less positive nowadays.
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  #337  
Old Posted Dec 12, 2015, 10:48 PM
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As late as the mid ’80s, Stelco & Dofasco employed ~34,000 workers combined (~11% of Hamilton’s workforce at the time). Firestone, International Harvester, P&G, Westinghouse, Otis, Dominion Glass — all added to the sector’s employment and all vanished in the 1987-1997 period. But while it represents a proportionately smaller segment of the workforce than it once did, manufacturing is still apparently Hamilton’s leading jobs sector.

Top 10 Industries of City of Hamilton Labour Force Population Age 15 Years and Over, 2006

Manufacturing: 16.1%
Health Care & Social Assistance: 11.5%
Retail Trade: 11.2%
Construction: 6.6%
Accommodation & Food Services: 6.2%
Professional, Scientific & Technical Services: 4.8%
Administrative & Support, Waste Management & Remediation Services: 4.7%
Wholesale Trade: 4.6%
Transportation & Warehousing: 4.5%


A 2014 paper by Deloitte reported 52,400 employed in Hamilton’s manufacturing sector as of 2014, and anticipated that rising to 54,300 by 2017.
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  #338  
Old Posted Dec 12, 2015, 11:03 PM
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Historical StatsCan numbers for November across the Hamilton CMA.

2001 Labour force 365,200 | 5.6% unemployment | 65.6% participation rate | Employment rate 62.0%
2002 Labour force 376,400 | 5.5% unemployment | 66.7% participation rate | Employment rate 63.1%
2003 Labour force 391,500 | 6.1% unemployment | 69.0% participation rate | Employment rate 64.7%
2004 Labour force 397,100 | 5.5% unemployment | 69.2% participation rate | Employment rate 65.3%
2005 Labour force 389,500 | 5.4% unemployment | 67.1% participation rate | Employment rate 63.1%
2006 Labour force 385,600 | 6.0% unemployment | 65.9% participation rate | Employment rate 61.9%
2007 Labour force 391,600 | 5.8% unemployment | 66.4% participation rate | Employment rate 62.6%
2008 Labour force 391,000 | 6.3% unemployment | 65.7% participation rate | Employment rate 61.6%
2009 Labour force 405,200 | 7.8% unemployment | 67.5% participation rate | Employment rate 62.2%
2010 Labour force 397,000 | 6.4% unemployment | 65.3% participation rate | Employment rate 61.1%
2011 Labour force 407,800 | 6.4% unemployment | 66.2% participation rate | Employment rate 62.0%
2012 Labour force 398,000 | 6.1% unemployment | 63.8% participation rate | Employment rate 59.9%
2013 Labour force 395,200 | 5.9% unemployment | 62.6% participation rate | Employment rate 58.9%
2014 Labour force 403,200 | 4.7% unemployment | 63.6% participation rate | Employment rate 60.2%
2015 Labour force 408,400 | 5.6% unemployment | 63.3% participation rate | Employment rate 59.8%
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  #339  
Old Posted Feb 20, 2016, 4:46 PM
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Hamilton ready for post-Steeltown boom as loonie continues to sink
Food is the new steel, or is it art is the new steel? Whatever it is, Hamiltonians are quick to tell you they’re over Steeltown.

http://www.thespec.com/news-story/63...inues-to-sink/

The laid-off steelworker-turned-entrepreneur serves gourmet grilled cheese to former co-workers at the restaurant he opened on gentrifying Ottawa St., in the shadow of Hamilton's steel mills.

When Smith landed a job at Stelco in 2006, a year before it became the now-insolvent U.S. Steel Canada, he believed he landed a lifelong career like his father, who worked at the mill for 38 years.

"But the writing was on the wall," he said.

He was laid off within a year of the new ownership's takeover, and used Ontario's Second Career Program to go to culinary school, where he developed a business plan for his 20-year dream to open "Gorilla Cheese." His concept became Hamilton's first food truck in 2011, and a permanent part of its reinvigorated restaurant scene in November.

