Posted Jan 29, 2015, 9:01 PM
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Join Date: May 2012
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Project partners Rudi Spallacci, right, and Ted Valeri with an architect's
rendering of all five phases of the Royal Connaught development.
- Source
Turning the corner: Royal Connaught’s renaissance begins
By Steve Arnold
Hammers are hammering and saws are sawing as construction work finally gets underway on the revival of the Royal Connaught.
The developers who will turn the downtown dowager from a long-abandoned hotel into a new condo tower cleared the final city planning hurdles at the end of December and started work on the project this week.
"We are finally able to start our revival of this historic building," developer Rudi Spallacci said in an interview Wednesday. "We are going to bring this building into the modern age."
Spallacci and partner Ted Valeri were part of a group that purchased the former hotel in 2004 and later became the sole owners.
Their plan calls for 700 condo units on the site built in multiple phases involving the old hotel and in three new towers on the site. The units will range between 555 and 1,060 square feet and sell for between $242,990 and $420,900. The condos are named after Hamilton streets including York, MacNab, Aberdeen, Queenston, Sherman and Victoria.
Sales began last June and about 80 per cent of the 122 units in the first phase have already been sold. The full plan also calls for 13,000 square feet of retail space in the area of King and Catharine streets.
The first phase build will focus on the western portion of the Connaught property, originally built in 1946. Those are expected to be ready for occupancy in the middle of next year. Presales of units in the eastern part of the building originally built in 1916 will start soon.
Spallacci and Valeri both believe the revival of the Connaught will be the spark that ignites a broader rebirth of Hamilton's core.
"I think we're on the brink of the transformation of downtown Hamilton," Valeri said. "Hopefully this is going to kick-start everything else."
They're already seeing signs of that revival.
"There's already a flowering of activity around us," Valeri said. "The real estate around us is being sold and rented. It's like people have been waiting for this project for the last 20 years."
Glen Norton, the city's director of urban renewal, agrees the Connaught's revival is already sparking new life.
"The fact they're moving ahead with a viable plan and built a sales centre in the lobby gave people the confidence to make decisions about properties downtown," he said.
As examples, he notes plans to turn the former Hamilton Spectator building across the street from the Connaught into a Ping-Pong bar, shared workspace and rooftop garden facility, work to revive the former Joe Buttinsky's pub, and the arrival of a new Coffee Culture store in a city building on King Street.
"Decisions are being made and stores are investing in the storefronts," Norton said. "I take these all as signs that people are confident the Connaught project is moving ahead."
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