New player in race for Falls’ tallest building
Developers want to build matching hotel towers
When Ralph Terrio and Hunter Milborne announced they had bought the Niagara Falls Aviary and Michael’s Inn hotel buildings three months ago, they were coy about their future plans.
Now those plans are public — and they’re big.
Niagara Falls city council was set to vote Tuesday night on a zoning bylaw amendment that would clear the way for two hotel towers where the aviary and Michael’s Inn currently sit on either side of Hiram St. facing River Rd.
The towers would be 60 and 61 storeys, making them the tallest two buildings in Niagara Falls and the tallest hotel towers in Canada.
Alex Herlovitch, the city’s director of planning, said city staff is recommending council allow the project to move forward.
“We support the development because it meets the intent of the official plan and represents good land use,” Herlovitch said. “We feel it will create an iconic feature within the skyline, which our policies call for.”
According to the proposal, the .86-acre property the aviary sits on would house a 60-storey, 222- metre- tall hotel with 488 suites in it. The Michael’s Inn property, which is just under two acres, would house a 61 =-storey, 229- metre- tall hotel with 478 suites.
Both properties would have on-site parking and a pedestrian bridge over Hiram St. would connect the two buildings. There would also be a service tunnel under the street.
The front of the buildings would be rounded going to a point in the back and they would be nearly identical. The city and developers, however, are avoiding the use of the term “twin towers” because of what happened to the World Trade Centre buildings on 9/11.
The two sites are already zoned tourist commercial, but under the existing zoning bylaws, new construction is limited to 12 storeys unless special permission is granted by city council.
Developments given t he green light to build higher than the 12-storey limit are required to make a payment to the city based on 5% of the total construction cost of any floors above 30 stories.
The total project costs are believed to be in the hundreds of millions of dollars, and Herlovitch said the payment to the city has been worked out to about $4.28 million.
“It has to go back to community facilities. We’ve collected it a couple of times. One of the contributions was used for the Gale Centre and the other was used for the Olympic Torch Trail along the old railway corridor,” he said.
Larry Vann, who owns the Bird Kingdom inside the Niagara Falls Aviary, said Tuesday afternoon he supports the project and believes his business will have a home inside the new development.
“We’re supportive of the idea. The bird aviary would stay here, which would be good for Niagara Falls,” he said. But not everyone is in favour. Some area residents have expressed their concerns about the project.
“We would probably move and so would our neighbours,” said Kathy Phillips, who has lived on John St. across from Michael’s Inn for 17 years.
“Going so high up, it’s just too much. They’ve taken away the view as much as they can around here as it is.”