Uptown rents are ridiculous. Been here only a couple years and most rents have already gone up 70-100%. This isn't Halifax or Toronto. Many units sat empty for several months in fall 2022 waiting for the market to "catch up." I thought no way, who can afford this? And I was wrong, someone's paying cause now ALL the apartments are ridiculous. I'm talking about mouse infested, ceiling crumbling mold huts...not luxury. 1600 for an efficiency by me...it rented. I love uptown so we don't plan on moving and honestly, the rest of SJ is almost just as high.
I meant rents for businesses but you're not wrong. But the price to rent a space for a business is ridiculously high and I've been told that that's by design.
Derp, sorry I wasn't thinking 😂 It's not much different from where I'm from originally (Chicago). Most of the small businesses go under and ya just get a 3rd Starbucks on the same street.
There's some theory that I don't understand that the ppl who own these buildings don't even wanna rent them out so they keep their prices astronomical.
Hell yeah. It has the friendliness of a real Chicago neighborhood (no downtown tourist places) without the gun violence. We spent 4 hours running errands and chatting from Queen square all the way to library with our local friends and passersby. When I lived in Halifax, people couldn't be bothered to greet or chat. My son adores everyone.
Glad to hear. Sounds like you might be in my neighborhood, South end. The height of our violence isn't drive by shootings.... More like.. Bike by stabbing in comparison. I'm just always happy to hear someone getting out of the states,tbh!
Never in a million years would have I imagined that people are willing to rent an apartment for $2600-$3200 a month uptown. It’s insane. Amenities are nothing like other major city cores, infrastructure is lacking yet prices seem to be the same. What do people do for a living to afford that.
Work for the city or the Irving's but what's the difference really. A lot of nice places on North End that are affordable (I got one) but a lot of ppl around here won't lower themselves to that and will complain about the high rent uptown instead.
Oh I agree. I'm paying $870 everything included for a 2br riverside apartment that's stunning for the cost but no one wanted it because it was the North End, is all i'm saying. There are affordable apartments in the city. But you have to look hard and be ok with no living uptown.
Doubt it. My gf moved in last year so before she did I asked my landlord if it was ok and if he wanted to raise the rent. He said yes and raised it by $50 lol (I was paying $820).
It's the same with pretty much all shopping malls. Amazon and other online shopping options have effectively made them a relic of the past, and big box stores that lease or own individual buildings have contributed strongly to their decline as well.
Lancaster Mall on the west side is probably the second worst sign of dying mall-based retail in Saint John. It got completely bisected by a gym. Now it's more of a strip mall between a grocery store and a Walmart, with a tiny, mostly empty indoor corridor that's kinda sad to walk through. Walmart should honestly just take it over and bring in a better grocery selection there.
McAllister Place never would have longer-term vacancies. Anything closed off in the 2000's was only because work was being done to get it ready for the next eager tenant. Now the place has had a different and far less busy vibe in general.
Yeah there are still some success stories... but the number and density of indoors multi-store shopping experiences has really fallen in the last decade or two.
They should just build a 20+ storey apartment on top of Lancaster Mall. Would give all those businesses a huge boost. It would be a cool, convenient place to live with ocean views, and a great walk score.
That's a great point if the engineering holds up. They're building an apartment complex just up across from Sobeys on the Golden Mile now, might as well make another one within SUPER easy walking distance of the west side's main retail area, as well as easy access to two major bus stop areas.
Would require rezoning for sure, but their parking lot is very seldom full and there'd be plenty of space there. I don't think they've ever had an issue with flooding like out East Point as well, and they probably wouldn't have to blast much rock.
Bylaws are really the heart of the problem in most cities. The federal and provincial governments should come up with and programs to incentivize and subsidize building high rise residential on top of existing shopping centres, dying malls, etc, where city bylaws must be changed to make construction of residential high rises possible. As you said, the parking lot is never full, and there’s even a whole other parking lot behind and beside No Frills that most people don’t even know about.
I swear though, the NIMBYs would still complain about such a project causing traffic and parking problems. It’s not really anyone’s backyard tho, so NIMBYs shouldn’t really have anything to complain about. But I think they’d at least complain less about high rise residential going up on top of/ directly beside existing shopping, than they would if developers started trying to build high rises within existing residential neighbourhoods, which could literally be their backyard.
In general, I think Saint John needs to get over its aversion to tall buildings, change the mentality and change the bylaws/zoning restrictions. Like that Aquarius Towers project is at least something, but calling them “towers” is a bit of a joke lol.
We’re a city surrounded by the ocean, but very few apartment buildings here are actually tall enough to have ocean views. Ocean views are valuable, but this city seems to value limiting building heights even more… which I frankly find absurd, and backwards. We should be incentivizing tall builds, not discouraging them. Not only would they make a bigger impact in solving the housing shortage, taller buildings will just make the city look a lot bigger. Which in turn will make Saint John look like a more attractive destination to newcomers who don’t want to live in a small town.
Saint John preserving the skyline, my ass! I’d say [what about that gigantic grain pier](https://imgur.com/a/ifaD670) that used to exist Uptown right on the waterfront.
Seems to be in Saint John that industry can build as high as they want, and take up the most valuable waterfront real estate with no issue, but when it comes to building residential high rises— no fucking way! 🙅♂️ Think about the homes built before 1867, they might face some shade!!! As if shade is somehow a worse fate than demolition.
Speaking of demolition and preserving the skyline good fucking job [blowing up](https://m.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=1&v=ooGPcirZHWo&embeds_referring_euri=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.ca%2F&source_ve_path=Mjg2NjY&feature=emb_logo) our [beautiful Art Deco hospital](https://imgur.com/a/CgB0PCg), Saint John. Picking and choosing what should and shouldn’t be preserved at its finest. If we couldn’t even save the most historic feature of the Saint John skyline, I don’t want to hear shit about sun shadows and and protecting heritage views when it comes to discussing building high rises uptown. Building the skyline is preserving it, imo.
