Development will bring shops, public spaces and refurbish heritage mansion that has been home to CHCH TV
A $360-million, large-scale condo project planned for downtown Hamilton is promising a major boost to the city’s urban renewal efforts.
Television City, a residential and retail community to be built on a one-acre site downtown Hamilton’s 163 Jackson St. W. — home to CHCH TV station — is the project of Toronto’s Lamb Development Corp., in partnership with Movengo Developments.
The enterprise will consist of 618 condominium units in two connected towers that will be 30- and 40-plus storeys tall. The heritage Pinehurst Mansion will remain on site and be preserved.
Brad Lamb, CEO of Lamb Development Corp., has built projects in Toronto, Ottawa, Calgary and Edmonton and now says he’s excited about Hamilton’s potential. For years, he’s been making annual overnight visits to the city to take in the arts, food and development scene.
He says that about two years ago he noticed the city, forged on an industrial past shaped by the steel industry, begin to develop a new identity as a creative and tech start-up centre. Home prices in Hamilton were up by 17.4 per cent in the first quarter of 2017 over last year; the average home price is just over $450,000.
“Hamilton is cool,” says Lamb. “The people who live there knew it, I knew it and now a lot of people from the outside are saying it’s cool.”
Restaurateur Michael Cipollo agrees. “The city has a lot of hip, cool professional people with new ways of thinking and that’s really what’s driving Hamilton.”
Cipollo, 42, who spent 14 years working as a chef for Toronto’s Bier Markt, wanted out of the corporate restaurant world to start his own business. So he and wife Paula opened a gourmet burger and craft beer restaurant, Hambrgr, in downtown Hamilton two years ago and moved there with their three sons. They have since opened a second Hambrgr and another downtown restaurant, Fsh & Chp.
https://www.thestar.com/life/homes/2017/06/24/hamiltons-television-city-brings-new-downtown-condos.html