New head office latest downtown coup

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 18/02/2004 (7940 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

THE renewal of downtown Winnipeg got another boost yesterday with the announcement of a new $15-million office building.

Construction will begin this spring on a five-storey building north of Portage Avenue at the site of the old Capitol Theatre.

When completed in the fall of 2005, the building will house 200 employees of Credit Union Central of Manitoba (CUCM), the trade association of the province’s credit unions, and Celero Solutions Inc., its provider of information technology.

The prime head-office location at 317 Donald St. will put it in the same burgeoning neighbourhood as the MTS Centre arena complex and the new Manitoba Hydro building.

Mayor Glen Murray said the planned 90,000-square-foot credit union building is a “breakthrough” in downtown development because it’s one of the first big projects that needed no financial help from the city.

Murray noted that it took thousands of dollars from the city to lure a&b sound, Giant Tiger and Mountain Equipment Co-op downtown.

“Now we have a fully private investment with no government assistance going in there on its own with a quality office development with no help from the public sector, which is where we wanted to be,” he said.

“It’s a wonderful announcement,” said Annitta Stenning, chief administrative officer for the City of Winnipeg. “Any time you enter into new construction, it adds jobs, excitement and investment in Winnipeg.”

Ron Margolis, president and chief executive officer of CentreVenture Development Corp., the city’s downtown development agency, was equally upbeat. He said the credit union building is another significant step in the rebirth of the Portage and Donald intersection.

On the south side of Portage, on the former Eaton’s site between Hargrave and Donald streets, the MTS Centre is under construction and should be open by this November.

On the north side, Mountain Equipment Co-op and a&b sound made retrofits of derelict buildings a few years ago.

On Portage across from Portage Place mall, a new 400,000-square-foot Manitoba Hydro headquarters building is scheduled to open in 2006 and house up to 2,000 employees.

“If you turn back the clock five years, that area was pretty sad,” Margolis said in an interview. “What a complete turnaround for an important and very visible part of downtown.”

He said the building represents the biggest office project since the 102,000-square-foot Revenue Canada office was built on Broadway in 1993.

Shindico Realty Inc., which took over the former Capitol theatre site from CentreVenture last April, will own the building. Bob Downs, development manager for Shindico, said his firm made a “huge” financial commitment to meet the needs of CUCM and Celero, agreeing to provide state-of-the-art infrastructure for its technological needs, including backup power.

Downs said the two companies will occupy about 70 per cent of the space, and he expects the remainder will be fully committed to four to six other tenants by the time the building opens.

Garth Manness, CEO of CUCM, said his association looked at 18 possible sites around town, including in suburban areas, before choosing the Donald Street lot, which the Capitol occupied until it was demolished in 2000.

“We’ve been in the same space since 1977. Celero has expanded significantly over the past five years, so we were bursting at the seams,” he said in an interview.

Manness noted CUCM preferred to locate downtown, but its biggest consideration was finding the right property to suit its needs.

“The fact we ended up downtown and part of all the construction activity is a positive component of our ultimate decision,” he said.

He noted the move also reflects the growth of credit unions in the province. He said credit union membership is nearly 500,000, and Manitoba’s 57 credit unions have assets of $8.26 billion, up from fewer than 400,000 members and less than $4.75 billion in assets five years ago.

Wayne Pratt, president of Colliers Pratt McGarry, which acted as the tenancy representative for CUCM, said the addition of 90,000 square feet of high-quality office space is a positive development for the downtown market.

“It’s good to have an option or two for larger-space occupancies. We’re a little short in having viable alternatives for anybody greater than 20,000 square feet in size,” he said.

Pratt said he hadn’t heard of any plans to backfill CUCM’s existing space, but is confident it will be absorbed “in a reasonable period of time.”

geoff.kirbyson@freepress.mb.ca