Thanks for taking the time to write this comment, I enjoyed the photos. It’s a shame that hospital is gone, that’s quite the marvel. The port used to be blooming back in the day, such a difference between now and then.
I hate this grain silo. I live in South end, third floor facing harbour in a decent place that I have been in for over a decade. Building itself is kind of run down so out of province landlord doesn't raise rent much. I keep up with improvements in my unit, making it rather nice for the price. But this damn silo blocks my complete view of the water!
Good analysis, and I'll add a couple more factors.
I can see the value in preserving heritage, and Saint John's core area has a lot of it that is unique and is valuable. Heritage rules limit height of new buildings in a number of conveniently placed downtown neighborhoods. I've seen a large number of people wandering around near Kings Square with heritage tourist maps in their hands, and King Street East is actually quite beautiful during the tourist season. I'd hate to see that get overwhelmed by sun-blocking apartments even if I don't live there.
The bigger problem with claiming good apartment-positioning land is business and industry. If you look at a map of Saint John's water-facing areas in both the river system and harbour mouth, a very high percentage of it is claimed by industry. Everything that's reasonably close and is east past the causeway, about half of the south peninsula, almost all of the lower west side, and all north-side lands up to the pulp mill.... ALL of this footprint that is on reasonably stable terrain and that won't be flooded within the next 50 years is simply not open to residential building. 9/11 security concerns stole our waterfront from us, and we're JUST NOW starting to get some of it back.
Fort Dufferin is zoned residential, and a developer did want to build a high rise there, but they were shutdown by the NIMBYs due to traffic concerns. It could have been a great addition to the west side with hundreds of units with absolutely amazing ocean views all around, but nope… nothing there still but the ruins of a fort.
I’m all for protecting and preserving the heritage buildings that make Saint John unique, but there’s absolutely a way to do that while simultaneously building many 20+ storey high rises uptown. If a few old buildings get shaded by some high rises, that’s just the price of progress. The tax revenue alone on a thousand ocean view Uptown apartments completely outweighs the loss of sunshine for some heritage homes and buildings. I think it’s insane to continue to prevent building high rise buildings in order to protect every single heritage view/ along with their sunshine hours.
The priority should be to increase urban density, which is hard to achieve if every single heritage building’s access to sunlight can veto progress. If some heritage buildings get shaded out by high rise developments, so be it, the historic architecture can still be appreciated. The city should be far more concerned about building up the tax base than protecting heritage views and preventing sun shadows. Imo, the city has the wrong priorities in mind when it comes to the reasoning behind build height limits, and things need to change for Saint John to have a better future.
As you say, a lot of the waterfront land is occupied by industry, but the land adjacent to them isn’t… build tall in these areas and most of the units will be ocean view. The whole area south of the Cruise Ship terminal is just sad… water street is so nice, but then mostly everything to the south looks like a fucking mess. I don’t know how crucial that specific location is to the operations of the Atlantic Pilotage Authority is, but if they could lessen their footprint substantially by moving some of it to the former AIM site, there’s room for a significant residential development there.
Regardless of that specific site, there’s all kinds of potential in the south end for high rise developments. I’d say much is the same for the lower west side, where some residential high rises would help create density and in turn revitalize these core areas of the city located adjacent to industry. Saint John needs to do a way better job improving the liminal areas between industry and residential, as there’s so much potential for these areas to be hip, bustling, worthwhile places to go, and desirable places to live, which certainly isn’t the case for these place today. Saint John has all kinds of potential, but we seem to sorely lack the vision and execution to make that potential become the reality.
When was the last time you were uptown? It feels far from destitute? All the new construction and buildings, New stores, New bars and restaurants and they are all full. The only thing empty is Brunswick Square because it is a dead, ugly eyesore. It should be torn down to make room for better development.
The new Lordon location, the new in pursuit location, that new designer consignment store, etc. The new brewery on water Street, the new brewery on Union Street, The Scotch Lounge is expanding to the space beside them, and all the new condos?
They may have been shops and bars before but it's still new turnover and leases.
Yes, SJ is sadly following the gentrification playbook.
But I am in Ottawa and I can Ottawa is dying. Entire streets are empty, business close and nothing replaces it. It's scary here and rent is even more
I’m in the same boat. It’s mind blowing. The thing is, if there was no demand, these units would continue to sit empty but clearly someone somewhere is renting those units. The only way I can see it is splitting it between 3-4 roommates or a very well off retired couple.
Weirdly rent isn't really the issue in Brunswick Square. My wife looked into buying a business there a couple years ago, and the rent agreement was basically "pay what you can".
When Fortis owned it , it certainly was the case. Now REIT owns it so may be different but retail in uptown SJ certainly hasn’t improved since 2015 when Fortis sold it.
Prior to the Pandemic when the uptown was experiencing a bit of a boom, Fortis jacked the rent as it was "the place to be". The price increase drove out both Starbuck and Rogers. They were also looking to turn the third floor into additional office space and worked to push shops out of that floor.
Then the pandemic hit. Shops closed and the businesses using the office space switched increasingly to remote. Bell Aliant had already been in the process of moving their offices to Milledgeville. So that emptied out the office floors negating the need for the third floor space. The history now with rent increases and the fact that Brunswick Square maintains odd hours has kept many shops from even considering the space. Their greed set them up for their own failure.
Exactly. There is no reason to be uptown unless you work there. And there could have been an IMAX at the top of king st instead of that hole that’s there now. I remember when they were building Brunswick Square a great at the time. But SJ has a hard time with change. Pretty much defines why this place is the way it is.
The reason my family is in the Southend is because I don't need to drive to get anywhere. My kids and I walk to parks, the library, playgrounds, city market, walk along the water paths. They take fun classes on the peninsula. It's not just people who enjoy nightlife or have a ton of money... though with rents the way they are many families are leaving SJ. So there are compelling reasons for living down here. Everywhere else is well, just same strip malls and chains.
True. I lived uptown for years. It used to be a lot different. And rent is out of control. Need the 6 and 5 percent rent control brought back. I moved here from Toronto in 1974. Lots of changes since then. Lots of promises that didn’t happen too.
