GREEN

Landscaping — and lots of it. Yards, courtyards, and a secret garden. Composed of evergreen cedars, yew hedges, boxwoods, and flowering hedges.

Overview

Introducing Moda by Polygon, an iconic tower in Burnaby where artistic style and smart living converge. It is an architectural statement in the vibrant Metrotown neighbourhood that exemplifies your unique identity. Designed with the modern professional in mind, it sets a new standard for thoughtful interiors and stylish features.

Evoking a sophisticated character that celebrates the spirit of artistic expression and urban diversity, this 33-storey striking landmark redefines the skyline and lifestyle of the most sought-after address in Burnaby. Inside, the one plus den and two bedroom residences feature open-plan layouts, hotel-inspired ensuites and gourmet kitchens with sleek appliances and quartz countertops. Expansive floor-to-ceiling windows allow you to start and finish your day with sweeping panoramas of the city and surrounding parks.

Life at Moda will always be in step with the latest fashion and entertainment options. With over 450 brand name stores and services just across the street at Metropolis at Metrotown, your excitement awaits. While strolling home, a newly transformed Beresford Street impresses with friendly sidewalk cafes and intriguing public art installations. And at the centre of the community, a spectacular art wall stands proud by the doorstep of Moda, embodying the animated heartbeat of the city and illuminating inspirations.

Neighbourhood

A short drive from downtown Vancouver, Burnaby is known for its beautiful residential areas, parks, shopping and its bustling, fast-growing business, entertainment and retail centres at Metropolis at Metrotown. Dozens of major companies have moved their headquarters to Burnaby, creating a booming regional economy.

As a leading centre of quality education and post-secondary and technology research, Burnaby is home to both Simon Fraser University and the British Columbia Institute of Technology. Families love Burnaby for its green and peaceful residential neighbourhoods. Recreation opportunities abound, from hiking and mountain biking on rugged Burnaby Mountain to exploring hundreds of acres of parkland around Deer Lake and Burnaby Lake. Burnaby’s Central Park is one of BC’s largest urban parks, a favourite spot for sports activities and picnics.

Map

View Larger Map

At first blush, the River District Centre at the foot of Kerr Street looks more like a family gathering place than a real-estate marketing office. A group of moms with their infants are seated in a circle, laughing and singing. Off to one side is a kids’ library, where the wall is covered with children’s art. Nearby, a machine will take your photo, enabling you to send it as a postcard. In another area, there’s an Xbox Kinect and a screen for showing children’s movies. Everyone is welcome to drop by—there are no age restrictions.

It’s all housed in a roomy, wood-panelled building with a high ceiling overlooking a gorgeous view of the Fraser River in Southeast Vancouver.

“This is a totally different approach to real-estate marketing,” Kyra Lubell, director of community relations for River District, tells the Georgia Straight. “The other thing that is unique is we’re not selling any real estate out of this building. We’re just educating the community about the project.”

River District is one of the largest community-building exercises in the city’s history. The area formerly known as East Fraserlands encompasses 52.6 hectares along the Fraser River, between Kerr Street and Boundary Road. Once the site of the Canadian White Pine Mill, this huge chunk of land south of Marine Drive was bought by ParkLane Homes in 2003.

Lubell explains that the goal is to create a “complete community”, with an elementary and secondary school, four child-care facilities, restaurants, retail space including a grocery store, parks, office space, public plazas, and recreational amenities, all within walking distance or a short bicycle ride. ParkLane is the land developer, preparing the site. Other builders will construct 6,000 to 7,000 new homes, which will eventually house some 15,000 residents.

The most noticeable feature of the area is the Fraser River, where the occasional log boom can still be spotted near the foot of Kerr Street. In the coming years, River District will be crisscrossed with bike lanes and pedestrian walkways as part of a comprehensive effort to create a sustainable community. Inside the River District Centre, there’s a huge, dazzling, colour-coded model showing the five neighbourhoods that will be developed over the next 15 to 20 years. The tallest buildings will be around 24 storeys in the High Street area at the centre of the project, fanning out into low-rise and mid-rise condo projects, as well as some townhouse developments. There’s even a plan for short-term boat parking beside a yet-to-be-built waterfront restaurant. This will enable patrons to anchor their vessels, have lunch, then head on down the river. “It’s a neat concept if you have a boat,” Lubell says.

In addition, Lubell says that ParkLane Homes will create an island, called Sanctuary Island, near the riverfront, which will only be accessible to wildlife. It’s part of the company’s strategy to promote the revival of songbird populations.

“We’re actually located on the Pacific Flyway, which is part of their migratory route,” she states. “So what we’ve done is create different types of habitat for them. Sanctuary Island is obviously one of those areas.”

