Two 20-storey towers on Grande Allée among city’s housing surge

Peter Black, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

peterblack@qctonline.com

The city administration is accelerating approvals of 18 residential projects in many sectors of the city, including two towers on Grande Allée, aimed at addressing what it identifies as a looming housing crisis.

Armed with statistics showing significant population growth in the coming years, Mayor Bruno Marchand announced at a May 20 news conference the fast-tracking of construction that will create some 2,850 housing units.

The projects are to receive approval from city council over the next two council meetings, and be under construction over the next year. Some 420 of the units are to be designated social housing.

Marchand, making the announcement at the Videotron Centre, said, “The housing crisis in Quebec City requires us to make a major push for housing creation, not only to meet current needs, but also to anticipate future needs.”

A chart contained in a presentation at the news conference showed the city’s population grew by 40,000 people over the past three years, an increase of 2.4 per cent.

Coun. Marie-Pierre Boucher, executive committee member responsible for housing, said Bill 31, which gives municipalities the power to ignore some regulations to encourage the construction of housing, also allows the city to “require construction conditions that ensure a distinctive architectural quality as well as the implementation of innovative and sustainable features, among other things, in terms of development, mobility and planning.”

She said the units being jump-started, after negotiations with developers, are part of the city’s grand plan for housing, which aims to build 80,000 new units by 2040.

Part of the criteria for approval of the projects was their proximity to urban transit services, including the proposed tramway.

Of the 18 projects, with a total estimated value of $819 million, the one destined to create the most units is that planned for 3155 Chemin des Quatre-Bourgeois, a site now occupied by a deconsecrated church, where a 401-unit structure is to be built.

Two of the projects are on Grande Allée, and both of them have controversial aspects. One of them will be a new building on what is now an empty lot on the corner of Rue de l’Amérique-Française and kitty-corner from the Hôtel Le Concorde. The long-deconsecrated Saint-Coeur- de-Marie church had been on the site since 1920 until it was demolished in 2019 due to its deteriorating condition.

The property owners, Société Immobilière Lessard, had proposed several residential projects for the prime location, but the city refused each as being too high for that site. The developers’ latest proposal, a nine-storey parking garage, was also rejected, and the stalemate ended up in the courts.

Now the city has dropped its opposition to height restrictions for the site and will authorize a 20-storey residential building which could be under construction as of next year. The building would contain 200 residential units, according to the city.

Loïk Lessard, president of the development company, declined to comment on the project pending a public consultation session scheduled for June 16. All 18 projects will be presented to the public over the coming weeks, with details available on the city’s website.

A few blocks west, the city is prepared to approve a 10-storey addition to the new 11-storey apartment building at 155 Grande Allée Est, adding 74 units to the existing 150 units.

According to a building resident who did not want to comment publicly, the developers, Bilodeau Immobilier, informed tenants of the impending project at a recent meeting. A request to the company for comment had not been answered as of press time.

Bilodeau also owns the building behind the Grande Allée property, the Montmorency, as well as several other rental buildings around the city. The company recently purchased the Catholic diocese’s property on Boul. René-Lévesque with plans for a residential complex.

The city’s acceleration of these particular housing projects did not receive unanimous plaudits. Transition Québec leader and mayoral candidate Jackie Smith, the councillor for the Limoilou district, said Marchand had “sold his soul to developers.”

Official Opposition and Québec d’abord leader, mayoral candidate and councillor for the Maizerets-Lairet district Claude Villeneuve said the jump-started housing initiative smelled of “pre-election panic.”

Marchand denied charges of “giving the keys to the city to developers.” He said, “If cities start building housing themselves, it is a financial disaster. This is not our level of expertise, this is not our level of competence. We must work with people who have this level of competence and who take the risks.”