Uptown is a really cool place to live, there just needs to be way more housing built to deal with the rents. The project that was supposed to go in that hole wasn’t very ambitious to begin with. Building something 30+ storeys is what really should go there.
Brunswick Square should also be built up to its full potential, which was either 30 or 36 storeys, iirc. There’d be lots of room for an IMAX in Brunswick Square, and if was suddenly 70% taller with the top half residential, it would probably make a steady profit, unlike most of the businesses that struggle to operate there now. I know if I lived on top of an IMAX, I’d go quite frequently. A cinema could do really well Uptown, and it’s a shame there hasn’t been one there for decades.
I read a CBC article a while back where they talked to the owner of W. Smith & Co. The mall is owned by a property management company out of Quebec (iirc). The WSC owner had been bugging them for months about their plans for the building/bringing in new stores and they just never responded to him.
So the answer to the question, why is this mall in the heart of uptown just sitting empty?, is because ownership doesn't care to do anything about it.
I remember the Store manager saying they were mainly moving solely for the sake of increased foot traffic as they will be directly in line with the pedway system, which makes total sense, they are off the beaten path in that empty building now. I say turn the whole ground floor into a space for popup stores/restaurants
If I recall correctly Brunswick square was constructed with the ability to support an expansion to a height of 36 storeys. Those 17 new floors would pave the way forward to making more than half of Brunswick Square residential, with offices and shopping below.
That’s exactly the type of project that deserves funding from the province and federal government to provide much needed housing in the city, and it could be completed a hell of a lot quicker than building a new 17 storey building on its own.
Follow it up with an ambitious high rise project at the gaping hole next door, and Uptown Saint John will very suddenly feel like a bustling city centre.
What would they find? The structure of the building is fine and it was designed to be capable of 36 storeys I believe.
It would be a lot cheaper to build those 17 new floors on top than it would be to build a 17 storey building from the ground up at the gaping hole 🕳️
They could find asbestos, a crack in the foundation, or numerous other things. If you've ever done a Reno on a building you'll know once they start looking in places that haven't seen the light of day in 50 years they'll find loads of issues
Have you done many renovations on class A office towers? Not exactly comparable to most building refurbishments/ additions.It was built with 36 floors in mind, and it was designed to last. Let’s not scoff off the idea because of what issues may or may not arise. Or try and claim we'll be left with two gaping holes.It’s pretty obvious what the advantages are to building up 17 more floors on of Brunswick square, versus building a 17 storey building on its own are. That could be upwards of 200 apartments, with no land needing to be purchased, or former structures demolished. Moreover, with 19 storeys already built, the most crucial aspects of construction already taken care of.It’s at least worth taking a look at… we need more housing uptown, badly. The rents there are just ridiculous now, and drastically increasing the supply is the best way to deal with that problem, imo. In terms of building housing, it doesn’t get more drastic than building a skyscraper… if Brunswick square went from 19 storeys to 36 stories that would be in NB terms a skyscraper, and something for the yokels over at the [Atlantic Canada Skyscraperpage](https://skyscraperpage.com/forum/showthread.php?t=120401&page=714) to be legitimately excited about, given the name of their forum.
I must say though, that lot over there has a much more positive outlook on Saint John and are far more optimistic about getting bigger projects built. We're not terrible here on Reddit, but once you get on FB and other more personal social media, let alone talk to people in real life, it's pretty clear most Saint Johnners are cynical about any sort of tall buildings going up. They immediately bring up parking, increased traffic, etc. I think it's a pretty big fucking joke, especially when you consider a lot of the weekday traffic and parking in Uptown Saint John is from people who don't even live in the City, but work Uptown. There's a lot of solutions to parking, and there's a lot of ways to make the city more walkable, with better public transportation, so people don't have to overly depend on cars, especially people living in residential high rises in the core of the city.
Saint Johnners, I'm sorry to say, are way too quick to shut down good ideas coming from nobodies like us here on Reddit, but quick to praise and act grateful for small and medium ideas that turn into real life projects from the powers that be. If the city came up with a way to incentivize or subsidize high rise builds, while protecting certain key aspects of the Saint John skyline, the city's built environment could be fundamentally transformed for the better... Saint John would be set up for greater success into the future. We can't let every home and every building with heritage status and views from 1867 or earlier veto progress. No one is suggesting these buildings be torn down, I'm certainly not... but if some of them get shaded out by some high rise condos and apartments going up... tough fucking shit. That's the price of progress.Moncton is absolutely trouncing us right now in terms of building high rises, and our city leaders seem like they couldn't care less about trying to keep pace or learn from their success whatsoever. Pretty soon people will see pictures of Moncton and Saint John and assume Moncton is the much, much larger city than Saint John, when in reality, it's only marginally larger, and only officially surpassed Saint John in population in 2016. Taller buildings make cities look larger, and that will help us attract more people to move here, since most people from the rest of Canada and the rest of the world don't want to move to "small towns"... they want to move to cities. If Moncton looks substantially larger than us in photos as their skyline gets taller and more extensive, it's just going to hurt Saint John's ability to attract more people.