His story is emblematic of Hamilton's new-found narrative: the scrappy community that pulled itself up by the bootstraps to prove there is life after Steeltown.

Even as a U.S. recovery and low Canadian dollar breathe new life into the city's manufacturing sector, Hamilton is focused on diversifying the local economy away from its former dependence on heavy manufacturing, the fate of which is largely determined by global cycles beyond its control.

The port city's steel-driven manufacturing base — once the Canadian home to a who's who of industrial leaders from Westinghouse to Procter and Gamble — has shed some 25,000 jobs since 1976, as major employers lost out to new cheap global competitors amid the rise of the Canadian dollar.

"We were in desperate need of diversifying the economy and growing the economic base," said Neil Everson, City of Hamilton economic development director.

The realization came at an auspicious moment — just before the 2008-2009 recession battered the city's manufacturing sector, sending output down 16 per cent in 2009.

City hall believes that this focus on diversification is one of the major reasons Hamilton weathered the recessionary storm as well as it did, and even managed to post lower unemployment rates than the provincial or Canadian averages.

Hamilton has been rated Canada's most diverse city economy by the Conference Board of Canada, which expects it to make strides in economic growth, employment and personal income levels over the next three years.

The city's transformation away from a reliance on one dominant sector can be a lesson for oil-dependent communities that are smarting from a crude downturn, Everson said.

The principle is deceptively simple: "Don't put all your eggs in one basket."

But execution has been less easy. The public sector is the new economic driving force, and the city needs private companies to create more of that growth, Everson said. Hamilton ranked just 67th out of 121 Canadian cities on a Canadian Federation of Independent Business survey of best communities for entrepreneurship.

Steel is still the biggest private-sector employer here. Even if Hamilton's fortunes are less susceptible to the ebb and flow of the commodities market, manufacturing is still a giant piece of its economic puzzle. The sector is expected to drive municipal growth this year, as a low loonie makes Ontario-made goods cheaper and a U.S. recovery spurs demand.

The city's steel manufacturers are part of a rebound in Ontario auto part shipments to the U.S. over the past six months. ArcelorMittal Dofasco plans to hire 1,000 workers over the next three years. U.S. Steel Canada, which is mostly shuttered and has slashed its workforce, has been recalling workers in recent weeks.

National Steel Car, which makes railroad cargo containers, laid off 520 workers just before Christmas when it shut its oil tanker line due to a slowdown in orders. But 300 of those workers have been recalled to work instead on two additional freight lines where orders are picking up, partly thanks to a low dollar. It expects to have all of the workers back by March and even plans to hire.

While the City is encouraged by a rebound in it traditional manufacturing base, it is more excited about the opportunity that the low loonie provides to attract new foreign investment in the sectors it's focused on, including advanced manufacturing, life sciences and technology.

Advanced Hamilton-based manufacturers have succeeded by focusing on knowledge-based, value-added production to give them an advantage over lower-cost competitors.

A multitude of smaller players are in expansion mode, including waste water filter company Fibracast and auto parts maker Stackpole. They employ hundreds rather than thousands of people, but combined they have helped the city to more than make up the jobs lost in heavy industry.

Output from the city's manufacturing sector is expected to increase by two per cent in 2016, thanks in part to the growing food processing business, led by a Maple Leaf Foods superplant and investments from major agricultural players at the port.

Much of Hamilton's economic diversity relies on the growth of "eds and meds" sectors, a focus that is a popular route to economic development for recovering Rust Belt cities. The research-focused health care industry is now the city's biggest employer, providing some 20,000 jobs, while education is its fastest-growing sector.

The information and cultural industries, which have grown since the city became an affordable destination for artists in the 2000s, is another of the city's fastest growing sectors. The Conference Board projects that a low loonie will make it an even more attractive location for film shoots.

To passersby, Hamilton's economic renaissance has been overshadowed by the factories spewing smoke over the Burlington Skyway, clouding a transformation inside the city that Ontario's economic development minister has touted as a role model for recovery.