Matt Shillito, the city’s assistant director of planning, tells the Straight by phone that the goal is to create a sustainable new neighbourhood centre along the waterfront in Southeast Vancouver. “It’s to introduce new shops and services and community amenities, as well as a whole variety of different housing types, in a location where many of those things are currently lacking,” he says.

During the planning process, he heard concerns from Southeast Vancouver residents about having to drive to Champlain Mall or Burns Road whenever they want a litre of milk. That won’t be the case when River District offers those services in its High Street area, in the second phase of the development. The overall plan calls for up to 250,000 square feet of retail space and another 250,000 square feet of flex space, which could include office, institutional, or light-industrial uses.

Shillito says that all buildings will be at least LEED Gold, and there will be a district energy utility to provide heat and hot water, likely by capturing waste heat from a Metro Vancouver incinerator in Burnaby. “There’s a storm-water management strategy, so the rainwater and other water flowing down to the site will be cleaned and slowed up before it goes into the river,” he adds. “At a high level, the concept of introducing higher densities, mixed use, and a complete community on a brownfield site in the centre of the region is probably one of the biggest things we can do for reducing our greenhouse-gas emissions.”

Over the next 20 years, River District will include five neighbourhoods, restaurants, retail, and a mix of housing options.

Brent Toderian, the city’s former director of planning, tells the Straight over the phone that most communities on the suburban edge of the city are “not complete” because they don’t have sufficient density to facilitate a mix of uses. He suggests that this won’t be the case in River District, where all the homes will be either townhouses or condos.

“The intention in the long term is to have transit possibly even run along the rail tracks,” Toderian says. “There has always been the intention for it to match the city’s philosophy around walk, bike, and transit, even though it’s on the far edge of the city.”

He adds that this might be the last opportunity to buy a riverfront home in Vancouver, because Metro Vancouver and the city have already indicated their opposition to rezoning any more industrial land that isn’t in proximity to a SkyTrain station. “We have a very long river in Vancouver but not much residential development along the river, because the clear intention of the city is to preserve the majority of that river edge for job space,” he says.

ParkLane’s first development partner, Polygon Homes Ltd., is already marketing New Water, a two-building, 157-unit condominium complex on the western edge of River District, along Kerr Street. In an interview with the Straight in the Polygon marketing office on Kerr Street, the vice president of marketing, Ben Smith, says his project is competitively priced.

To elaborate, he says it’s possible to buy a condo in New Water for less than $500 per square foot, with units starting at $324,900. He suggests that this is one of the most affordable new-home options in Vancouver. He describes it as buying waterfront but not at waterfront prices.

“If you think of buying a home for under $400,000 in Vancouver, what are you going to get?” Smith says. “Here, we’re going to give you a two-bedroom home that’s 850 square feet. That’s great value for the city of Vancouver.”

River District has design guidelines to ensure the community has a certain look and feel. Smith characterizes New Water as having a “very modern West Coast aesthetic”, with a mixture of steel, brick, and timber details that play on the heritage of the site. On a tour of the display suite, he points out that the kitchens and bathrooms have quartz countertops. And Smith notes that each unit includes top-of-the-line stainless-steel appliances manufactured by Fisher & Paykel and Bosch.

In keeping with River District’s sustainability objectives, New Water includes low-flow faucets for energy efficiency and water conservation. The ground-floor units have their own gates, which will allow residents to enter and leave without going down a common walkway.

Like ParkLane, Polygon has developed some innovative marketing approaches. It has placed a couple of bicycles in the marketing area, so prospective purchasers can cycle around the neighbourhood to get a better sense of the community. When I ask Smith if he wants to hop on the bikes to check out the area, he doesn’t hesitate for a moment, even though it’s raining.

Cycling past a refurbished pier, Smith says that he often sees people hanging out there, walking their dogs, or dropping a line in the river for fish. As we move into the area known as West Fraserlands, he points out that in some apartment-rental ads, landlords have taken the name “River District” to describe this area as well. “It’s starting to have some cachet,” he comments.

Later, we pass by a huge open field that is heavily used in the summer months by beach-volleyball and ultimate players. It’s easy to notice how fresh the air is in this part of the city. “It’s because you’re by the water,” Smith says with a smile.

It’s sure to be central to Smith’s marketing pitches in the future.

Source: The Straight

Read more: http://www.vancouversun.com/gates+rapid+transit/6318395/story.html#ixzz1pUp4QIiV

Bob Rennie and Tracie MacTavish – respectively, principal and president of Rennie Marketing Systems – have been spending a lot of time in recent weeks focusing on how to best address the intense demand for the Marine Gateway project.

Some 11,000 people have already registered their interest in the 415 homes at the site at Cambie and Southwest Marine Drive.