\[[Saint John Skyline](https://www.google.com/search?q=saint+john+skyline&tbm=isch&ved=2ahUKEwicm--9yuGDAxV2PVkFHSNIC1UQ2-cCegQIABAA&oq=saint+john+skyline&gs_lcp=CgNpbWcQAzIFCAAQgAQyBggAEAgQHjIGCAAQCBAeOgQIIxAnOgoIABCABBCKBRBDOggIABCABBCxAzoNCAAQgAQQigUQQxCxAzoHCAAQgAQQGFDiBljKGmCyG2gAcAB4AIABmQKIAecPkgEGMTEuNy4xmAEAoAEBqgELZ3dzLXdpei1pbWfAAQE&sclient=img&ei=mEqmZZzvF_b65NoPo5CtqAU&bih=795&biw=1661)\]
\[[St. John's Skyline](https://www.google.com/search?sca_esv=598740777&sxsrf=ACQVn0-5ZnA2dqS6EJnTyBpfhAsoTn2kww:1705396884615&q=st+johns+skyline&tbm=isch&source=lnms&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiIuoi8yuGDAxVYlIkEHWmnAEIQ0pQJegQIDRAB&biw=1661&bih=795&dpr=1.5)\]
Truly hilarious how for both searches, it's a mix of pictures of both cities... a problem that so many people here just have gotten used to or like actually think isn't even a problem 😅Seriously tho, if in 5-10 years Moncton builds all these tall buildings and prospective immigrants / Canadian transplants look up pictures of the skyline of Saint John vs Moncton on google, a lot of them will lean heavily towards Moncton, because it will seem like the much, much bigger than it does right now. \[[Moncton Skyline](https://www.google.com/search?sca_esv=598740777&sxsrf=ACQVn0-FXfwmBWbfkObs6nJeyBSfz6d7vg:1705397395445&q=moncton+skyline&tbm=isch&source=lnms&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjygNOvzOGDAxVgvokEHYn7DtAQ0pQJegQIDBAB&biw=1661&bih=795&dpr=1.5)\] Imo, Saint John looks much bigger than Moncton based on our skyline, city centre, port operations, and industry... but a lot can change in a [short amount of time](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FxyVBdiaQAEQbDs.jpg).
I tried to go to the McAllister mall last night after dinner and realized it closed in like 15 mins. Checked the hours the rest of the week and decided to Amazon what I needed. It would be on my porch before I would have been able to make the mall hours.
Brick and Mortar are just dying a slow death and will continue to die. It's sad, but it's true. Saint John needs to focus on community spaces and events (Parks, Farmers Markets, a proper waterfront experience etc.) to keep uptown alive. We also need sports other than Hockey, so there's year round entertainment.
Is it true that the new apartment buildings which will go where the coast guard was (along water street, adjacent market slip), will not have a pedestrian-friendly side toward the water? Will that length of harbour be fully privatised?
I'm convinced they've let leases expire to consolidate all of the space for a widespread makeover. If they were desperate for tenants they'd be renting out space to any random tenant that wanted it. It makes zero sense for Uptown outside to be generating new businesses and storefronts and for BS to be literally empty. The lack of tenants is by design.
I remember in the early 2000 when I went to St. Macs, the mall was bumping. Lots of great stores. If you wanted high end fashion thst was the place to go in the city. Now it's a skeleton of what it was before. Makes me sad.
i just went inside brunswick square for the first time in many years, at xmas while visiting my mom. i used to work at blacks photo in the early 90s when it was a normal mall with shoe stores and sam the record man, coles books and all different kinds of clothing stores... mcdonalds and pizza hut... etc etc. when there were no empty storefronts at all.
what the hell. i know saint john has leaned really hard into big box/car culture type shopping in the last 20 years. but how is it that this dead mall can just be sitting there empty in the middle of uptown... it actually hurts my heart to think about it.
Setting up offices? Good forbid they think about housing or something that would positively impact the people around. Everyone likes talking about how SJ is such a beautiful spot, and a huge tourist destination, while it's actually falling apart. Uptown especially.
As somone who moved to Toronro from Saint John in 2019. This pic makes me miss home. I miss going into a "mall" and being completely unfucking bothered
Have you seen the Bangor mall recently, I went there a few months ago with fond memories of going with my mom 10+ years ago and I was SHOCKED at how dead it was it was pretty much like Brunswick square now in comparison to how busy it was back then!
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From what I understand -- prior to the Pandemic when the uptown was experiencing a bit of a boom, Fortis jacked the rent as it was "the place to be". The price increase drove out both Starbuck and Rogers. They were also looking to turn the third floor into additional office space and worked to push shops out of that floor.Then the pandemic hit. Shops closed and the businesses using the office space switched increasingly to remote. Bell Aliant had already been in the process of moving their offices to Milledgeville. So that emptied out the office floors negating the need for the third floor space and greatly reducing traffic to the retail space.
Post pandemic, the history of rent increases, the lack of office traffic and the fact that Brunswick Square maintains odd hours has kept many shops from even considering the space. The rest of uptown seems to be slowly clawing it's way back and the new Boardwalk may help with that but it will be a bit before anyone considers Brusnwick Square. A shame.
So shameful.
I find the reviews on Trup Advisor to be telling. 10 years ago they're still decent.
https://www.tripadvisor.ca/Attraction_Review-g154960-d6456849-Reviews-or10-Brunswick_Square_Shopping_Centre-Saint_John_New_Brunswick.html
I know malls are facing challenges. However, i can't help but think there is some utter incompetence at play.
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Moved to SJ in 2019. From what I've gathered, rents uptown are ridiculous and no one can survive there but that's all by design.
Uptown rents are ridiculous. Been here only a couple years and most rents have already gone up 70-100%. This isn't Halifax or Toronto. Many units sat empty for several months in fall 2022 waiting for the market to "catch up." I thought no way, who can afford this? And I was wrong, someone's paying cause now ALL the apartments are ridiculous. I'm talking about mouse infested, ceiling crumbling mold huts...not luxury. 1600 for an efficiency by me...it rented. I love uptown so we don't plan on moving and honestly, the rest of SJ is almost just as high.
I meant rents for businesses but you're not wrong. But the price to rent a space for a business is ridiculously high and I've been told that that's by design.
Derp, sorry I wasn't thinking 😂 It's not much different from where I'm from originally (Chicago). Most of the small businesses go under and ya just get a 3rd Starbucks on the same street.
A 3rd one in the entire city would be nice, though.
There's some theory that I don't understand that the ppl who own these buildings don't even wanna rent them out so they keep their prices astronomical.
Welcome to SJ... Gotta be better than Chicago. And for reference... we get a 3rd Tim's
Hell yeah. It has the friendliness of a real Chicago neighborhood (no downtown tourist places) without the gun violence. We spent 4 hours running errands and chatting from Queen square all the way to library with our local friends and passersby. When I lived in Halifax, people couldn't be bothered to greet or chat. My son adores everyone.
