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Ideas to improve city housing
Letter to Editor
Hey, Cranbrook – well done!
Chatter from some people in the know is that some big empty lots and buildings have been sold or come available. Will we finally, finally be getting some low and middle income housing?
Here’s what’s happening:
* The empty grocery store at the corner of Baker Street and 11th Avenue downtown has been sold! Wow, what will go in there? Commercial space and loft apartments above?
* The empty lot next to Save-On Foods at Victoria Avenue and 6th Street, North has been sold! Perfect for apartments if you ask me. In the meantime, stop piling dirty, contaminated snow there where it melts right into Joseph Creek! (Talk about overburdening the creek and jeopardizing fish stocks!)
* The original bank building housing Cranbrook Photo and Dr. Jewett et al’s office is up for sale. Oh, please won’t someone buy it, keep it as a heritage building and turn it into a beautiful boutique hotel? It’s right on the highway and would be so visible to people travelling and, it leads to them to enter our downtown area. Please?
Some may question the idea of a hotel because of the noise and the neighbours. (Yes, I’ve heard that.) But honestly, I’ve been all around the world and some of the best hotels big and small are near train stations, highways, and economically-diverse neighbours. They are doing good business, why can’t we? So, that argument just doesn’t wash with me. Yes, yes a heritage, boutique hotel on the corner of Baker Street and 8th Avenue, S. in the old bank building. Call it the Bank Boutique or something that incorporates the heritage? What do you think?
* College of the Rockies, if you are listening, may I make a suggestion? Now is the time to turn the Gold Creek Campus into student housing: shipping container student housing. Have you seen the great results for this in Holland and elsewhere? Fabulous, cutting edge student residents from shipping containers. Come on, you can do this. That land is yours – bequeathed to the college, I believe.
Of course, these are just my ideas; my opinion. If you are not a politician, please share yours, won’t you? ‘Love to hear what ‘the people’ are interested in.
Melodie Hull,
Cranbrook