There has been a succession of phone calls from a wide variety of potential buyers, and a steady stream of people looking at the show suites in advance viewings. When sales formally open today, it would not be a surprise if there were people lined up outside. That was once a common sight on Vancouver streets for pre-sale projects, but has become increasingly rare in recent years.

The number of people taking notice would appear to support Rennie’s take on Marine Gateway as a whole.

“It’s 900,000 square feet of space – the largest single-phase development happening right now in the city,” he says. “It’s a game changer.”

Rennie is quick to acknowledge that the key to the whole concept is access to non-car transportation methods, particularly the Canada Line.

Marine Gateway consists of a “podium” incorporating retail space and some homes, before dividing into one tower of 29 storeys and another of 38. The first half dozen floors of the building will house a major supermarket, as well as a complex of 11 movie theatres, and shopping and dining options. There will also be services such as banking. The 360-degree views – particularly into Richmond – promise to be unparalleled in the area.

Those views can be enjoyed on the oversized balconies of the homes; the City of Vancouver allowed them to be larger than normal to create more shade for floors below. That feature is part of why the project is built to the equivalent of LEED gold standards, meaning the sleek interiors also have an eco-friendly side.

The refrigerators and dishwashers in the kitchens will be concealed behind subtly grained cabinetry, while the seamless stovetop will be a breeze to clean. Little touches of luxury can be seen in the finely speckled granite of kitchen and bathroom countertops, as well as a deep soaker tub. Wide plank oak laminate flooring sweeps across living room floors. However, it’s the project’s proximity to rapid transit service, a bus loop, and bike lanes that may be its most desirable feature – particularly for younger buyers being driven by the goal of staying out of cars.

“Twenty-and 30-somethings often see car ownership and use as a bur-den,” Rennie points out. “Baby boomers grew up driving everywhere; this generation is much more aware of what that involves.”

He says residents at Marine Gate-way will be within an easy commute to both downtown Vancouver and Richmond, but their homes will have a much lower price tag, certainly com-pared to homes downtown. Half of the condos are priced at under $350,000, which will likely to be attractive to people who don’t want to pay in the neighbourhood of $1,500 a month in rent. Residents will be able to access the Canada Line without even having to step outside – they can walk directly from their front lobby, pay their fares, and get on the train at the Marine Drive station.

MacTavish says the project would not exist without the arrival of the Canada Line.

“This will create a new neighbour-hood. It’s a textbook demonstration of putting density together with transportation,” says MacTavish of the project, one of the last to be shaped by Vancouver city planner Brent Toderian before his contract was terminated. “This is what the City of Vancouver has been looking for here.”

MARINE GATEWAY

Project location: 8440 Cambie St., Vancouver

Project size: 415 homes in two joined towers, south tower 29 storeys, north tower 38 storeys Residence size: 1 bed 468 – 561 sq. ft; 1 bed + den 562 – 572 sq. ft; 2 bed 631 – 1,347 sq. ft

Prices: 1 bed from $269,900; 1 bed + den from $342,000; 2 bed from $380,900

Developer: PCI Group

Architect: Perkins + Will

Interior Design: BYU Interiors

Sales centre: 8515 Cambie Street

Hours: noon – 6 p.m., daily

Telephone: 604-322-8831

Web: www.marinegateway.com

Occupancy: Summer 2015

Sales begin: today

Marine Gateway developer PCI Group has found success before in combining housing density with desirable retail outlets and transit access. For instance, its 2009 Crossroads development at West Broadway and Cambie integrated condos with restaurants and downsized versions of big-box stores – creating a new hub just south of downtown Vancouver.

Mixed-use neighbourhoods have become increasingly popular in Greater Vancouver as a way to efficiently use expensive land, and usually develop over the course of a few years.

In contrast, Crossroads and Marine Gateway are almost “capsule” communities, their range of amenities neatly bundled together in one package, all at one go.

UBC Sociology associate professor Richard Carpiano says that whether such packages create a true feeling of neighbourhood depends on how people respond to them.

“I would say a very important factor is whether the amenities promote people getting out there and walking around. There needs to be an opportunity for residents to bump into each other as they do their errands to form a sense of community.”

Up until now, the immediate neighbourhood at Marine and Cambie has not been known as a residential one, but Carpiano notes that the development will certainly provide new residents with a pedestrian-friendly opportunity for people to dine and shop in the immediate vicinity.

“There’s no cookie-cutter, one-size-fits-all model when it comes to developing a sense of neighbourhood,” he explains. “All you can do is bring together groups of ideas and see what happens – and hope that enough planning has been done in advance to anticipate what people need and want.”

Rennie and MacTavish aren’t waiting. They’re already confidently predicting that other developers will follow where Marine Gateway has led – in future years, perhaps offering larger apartments, more luxurious homes, and townhomes for families.