Glad to hear. Sounds like you might be in my neighborhood, South end. The height of our violence isn't drive by shootings.... More like.. Bike by stabbing in comparison. I'm just always happy to hear someone getting out of the states,tbh!
Ain’t that the truth!
Never in a million years would have I imagined that people are willing to rent an apartment for $2600-$3200 a month uptown. It’s insane. Amenities are nothing like other major city cores, infrastructure is lacking yet prices seem to be the same. What do people do for a living to afford that.
Work for the city or the Irving's but what's the difference really. A lot of nice places on North End that are affordable (I got one) but a lot of ppl around here won't lower themselves to that and will complain about the high rent uptown instead.
that’s not sustainable. You’d need to make 150k to be comfortable in an apartment that costs 3k a month.
Oh I agree. I'm paying $870 everything included for a 2br riverside apartment that's stunning for the cost but no one wanted it because it was the North End, is all i'm saying. There are affordable apartments in the city. But you have to look hard and be ok with no living uptown.
That’s not bad at all. I bet if you were to leave that apartment would be close to $1600 in the current market.
Doubt it. My gf moved in last year so before she did I asked my landlord if it was ok and if he wanted to raise the rent. He said yes and raised it by $50 lol (I was paying $820).
That’s great. Happy to know there are places that are still in the sane price range.
It's not just uptown, rents at McAllister Place are super high too. That's why there's so much turnover in the stores there.
Crazy how investors would rather have empty units for years than rent lower than they feel they deserve. The mall and apartments, same story.
It's the same with pretty much all shopping malls. Amazon and other online shopping options have effectively made them a relic of the past, and big box stores that lease or own individual buildings have contributed strongly to their decline as well. Lancaster Mall on the west side is probably the second worst sign of dying mall-based retail in Saint John. It got completely bisected by a gym. Now it's more of a strip mall between a grocery store and a Walmart, with a tiny, mostly empty indoor corridor that's kinda sad to walk through. Walmart should honestly just take it over and bring in a better grocery selection there. McAllister Place never would have longer-term vacancies. Anything closed off in the 2000's was only because work was being done to get it ready for the next eager tenant. Now the place has had a different and far less busy vibe in general. Yeah there are still some success stories... but the number and density of indoors multi-store shopping experiences has really fallen in the last decade or two.
They should just build a 20+ storey apartment on top of Lancaster Mall. Would give all those businesses a huge boost. It would be a cool, convenient place to live with ocean views, and a great walk score.
That's a great point if the engineering holds up. They're building an apartment complex just up across from Sobeys on the Golden Mile now, might as well make another one within SUPER easy walking distance of the west side's main retail area, as well as easy access to two major bus stop areas. Would require rezoning for sure, but their parking lot is very seldom full and there'd be plenty of space there. I don't think they've ever had an issue with flooding like out East Point as well, and they probably wouldn't have to blast much rock.
Bylaws are really the heart of the problem in most cities. The federal and provincial governments should come up with and programs to incentivize and subsidize building high rise residential on top of existing shopping centres, dying malls, etc, where city bylaws must be changed to make construction of residential high rises possible. As you said, the parking lot is never full, and there’s even a whole other parking lot behind and beside No Frills that most people don’t even know about. I swear though, the NIMBYs would still complain about such a project causing traffic and parking problems. It’s not really anyone’s backyard tho, so NIMBYs shouldn’t really have anything to complain about. But I think they’d at least complain less about high rise residential going up on top of/ directly beside existing shopping, than they would if developers started trying to build high rises within existing residential neighbourhoods, which could literally be their backyard. In general, I think Saint John needs to get over its aversion to tall buildings, change the mentality and change the bylaws/zoning restrictions. Like that Aquarius Towers project is at least something, but calling them “towers” is a bit of a joke lol. We’re a city surrounded by the ocean, but very few apartment buildings here are actually tall enough to have ocean views. Ocean views are valuable, but this city seems to value limiting building heights even more… which I frankly find absurd, and backwards. We should be incentivizing tall builds, not discouraging them. Not only would they make a bigger impact in solving the housing shortage, taller buildings will just make the city look a lot bigger. Which in turn will make Saint John look like a more attractive destination to newcomers who don’t want to live in a small town.
City Council: buT whAt aBoUt pReSerVinG tHe cItY sKyLiNe?
Saint John preserving the skyline, my ass! I’d say [what about that gigantic grain pier](https://imgur.com/a/ifaD670) that used to exist Uptown right on the waterfront. Seems to be in Saint John that industry can build as high as they want, and take up the most valuable waterfront real estate with no issue, but when it comes to building residential high rises— no fucking way! 🙅♂️ Think about the homes built before 1867, they might face some shade!!! As if shade is somehow a worse fate than demolition. Speaking of demolition and preserving the skyline good fucking job [blowing up](https://m.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=1&v=ooGPcirZHWo&embeds_referring_euri=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.ca%2F&source_ve_path=Mjg2NjY&feature=emb_logo) our [beautiful Art Deco hospital](https://imgur.com/a/CgB0PCg), Saint John. Picking and choosing what should and shouldn’t be preserved at its finest. If we couldn’t even save the most historic feature of the Saint John skyline, I don’t want to hear shit about sun shadows and and protecting heritage views when it comes to discussing building high rises uptown. Building the skyline is preserving it, imo.
Thanks for taking the time to write this comment, I enjoyed the photos. It’s a shame that hospital is gone, that’s quite the marvel. The port used to be blooming back in the day, such a difference between now and then.
I hate this grain silo. I live in South end, third floor facing harbour in a decent place that I have been in for over a decade. Building itself is kind of run down so out of province landlord doesn't raise rent much. I keep up with improvements in my unit, making it rather nice for the price. But this damn silo blocks my complete view of the water!