But now an increasing number of Toronto developers and families are ready to invest in Hamilton's skyrocketing, but much more affordable, real estate market.

"We were the city that people drove by and see the smoke stacks and went 'Oh, what a dirty city'," said Smith, sitting at a table in his little grilled cheese shop, giving a knowing smile toward the steel mills at the end of the street.

"But people from Hamilton are happy being the little kept secret because we're happy with what we've got here."

The businesses
Hamilton has more than made up for the loss of manufacturing jobs by adding to the workforce in the knowledge-based sectors it's focused on. Its average unemployment rate was 5.4 per cent in 2015, less than the average in Canada or Ontario, and it's lowest since 1976.

On the lakeshore, the Hamilton Port Authority desperately needs land to meet the growing demand for space from a steadily rising base of agribusiness customers that surround steel company lands.

"We've been almost using a shoehorn now to bring in new customers and fitting them all into the footprint we've got," said the port's vice-president Ian Hamilton.

The port has seen about $200 million in investment from agri-companies in the past five years. In addition to a sugar refinery and a new craft brewery, construction is underway for a third grain terminal and a new flour mill.

Attracting agricultural tenants was an intentional strategy by the port to offset some of the losses from shipping steel-related products it was seeing in 2007.

"We recognized we were too dependent, we just didn't recognize we were going to lose that chunk of business, that we were going to be filling this void."

Agriculture hasn't filled the entire 4 million tonne loss from the steel business, but has replaced about half.

Hamilton anticipates demand for shipping cargo to the U.S. will grow further due to the lower dollar. But he believes it will take another half a year to see the real opportunities arise.

Hamilton's port, the busiest on the Canadian side of the Great Lakes, has 130 tenants on long-term leases and just 27 acres of vacant land, compared to 200 acres in 2007. The port has expressed interest in buying at least some of the parcel of adjacent U.S. Steel land.

"That's one of our challenges now with the success is we just don't have the land to meet that demand going forward."

Here's a look at how other Hamiltonians are building the new economy:

Information technology
Waterloo doesn't own tech, said David Carter, executive director of Hamilton's Innovation Factory. But without a startup incubator of Hamilton's own, the city risked losing a lot of "interesting collisions" — with health care, advanced manufacturing and other burgeoning sectors — to the city an hour away.

The Forge incubator opened its doors in January 2015 and houses about a dozen young companies in various stages of development — from QCard, an app designed to help people with cognitive impairments remember tasks, to Chipsetter, a low-cost microchip machine for companies to make small batch circuit boards.

Hamilton may not have a RIM yet, Carter said, but "it's not hard to see a generation here that in five years will be significant employers."

Nix Sensors Inc. grew from engineering student Matthew Sheridan's house through the incubator into an eight-person team. Sheridan, now CEO, moved the company briefly to Waterloo. He had offers to move into programs in Boston and San Francisco, but decided to return to Hamilton. "There's no shortage of talent here, and definitely no shortage of community support as well."


Creative industries
Erin Dunham was always going to Toronto to eat because Hamilton had few independent restaurants where she wanted to hang out. So she opened one — and then four more. Dunham and partner Matt Kershaw own Other Bird food group, which opened Rapscallion Rogue Eatery, one of Hamilton's hottest restaurants, four years ago. Since then, their team has grown from five to 70 people.

The growth of the creative industries, spurred by an influx of artists into the city since the new millennium, has sparked a grassroots scene that has helped the city's "cool factor" she said. Art Crawl, a decentralized once-a-month art show, spawned the award-winning Supercrawl festival which now attracts more than 130,000 visitors.

"It's all very much spontaneous, it's not being centrally organized but it's all happening," said Rob Zeidler a developer who recently converted a turn-of-the- 20th-century Imperial Cotton factory into an affordable workspace hub that houses 60 artists, filmmakers and fashion designers.

"The art scene has become the symbol of the revitalization of Hamilton."