For now, the sales team is trying to focus on the long list of people who already seem interested in making Marine Gateway their new neighbourhood.

Condos from $277,800
Townhomes from $399,800

Sales for Richmond’s Parc Riviera launched Oct. 22, and the project’s first phase is being marketed as the best riverfront value in the city.

The 20-acre master-planned community on the Fraser River just north of Bridgeport Road has yet to be developed, but will eventually comprise 1,000 homes. And in a bid to give the community some strong early “momentum,” says Parc Riviera sales director Greg Lowe, current pre-sale pricing has been set at less than what future pricing is anticipated to be.

“In a couple years, when it’s all here, these will not be the prices,” Lowe says. “The prices will be waterfront prices as an established community. Right now, you’re probably saving somewhere between $25,000 to $50,000 off where the prices will be in the subsequent buildings when we bring them on because it’s the initial phase. It’s discounted right now. We want to get a good start. We want to get a good momentum. We’re asking people to have some faith, and we have to reward them for that with the pricing. But it’s a very limited time offer.”

Yvonne Nakano is aware that the one-bedroom Parc Riviera condo she purchased will be a good investment if she decides not to move in, however, she bought it as a convenient and pleasant place to live. Parc Riviera is close to both the Bridgeport SkyTrain station and the Arthur Laing Bridge, making it an easy commute to her business, Sakanaya Seafood on Granville near 70th Avenue.

Because Parc Riviera is next to the river, she will be able to walk her dogs, a Pomeranian and a toy poodle, along the dike. Nakano was also attracted by the prospect of the swimming pool to be located in a dramatic glass-walled clubhouse with unobstructed views across the river to the North Shore mountains.

There will also be views of the Olympic Mountains and Mount Baker, especially from condos above the third floor. The existing buildings along River Drive are single-family homes, and much of the site will be open space with trails, community gardens, public art, water features and tennis courts, all belonging to the City of Richmond.

Condo buildings will be six or seven storeys with retail on the ground floor. There will also be town houses, with the largest number being released in this first phase. Town houses are available in three styles: garden homes, “city” homes and traditional town houses. Garden homes are one-storey ground-level residences that extend right through the building with windows on both the north and south sides. Above them are city homes, which are two levels with the bedrooms upstairs. The third, more traditional, type of town house is also two storeys, but has the main floor at ground level. The town houses fronting on River Drive will have private garages, while all the other residences will share underground parking.

The interiors reflect the higher price point of future Parc Riviera homes. Floors are engineered hardwood with a matte finish. There are two sophisticated yet peaceful colour options: the grey stain used in the display suite and a light natural wood.

Kitchens are designed for serious cooks.

The quartzite composite countertops are an inch and a quarter thick to withstand heavy chopping. The stainless steel appliances are from the restaurant-inspired GE Café series. The gas range has a long fifth burner in the centre that accommodates a griddle, and there is a second oven in place of the usual warming drawer. The Panasonic microwave oven is also a range hood that moves more air than many conventional hoods, says Lowe.

All the condos will have spacious balconies, many with dual access from the living room and master bedroom. Ground-floor homes will have patios starting at 250 square feet. Both the patios and the balconies will be surfaced with attractive and durable granite paving stones.

Parc Riviera will also have geothermal heating and cooling, being built by the geothermal division of Oris Consulting, one of the development partners; the other partner is Dava Developments. Both are established Richmond enterprises. Dava has developed numerous commercial and multi-family projects, including Residences at the River, Parc Camelot, Alderbridge Business Centre and Rivers Edge Business Park. Oris, which specializes in the revitalization of urban neighbourhoods, has previously built Alexandra Gate and the Georgie-winning London Landing in Steveston, and Oris Geothermal has built systems for the City of Richmond.

The Parc Riviera site is former industrial land bordering the established single-family Tait neighbourhood to the south. It is one of the oldest neighbourhoods in Richmond, says Lowe. “A lot of the original farming families lived here. It’s nice to allow people to come back here and enjoy it.”

PARC RIVIERA

Project location: Richmond

Project size: Initial stage is 86 condominiums in three buildings, plus 50 townhomes

Residence size: 1 bedroom, 1 bath; 2 bedrooms, 2 baths; 3 bedrooms, 2.5 baths; 617 – 1,215 sq. ft.

Prices: Condos from $277,900; townhomes from $399,900

Developer: Dava Developments and Oris Consulting

Architect: Cotter Architects

Interior Design: Portico Design Group

Sales Centre: 10111 River Drive, Richmond

Hours: Noon-5 p.m., Sat -Thurs

Telephone: 604-231-5900

Email: info www.parcriviera.ca

Completion: Townhomes summer 2013; condos fall 2013