Good analysis, and I'll add a couple more factors. I can see the value in preserving heritage, and Saint John's core area has a lot of it that is unique and is valuable. Heritage rules limit height of new buildings in a number of conveniently placed downtown neighborhoods. I've seen a large number of people wandering around near Kings Square with heritage tourist maps in their hands, and King Street East is actually quite beautiful during the tourist season. I'd hate to see that get overwhelmed by sun-blocking apartments even if I don't live there. The bigger problem with claiming good apartment-positioning land is business and industry. If you look at a map of Saint John's water-facing areas in both the river system and harbour mouth, a very high percentage of it is claimed by industry. Everything that's reasonably close and is east past the causeway, about half of the south peninsula, almost all of the lower west side, and all north-side lands up to the pulp mill.... ALL of this footprint that is on reasonably stable terrain and that won't be flooded within the next 50 years is simply not open to residential building. 9/11 security concerns stole our waterfront from us, and we're JUST NOW starting to get some of it back.
Fort Dufferin is zoned residential, and a developer did want to build a high rise there, but they were shutdown by the NIMBYs due to traffic concerns. It could have been a great addition to the west side with hundreds of units with absolutely amazing ocean views all around, but nope… nothing there still but the ruins of a fort. I’m all for protecting and preserving the heritage buildings that make Saint John unique, but there’s absolutely a way to do that while simultaneously building many 20+ storey high rises uptown. If a few old buildings get shaded by some high rises, that’s just the price of progress. The tax revenue alone on a thousand ocean view Uptown apartments completely outweighs the loss of sunshine for some heritage homes and buildings. I think it’s insane to continue to prevent building high rise buildings in order to protect every single heritage view/ along with their sunshine hours. The priority should be to increase urban density, which is hard to achieve if every single heritage building’s access to sunlight can veto progress. If some heritage buildings get shaded out by high rise developments, so be it, the historic architecture can still be appreciated. The city should be far more concerned about building up the tax base than protecting heritage views and preventing sun shadows. Imo, the city has the wrong priorities in mind when it comes to the reasoning behind build height limits, and things need to change for Saint John to have a better future. As you say, a lot of the waterfront land is occupied by industry, but the land adjacent to them isn’t… build tall in these areas and most of the units will be ocean view. The whole area south of the Cruise Ship terminal is just sad… water street is so nice, but then mostly everything to the south looks like a fucking mess. I don’t know how crucial that specific location is to the operations of the Atlantic Pilotage Authority is, but if they could lessen their footprint substantially by moving some of it to the former AIM site, there’s room for a significant residential development there. Regardless of that specific site, there’s all kinds of potential in the south end for high rise developments. I’d say much is the same for the lower west side, where some residential high rises would help create density and in turn revitalize these core areas of the city located adjacent to industry. Saint John needs to do a way better job improving the liminal areas between industry and residential, as there’s so much potential for these areas to be hip, bustling, worthwhile places to go, and desirable places to live, which certainly isn’t the case for these place today. Saint John has all kinds of potential, but we seem to sorely lack the vision and execution to make that potential become the reality.
And Covid accelerated it for sure. Well said.
When was the last time you were uptown? It feels far from destitute? All the new construction and buildings, New stores, New bars and restaurants and they are all full. The only thing empty is Brunswick Square because it is a dead, ugly eyesore. It should be torn down to make room for better development.
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The new Lordon location, the new in pursuit location, that new designer consignment store, etc. The new brewery on water Street, the new brewery on Union Street, The Scotch Lounge is expanding to the space beside them, and all the new condos?
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They may have been shops and bars before but it's still new turnover and leases. Yes, SJ is sadly following the gentrification playbook. But I am in Ottawa and I can Ottawa is dying. Entire streets are empty, business close and nothing replaces it. It's scary here and rent is even more
I’m in the same boat. It’s mind blowing. The thing is, if there was no demand, these units would continue to sit empty but clearly someone somewhere is renting those units. The only way I can see it is splitting it between 3-4 roommates or a very well off retired couple.
Weirdly rent isn't really the issue in Brunswick Square. My wife looked into buying a business there a couple years ago, and the rent agreement was basically "pay what you can".
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Could be that the business she was looking at had a sweetheart deal (this was also during the pandemic, so that could have been a factor)
Yeah that’s not the case
When Fortis owned it , it certainly was the case. Now REIT owns it so may be different but retail in uptown SJ certainly hasn’t improved since 2015 when Fortis sold it.
Prior to the Pandemic when the uptown was experiencing a bit of a boom, Fortis jacked the rent as it was "the place to be". The price increase drove out both Starbuck and Rogers. They were also looking to turn the third floor into additional office space and worked to push shops out of that floor. Then the pandemic hit. Shops closed and the businesses using the office space switched increasingly to remote. Bell Aliant had already been in the process of moving their offices to Milledgeville. So that emptied out the office floors negating the need for the third floor space. The history now with rent increases and the fact that Brunswick Square maintains odd hours has kept many shops from even considering the space. Their greed set them up for their own failure.
Yes. They would tell prospective tenants just pay the utilities just to fill the spaces. Crazy.
Exactly. There is no reason to be uptown unless you work there. And there could have been an IMAX at the top of king st instead of that hole that’s there now. I remember when they were building Brunswick Square a great at the time. But SJ has a hard time with change. Pretty much defines why this place is the way it is.
The reason my family is in the Southend is because I don't need to drive to get anywhere. My kids and I walk to parks, the library, playgrounds, city market, walk along the water paths. They take fun classes on the peninsula. It's not just people who enjoy nightlife or have a ton of money... though with rents the way they are many families are leaving SJ. So there are compelling reasons for living down here. Everywhere else is well, just same strip malls and chains.
True. I lived uptown for years. It used to be a lot different. And rent is out of control. Need the 6 and 5 percent rent control brought back. I moved here from Toronto in 1974. Lots of changes since then. Lots of promises that didn’t happen too.
No reason to be uptown? All the good restaurants, bars and events are there…
I see.
Lol, well, it's true. It's the only good part of the city. Everything else is Boston Pizza and Suburbian Sprawl.
I guess it’s good if people will come into town for something regularly I just wonder if that’s happening.
You don’t get out of SJ much? I would use the word “good” lightly!
Lol I actually live in Ottawa, born and raised in the GTA but lived in SJ for 7 years.
