Delta landowners and developers who stand to gain from better access to Richmond and Vancouver are applauding the B.C. government’s September 20 commitment to build a bridge to replace the 54-year-old George Massey Tunnel.
“The whole real estate picture south of the Fraser River for residential, industrial and commercial properties has been dramatically changed for the better with the announcement of the new bridge,” said Century Group CEO Sean Hodgins.
Construction of the bridge is slated to start in 2017.
Century Group owns 538 acres of land in Delta’s Southlands district that it wants to redevelop by building 950 homes on 105 acres and ceding the remaining 433 to the Corporation of Delta for agriculture or forest. Its rezoning proposal is set to go before council later in October.
Better access to Delta is expected to be the tide that will lift all boats.
Aside from land owners, the Delta and Tsawwassen First Nation (TFN) municipal governments will benefit because their tax rates for services are often based on land values, said retail developer and Property Development Group (PDG) chairman Lawrence Rank.
PDG is building part of what is set to be B.C.’s largest shopping complex when it opens in 2015.
The shopping mecca on TFN land will include Ivanhoe Cambridge’s 1.2 million-square-foot enclosed Tsawwassen Mills mall and PDG’s 600,000-square-foot adjacent outdoor Tsawwassen Commons mall.
Both developers shelled out an undisclosed sum for their pre-paid 99-year lease with the TFN.
Rank expects that the greater access created by the future bridge will draw more shoppers, which will attract more tenants and drive up rents.
The TFN will also benefit from higher lease rates it will charge developers to build 1,800 homes on TFN territory in the next 25 years.
“Improvements to the transportation corridor to and from Tsawwassen is critical to our growth and development,” TFN chief Bryce Williams told BIV.
The connection of the bridge to the South Fraser Perimeter Road could also fuel demand for industrial tenants.
Dayhu Group of Companies COO Paul Tilbury said his company’s under-construction Boundary Bay Industrial Park will benefit from better access.
He added that the company is seeking tenants for a 440,000-square-foot building that could be split into four units or kept whole for a single tenant.
“Tenants traditionally look at location first and foremost,” he said. “The Boundary Bay Industrial Park is close to the container port in Delta, to the South Fraser Perimeter Road and Highway 91. So the improvements that will come from a bridge will help answer a lot of the initial needs.”
Agricultural land reserve (ALR) properties are also expected to rise in value yet remain less expensive than land outside the reserve because ALR land can’t be used for commercial or residential purposes.
That could increase developer pressure to remove land from the ALR, although Delta mayor Lois Jackson said such attempts are unlikely to be successful.
“We have thought long and hard about how to keep our agricultural land,” she said. “That won’t change.” •
