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Look what they're putting up next to the Diplomat Motel (6 images)

A new affordable-housing building to be built at 860 Queen Street East will have residential apartments on the ground floor, even though that's not allowed at other downtown Queen Street locations.

A Toronto-area developer/ property manager is planning to add 20 affordable-housing apartments in a new building on Queen Street.

Edgecon Inc. of Markham, Ontario intends to build a three-storey apartment building at 860 Queen Street East, former home of a Shell gasoline station and more recently, Dan's Custom Repair.

Dan's Customer Repair has recently moved to 68 Metig Street, Batchewana First Nation, and the former Queen Street garage will be demolished to make room for the new apartments.

Zoning changes to allow the development were approved last week by Sault Ste. Marie City Council.

All of the units will be single-bedroom apartments.

Seven parking spaces (five of them barrier-free) will be provided on the property, all accessible from Towers Street.

Fourteen additional spaces will be available in the underground parking garage on the adjacent Diplomat Motel property at 844 Queen Street East, which is owned by the same developer.

As SooToday reported last November, the Diplomat property is currently being renovated into 10 apartments.

Doug Leask from the Sault office of consulting engineers WSP Canada Inc. represented the new construction project at City Council last week.

Leask confirmed there will be apartments on the main floor at 860 Queen.

The city's zoning bylaw doesn't allow main-floor apartments downtown but an exception is being made for this project.

"In this particular case, the building is being set back," said Don McConnell, the city's planning director.

"It is part of the interface between the commercial area and the residential area," McConnell said.

"It's set back from the road and the front of the building is used for service rooms and for recreation rooms. There won't actually be somebody in their living room looking out at Queen Street."

"There are living-room windows on the other three sides of the buildings, but not directly onto Queen Street. With the setback and the landscaping proposed, it should work quite well. It's a very well-designed building," McConnell said.

City planner Peter Tonazzo said the new brick building has been designed to complement the adjacent Algonquin Hotel, a designated heritage building.

"Appropriate landscaping will be provided along the Pim and Queen Street frontages which will also serve to fill in and round out this prominent corner," Tonazzo said.


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David Helwig

About the Author: David Helwig

David Helwig's journalism career spans seven decades beginning in the 1960s. His work has been recognized with national and international awards.
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