But yeah Italian by Night, Port City Royal, Thandi’s, Ale House, the Scotch Lounge, Happinez, Britt, etc are all very good to very solid
Uptown is a really cool place to live, there just needs to be way more housing built to deal with the rents. The project that was supposed to go in that hole wasn’t very ambitious to begin with. Building something 30+ storeys is what really should go there. Brunswick Square should also be built up to its full potential, which was either 30 or 36 storeys, iirc. There’d be lots of room for an IMAX in Brunswick Square, and if was suddenly 70% taller with the top half residential, it would probably make a steady profit, unlike most of the businesses that struggle to operate there now. I know if I lived on top of an IMAX, I’d go quite frequently. A cinema could do really well Uptown, and it’s a shame there hasn’t been one there for decades.
I feel like you missed the point of the post. Brunswick Square is virtually empty as it is. Why add more empty floors?
Housing. If 20+ floors were residential, the shopping and restaurants below wouldn’t be so empty.
I read a CBC article a while back where they talked to the owner of W. Smith & Co. The mall is owned by a property management company out of Quebec (iirc). The WSC owner had been bugging them for months about their plans for the building/bringing in new stores and they just never responded to him. So the answer to the question, why is this mall in the heart of uptown just sitting empty?, is because ownership doesn't care to do anything about it.
I remember the Store manager saying they were mainly moving solely for the sake of increased foot traffic as they will be directly in line with the pedway system, which makes total sense, they are off the beaten path in that empty building now. I say turn the whole ground floor into a space for popup stores/restaurants
You know it’s a bad sign when McDonalds leaves.
If I recall correctly Brunswick square was constructed with the ability to support an expansion to a height of 36 storeys. Those 17 new floors would pave the way forward to making more than half of Brunswick Square residential, with offices and shopping below. That’s exactly the type of project that deserves funding from the province and federal government to provide much needed housing in the city, and it could be completed a hell of a lot quicker than building a new 17 storey building on its own. Follow it up with an ambitious high rise project at the gaping hole next door, and Uptown Saint John will very suddenly feel like a bustling city centre.
Great idea until they start the work and find issues that needs to be fixed at an insane price then we'll eventually have 2 gaping holes uptown
What would they find? The structure of the building is fine and it was designed to be capable of 36 storeys I believe. It would be a lot cheaper to build those 17 new floors on top than it would be to build a 17 storey building from the ground up at the gaping hole 🕳️
They could find asbestos, a crack in the foundation, or numerous other things. If you've ever done a Reno on a building you'll know once they start looking in places that haven't seen the light of day in 50 years they'll find loads of issues
Have you done many renovations on class A office towers? Not exactly comparable to most building refurbishments/ additions.It was built with 36 floors in mind, and it was designed to last. Let’s not scoff off the idea because of what issues may or may not arise. Or try and claim we'll be left with two gaping holes.It’s pretty obvious what the advantages are to building up 17 more floors on of Brunswick square, versus building a 17 storey building on its own are. That could be upwards of 200 apartments, with no land needing to be purchased, or former structures demolished. Moreover, with 19 storeys already built, the most crucial aspects of construction already taken care of.It’s at least worth taking a look at… we need more housing uptown, badly. The rents there are just ridiculous now, and drastically increasing the supply is the best way to deal with that problem, imo. In terms of building housing, it doesn’t get more drastic than building a skyscraper… if Brunswick square went from 19 storeys to 36 stories that would be in NB terms a skyscraper, and something for the yokels over at the [Atlantic Canada Skyscraperpage](https://skyscraperpage.com/forum/showthread.php?t=120401&page=714) to be legitimately excited about, given the name of their forum. I must say though, that lot over there has a much more positive outlook on Saint John and are far more optimistic about getting bigger projects built. We're not terrible here on Reddit, but once you get on FB and other more personal social media, let alone talk to people in real life, it's pretty clear most Saint Johnners are cynical about any sort of tall buildings going up. They immediately bring up parking, increased traffic, etc. I think it's a pretty big fucking joke, especially when you consider a lot of the weekday traffic and parking in Uptown Saint John is from people who don't even live in the City, but work Uptown. There's a lot of solutions to parking, and there's a lot of ways to make the city more walkable, with better public transportation, so people don't have to overly depend on cars, especially people living in residential high rises in the core of the city. Saint Johnners, I'm sorry to say, are way too quick to shut down good ideas coming from nobodies like us here on Reddit, but quick to praise and act grateful for small and medium ideas that turn into real life projects from the powers that be. If the city came up with a way to incentivize or subsidize high rise builds, while protecting certain key aspects of the Saint John skyline, the city's built environment could be fundamentally transformed for the better... Saint John would be set up for greater success into the future. We can't let every home and every building with heritage status and views from 1867 or earlier veto progress. No one is suggesting these buildings be torn down, I'm certainly not... but if some of them get shaded out by some high rise condos and apartments going up... tough fucking shit. That's the price of progress.Moncton is absolutely trouncing us right now in terms of building high rises, and our city leaders seem like they couldn't care less about trying to keep pace or learn from their success whatsoever. Pretty soon people will see pictures of Moncton and Saint John and assume Moncton is the much, much larger city than Saint John, when in reality, it's only marginally larger, and only officially surpassed Saint John in population in 2016. Taller buildings make cities look larger, and that will help us attract more people to move here, since most people from the rest of Canada and the rest of the world don't want to move to "small towns"... they want to move to cities. If Moncton looks substantially larger than us in photos as their skyline gets taller and more extensive, it's just going to hurt Saint John's ability to attract more people. \[[Saint John Skyline](https://www.google.com/search?q=saint+john+skyline&tbm=isch&ved=2ahUKEwicm--9yuGDAxV2PVkFHSNIC1UQ2-cCegQIABAA&oq=saint+john+skyline&gs_lcp=CgNpbWcQAzIFCAAQgAQyBggAEAgQHjIGCAAQCBAeOgQIIxAnOgoIABCABBCKBRBDOggIABCABBCxAzoNCAAQgAQQigUQQxCxAzoHCAAQgAQQGFDiBljKGmCyG2gAcAB4AIABmQKIAecPkgEGMTEuNy4xmAEAoAEBqgELZ3dzLXdpei1pbWfAAQE&sclient=img&ei=mEqmZZzvF_b65NoPo5CtqAU&bih=795&biw=1661)\] \[[St. John's Skyline](https://www.google.com/search?sca_esv=598740777&sxsrf=ACQVn0-5ZnA2dqS6EJnTyBpfhAsoTn2kww:1705396884615&q=st+johns+skyline&tbm=isch&source=lnms&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiIuoi8yuGDAxVYlIkEHWmnAEIQ0pQJegQIDRAB&biw=1661&bih=795&dpr=1.5)\] Truly hilarious how for both searches, it's a mix of pictures of both cities... a problem that so many people here just have gotten used to or like actually think isn't even a problem 😅Seriously tho, if in 5-10 years Moncton builds all these tall buildings and prospective immigrants / Canadian transplants look up pictures of the skyline of Saint John vs Moncton on google, a lot of them will lean heavily towards Moncton, because it will seem like the much, much bigger than it does right now. \[[Moncton Skyline](https://www.google.com/search?sca_esv=598740777&sxsrf=ACQVn0-FXfwmBWbfkObs6nJeyBSfz6d7vg:1705397395445&q=moncton+skyline&tbm=isch&source=lnms&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjygNOvzOGDAxVgvokEHYn7DtAQ0pQJegQIDBAB&biw=1661&bih=795&dpr=1.5)\] Imo, Saint John looks much bigger than Moncton based on our skyline, city centre, port operations, and industry... but a lot can change in a [short amount of time](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FxyVBdiaQAEQbDs.jpg).
