February 23, 2006
Daily News
Local News, Thursday, February 23, 2006, p.4
Stephen Bornais
Dartmouth - Take a good look at downtown Dartmouth, because you may not recognize it in a few years.
Curious residents of the City of Lakes came out last night for a public information session, to get details on a gaggle of projects that would dramatically alter the face of the 250-year-old community.
They got to speak to the people behind everything from "daylighting" a now-buried river running through the downtown to those proposing the $300-million King's Wharf residential development on the former Dartmouth Marine Slips.
Dartmouth resident Gerald Cosgrove said the extent of the plans reminds him of what Vancouver did in turning an old harbourside industrial site into the stunning grounds for Expo 86.
"It's took 25 years, but Vancouver has done a beautiful job," he said. "I may not be around to see Dartmouth's completed, but this is a start."
Tim Olive, executive director of the Downtown Dartmouth Business Commission, said the city is in for big changes over the next decade.
"Residents won't recognize it," he said.
Francis Fares, president of Fares Real Estate Inc., said the King's Wharf project - with 1,100 residential units and a large retail centre on the water's edge - is just part of a remaking of Dartmouth's entire waterfront.
"This is overdue," Fares said. "We saw the potential in Dartmouth; that's why we choose this piece of property."
The Shubenacadie Canal Commission wants to make part of Dartmouth's future a celebration of its past. The commission is proposing to bring back a portion of Sawmill River, the stream that ran alongside the old canal in the 1800s.
The stream was channelled into a pipe more than 40 years ago and now runs out of sight beneath the city's downtown.
Bernie Hart, the commission's executive director, said daylighting the old stream is part of a larger project to create a park stretching from Sullivans Pond to the waterfront.
The information session shows that the various groups are trying to co-ordinate their efforts, said Bill Campbell, vice-president of the Waterfront Development Corp. Ltd.
"Everyone who is working ... in the downtown and along the waterfront, is talking."