Gene Dub has applied to Edmonton city council to tweak the zoning at the former Charles Camsell hospital.
It’s hard to know whether this is good news or bad news.
For 21 years, Inglewood residents have been staring at a behemoth eyesore in the centre of their neighbourhood.
The hospital was vacant for eight years before Dub, the architect and former city councillor, bought the 4.7-hectare site from the province for $3.6 million back in 2004.
Dub and his investors planned to redevelop the area — east of St. Albert Trail and west of 127 Street, between 115 Avenue and 113 Avenue — into a mix of townhouses, condos and seniors facilities, with 594 units of housing.
It never happened, despite city approval.
Revised plans
On July 10, council will consider Dub’s revised plans for the site.
He wants to rezone the far end of the site, the 0.65 hectares that lie south of 114 Avenue. In his original plan, that land was reserved for lower-density housing, no more than two storeys high.
Dub now wants to increase the density on that site to hold 128 units. And he wants to raise the maximum height to four storeys.
Dub didn’t return my phone calls Wednesday. But city planner Laurie Moulton said Dub told the city he hopes to sell off the south parcel, or work with a partner, to build a condo or seniors’ housing.
You can see the logic. Work on the hospital has been slow and cripplingly expensive, thanks to asbestos removal.
Depressing mess
Meanwhile, the south parcel is a greenfield site. It would be relatively straightforward to build something fresh there. Then, perhaps, Dub could use the revenue to underwrite the laborious hospital work at the northern end of the site.
Frankly, it would have made more sense for Dub to do that in the first place. But he didn’t. Instead, he picked apart the old hospital, and left the site a depressing mess.
In May 2010, Dub assured me the asbestos was almost gone and would all removed by the end of that year.
“We’re going to go ahead like gangbusters,” he told me.
In November 2013, Dub assured me asbestos removal was “three-quarters done.” He was going to apply for a development permit in a few weeks, he told me, and start construction in the summer of 2014.
In April 2016, Dub told my colleague Bill Mah that development permits were in hand and construction about to begin.
“What makes it different this time around is it seems that the work is done,” Dub said then. “Before, we had never gotten this close.”
It’s like Zeno’s paradox. Dub gets closer and closer and closer, but he never actually arrives.
At a standstill
Jill Brighton, an Inglewood resident and community volunteer, said Dub’s crews installed some new windows in the hospital recently, which raised hopes that something was happening. Now, she said, all work appears to be at a standstill.
Brighton said she’s wouldn’t object to raising the maximum height at the south end of the development to four storeys. But she doesn’t love the notion of Dub developing the south end first, while the hospital hulk sits. She’s rather he finished what he started, first.
“People who live next to that big ugly thing have been looking at it for more than 20 years.”
I understand her argument. And I wonder who would want to buy a unit in a new condo with a view of a derelict hospital. Still, if this rezoning could actually jump-start work on the site as a whole, maybe it would be worth it.
But Dub has city council over a barrel. Councillors have no way to make sure he really goes through with his latest promises, even if they grant him the new zoning he’s asking for.
And if they don’t grant it? Well, then, we’re no further ahead.
I don’t know if the hospital is haunted — though many have claimed it is.
I don’t know if it is cursed.
I don’t believe in ghosts. Or curses.
But you could hardly blame Inglewood residents — or Gene Dub — if they did.
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