A win for downtown

The Chase Valley Group's plan for a large multipurpose, multi-storey building for Front Street will be a bonus for our downtown. Much of Tuesday night's session of Penticton city council dealt with the building that will offer a mix of retail and office space, plus 16 rental apartments inside. The outside is expected to be finished in concrete, wood, stone and glass. It will be open for business before Christmas 2018.

The artists’ rendering, published on Page 1 of today’s Herald, looks beautiful.

Much of council’s debate was devoted to the lack of parking which is an ongoing issue. It's easy to suggest everyone get out and walk but our concern is the existing merchants. Hopefully they're not hurt by a shortage of accessible and free on-street parking.

Also of note was the historic and cool look of all the old buildings on Front Street. It is indeed a historic neighbourhood and one of the last remaining of its kind. This new building, along with another new development, will be located closer to Lakeshore Drive than Backstreet Boulevard and it shouldn't stick out.

What we now have is an empty parking lot, once home of Slack Alice's Show Pub which burned to the ground in 2012. For those who forgot, the view inside Slack’s was more attractive than the outside of the building.

As Coun. Campbell Watt correctly said in an interview with The Herald, $10 million is going to be invested in our community. The developers, all locals, want to build an attractive building on a lot that’s been vacant for seven years. It sounds like a pretty good deal.

—James Miller

Front Street development improves an empty lot