Craigflower and Tillicum corner and recent changes

There have been a couple of smaller developments near the corner of Tillicum and Craigflower.    It strikes me that there is the potential for a village centre to come about in this area.

The two newest developments are certainly a step up in quality for the area.

The one is a four story condo development on Tillicum called Gorge Hill.  Since my kids go to Esquimalt High and I do a lot of shopping at the Real Canadian Wholesale Store, I pass this location a lot.  The development seems to have had some trouble selling out even though it only has 12 units.  It has been quite a while since it has been done and it has been sitting at four units for sale for ages.

The ground floor offers one small commercial space which has been rented by a hair salon 

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This is the location of the Gorge Hill condo

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This is looking at the location that is now Stratford Place.  Most of the houses on Craigflower look well past their best before date and the apartments built in the 1970s have awful street profiles.

The second new development is Stratford Place at 934 Craigflower.   It has recently been completed and the units are now for sale, though it does not look like any of they have sold.  People have been able to move in as of December 1st.

There are 13 units in the development and all of them are three floors tall and have three bedrooms.

The units range in size from 1246 square feet to 1741 square feet and are on the market for $449,000 to $539,000

I like the brownstone look of the place, it makes for a nice streetscape.   It makes Craigflower a much nicer place to walk.  That said, I am not certain if these will be successful in this area.   Neither development seems to be moving quickly.   I think the area needs at least a few more comparable developments.  The obvious location for this would be the building on north west corner of Tillicum and Craigflower and the crappy commercial development just to the west of there.

There is also some interesting potential with the area to the north Craigflower even a bit further west.   There is effectively a service road in the area.   Giving up that road to someone willing to redevelop the area would allow for something more interesting to be constructed along the road, ideally with some decent commercial space.