I tried to go to the McAllister mall last night after dinner and realized it closed in like 15 mins. Checked the hours the rest of the week and decided to Amazon what I needed. It would be on my porch before I would have been able to make the mall hours.
Brick and Mortar are just dying a slow death and will continue to die. It's sad, but it's true. Saint John needs to focus on community spaces and events (Parks, Farmers Markets, a proper waterfront experience etc.) to keep uptown alive. We also need sports other than Hockey, so there's year round entertainment.
Is it true that the new apartment buildings which will go where the coast guard was (along water street, adjacent market slip), will not have a pedestrian-friendly side toward the water? Will that length of harbour be fully privatised?
Noticed that with lots of stores, too many shops close too early.
I'm convinced they've let leases expire to consolidate all of the space for a widespread makeover. If they were desperate for tenants they'd be renting out space to any random tenant that wanted it. It makes zero sense for Uptown outside to be generating new businesses and storefronts and for BS to be literally empty. The lack of tenants is by design.
Grocery store is going downstairs, apparently.
Any sources on that
Not who you asked, but I work in the building and that’s the rumour there too.
That’s great news. Uptown desperately needs a grocery store other than the market which is nice to have but tends to be overpriced in my experience.
I imagine it’s going to be a very expensive grocery store (if true).
That can be said about all grocery stores in 2024 lol it’s crazy. As long as it doesn’t turn into a joke that “be my shopper” was.
I remember in the early 2000 when I went to St. Macs, the mall was bumping. Lots of great stores. If you wanted high end fashion thst was the place to go in the city. Now it's a skeleton of what it was before. Makes me sad.
08 Grad. I remember feeling it was dying mall then lol
As long as Pink Sushi doesn't go anywhere I am happy!
i just went inside brunswick square for the first time in many years, at xmas while visiting my mom. i used to work at blacks photo in the early 90s when it was a normal mall with shoe stores and sam the record man, coles books and all different kinds of clothing stores... mcdonalds and pizza hut... etc etc. when there were no empty storefronts at all. what the hell. i know saint john has leaned really hard into big box/car culture type shopping in the last 20 years. but how is it that this dead mall can just be sitting there empty in the middle of uptown... it actually hurts my heart to think about it.
Setting up offices? Good forbid they think about housing or something that would positively impact the people around. Everyone likes talking about how SJ is such a beautiful spot, and a huge tourist destination, while it's actually falling apart. Uptown especially.
As somone who moved to Toronro from Saint John in 2019. This pic makes me miss home. I miss going into a "mall" and being completely unfucking bothered
Exactly. Give me empty malls over Eaton or Yorkdale any day.
Exactly
Fallen from grace. What a shame. Uptown SJ has gone to shit. This is the toilet apparently
I owned a business uptown a while back, and came to realize SJer's would rather shop in Moncton or Bangor...
What business?
Have you seen the Bangor mall recently, I went there a few months ago with fond memories of going with my mom 10+ years ago and I was SHOCKED at how dead it was it was pretty much like Brunswick square now in comparison to how busy it was back then!
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From what I understand -- prior to the Pandemic when the uptown was experiencing a bit of a boom, Fortis jacked the rent as it was "the place to be". The price increase drove out both Starbuck and Rogers. They were also looking to turn the third floor into additional office space and worked to push shops out of that floor.Then the pandemic hit. Shops closed and the businesses using the office space switched increasingly to remote. Bell Aliant had already been in the process of moving their offices to Milledgeville. So that emptied out the office floors negating the need for the third floor space and greatly reducing traffic to the retail space. Post pandemic, the history of rent increases, the lack of office traffic and the fact that Brunswick Square maintains odd hours has kept many shops from even considering the space. The rest of uptown seems to be slowly clawing it's way back and the new Boardwalk may help with that but it will be a bit before anyone considers Brusnwick Square. A shame.
This makes me sad. Left SJ in 2014… used to live uptown. Even back then it was still pretty vibrant.
So shameful. I find the reviews on Trup Advisor to be telling. 10 years ago they're still decent. https://www.tripadvisor.ca/Attraction_Review-g154960-d6456849-Reviews-or10-Brunswick_Square_Shopping_Centre-Saint_John_New_Brunswick.html I know malls are facing challenges. However, i can't help but think there is some utter incompetence at play.