Life sciences
Hamilton's health sector is the city's biggest employer. It grew by eight per cent over the past five years. McMaster University, Hamilton Health Sciences and St. Joseph's Healthcare Hamilton have won global awards and recognition for research capabilities. The sector attracts more than $200 million in research revenue annually.

The industry's economic impact could be even greater if the group can bridge a gap between innovation, research and commercialization, said Rob MacIsaac, CEO of Hamilton Health Sciences.

The next step is to create more partnerships with the private sector, to spin off private companies to help sell products and services being developed in Hamilton around the world. There are currently about 300 life sciences companies operating within Hamilton, but a relatively small presence of multinational companies. One recent international collaboration will see Germany's Fraunhofer, Europe's largest applied research organization, partner with McMaster University to create the Biomedical Engineering and Advanced Manufacturing research facility, which will focus on regenerative medicine, cell therapies and innovative diagnostics.


Real estate
Hamilton is one of the hottest markets in the country, fuelled in part by Torontonians moving west because they're priced out of the market in the big city. Home prices in Hamilton rose by nearly 10 per cent in 2015, about the same as in Toronto. But prices are about half as much, with the average hovering around $363,000.

Vanessa Perry and her husband reluctantly moved back to the city where they grew up from Toronto three years ago, when she was pregnant with their first child. But they are converted.

"Hamilton was really starting to make a big change so on our return to Hamilton we started to see a lot more local small businesses opened up, new restaurants, condo conversions and it really just seemed like there was a whole different vibe."

Now, as a real estate agent in Hamilton, Perry serves clients in similar situations. Perry said Hamilton is starting to see an increase in bidding wars and sales of homes for above asking price. Prices in her area near Gage Park have risen nearly $100,000 in the three years they've been there.

Advanced manufacturing
ArcelorMittal Dofasco continues to hire and invest in its Hamilton harbour facility, telling a starkly different story from its competitor next door, where U.S. Steel sits mainly idle and on the verge of collapse. "Make no mistake, steel is still a very, very important economic engine in the city of Hamilton," said Sean Donnelly, president and CEO ArcelorMittal Dofasco.

The Canadian division of the global steel giant is a bright spot for the world's largest steelmaker and recently invested $120 million in a new line for advanced high strength steel for the auto and construction industries.

Still, it is the quiet local manufacturing successes like Ancaster-headquartered specialized oil pump maker Stackpole that have stepped in to fill the void left by industrial giants that, unlike Dofasco, have left the city.

The company employs about 700 people in Ancaster and is expanding its powdered metals plant by about one-third to meet current demand and plan for new business it expects to win as North American auto sales heat up. "Stackpole makes things on vehicles that I wouldn't consider to be commodity parts — that you can just buy a lot cheaper overseas. There's a lot of intellectual property involved in what we do," said Paul Bartel, general manager of the Ancaster division.
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  #340  
Old Posted Mar 2, 2016, 6:09 PM
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Can Hamilton sustain its economic transformation?
(Stoney Creek News, Kevin Werner, Feb 21 2016)

Hamilton is being touted as the poster child for how a Canadian rust-belt city can transform into a diversified economy.

But is its perceived economic success a mirage or the real thing, asks Marvin Ryder, business professor at McMaster University’s DeGroote School of Business.

After withstanding the economic and political shockwaves of the 2001 terror attacks in New York, the subsequent War on Terror, and the dislocation caused by the 2008 economic recession, Hamilton, along with the rest of Canada, is finally “turning itself around.

“I’m not sure it is inevitable we will succeed,” Ryder told about 60 people at the Stoney Creek Chamber of Commerce luncheon Feb. 18 at LIUNA Gardens.

Despite the strategy by the city’s economic development office to move beyond steel and heavy industry – especially in light of losing U.S. Steel’s Burlington plant – Hamilton’s economy remains in a precarious situation, he says.

Ryder says seven out of 10 employers remain in the public sector. And once U.S. Steel leaves the city, he says Wal-Mart will become Hamilton’s third largest private sector employer.

“Hamilton needs private sector investment,” he says.



Read it in full here.
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