How often have you heard that central Vancouver is in danger of becoming a resort – assuming that a city of high amenity is in conflict with a ‘real’ city of jobs and a diversity of people. The assumption must be that a city with lots of parks and a seawall, abundant restaurants and community services, with a generally high quality of design, is a place of frills, or one servicing only those who don’t have to work full time.
Why is that true? Especially when the statistics on job growth and income levels prove otherwise. (And as usual it’s necessary to remind everyone that the majority of West Enders are lower-middle income renters and that there has been a notable increase in employment downtown.)
Why shouldn’t a city core be a place where it feels somewhat like a resort: a place where people spend significant amounts of time and money to go to because it’s so damn nice? Why shouldn’t a city be a place where on your time off you don’t have to go somewhere else because what you want is already here?
Other places are catching on – as an Urban Land Institute article illustrates about development in Miami. And yes, these are all high-end ‘luxury’ products. But note, in particular, the importance of transit and walkability: the amenities and public spaces financed or assisted by the developers are available to the larger community.
Three new master-planned communities—two in Miami and a third in Sunrise, a west Broward County suburb that skirts the Everglades—are among the most highly anticipated real estate projects in south Florida right now as business and civic leaders gauge consumer appetite for dense, walkable, and mixed-use urban lifestyles. In a state known for sprawling, single-family subdivisions, a move toward vertical, compact communities represents a new chapter.
Representatives of these three marquee projects, Miami World Center, Brickell City Centre, and Metropica, spoke at the recent ULI Florida Summit in Miami about their projects’ past challenges and present opportunities as south Florida’s economic boom continues. …
Each development is also relying on heavy interest from international buyers who may be purchasing second or third homes and are in need or larger units to serve as a home base in Miami. Providing transportation alternatives is critical for these clients since they hail from “global cities where transit is a big part of the way they live,” said panelist Nitin Motwani, managing principal of Miami Worldcenter Associates, Miami World Center’s master developer. …
The goal has been to capitalize on the fortuitous transformation of downtown Miami into an arts and culture hub, Motwani said. Over the past decade, the Perez Art Museum Miami, Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts of Miami–Dade County, and Museum Park—all within walking distance of World Center—have undergone massive renovations and are continuing to be improved to enhance the pedestrian experience and access.
To the north of the site, the up-and-coming neighborhoods of Wynwood, the Design District, Midtown, and Edgewater are redefining the center of gravity for downtown, placing World Center in the middle. In addition, Brightline, a new passenger rail system that is being developed by All Aboard Florida, will provide high-speed rail service between Miami, Fort Lauderdale, West Palm Beach, and Orlando. The system’s brand-new Miami station, MiamiCentral, is a block away from the World Center site. …
Transit accessibility and fine-grained pedestrian streetscapes will make all the difference for World Center’s high street–style retail concept, which combines so-called attainable luxury brands with eateries and entertainment. Sidewalks were designed as wide boulevards to “allow not just for restaurants to spill out, but for people to push strollers and ride bicycles without fear” of cars, Motwani said. …
Brickell’s other sustainable features include pedestrian connectivity and transit orientation. Swire made significant transit investments to improve the site, including $14 million in upgrades to the Metromover station, which provides direct access to Brickell City Centre’s shops. …
Awesome! Too bad Miami will be underwater in 50 years. ?
Vancouver is already a resort city. It is a great place to work FROM. In the summer it is certainly a seaside resort. In the winter there are mountains nearby.
Many people who derive their income from places afar, such as me, live here because they could live (almost) anywhere. Mining executives, import/export folks, high tech entrepreneurs, real estate owners/developers, investors, folks rich enough to be “retired”, students even have choices where they live, work or study.
Weather plays an important role, as does water, mountains, an international airport close by and certainly walkability, safety or clean air. Monaco, London, Singapore, Whistler, Canmore, Palm Springs, Munich, Vienna, Vernon, Osoyoos, Colorado Springs, Scottsdale and the cities mentioned above in FL all come to mind as great places to live regardless where you make money as the world is a connected place and a smart brain with a telephone and an internet connection can work almost anywhere. In addition more and more folks are “retired” and might work part-time to amuse themselves, give back or be socially connected, but do not have to financially. Even many of those live here and do not decamp to boring places on Vancouver Island or rural BC.
I do real estate projects in Texas, Okanagon and Alberta. Many other folks do projects in Asia or Europe or a mine in Mexico or a drilling operation in the Yukon.
Hence our politicians need to recognize to not tax incomes more and more but consumption, especially real estate consumption. They ought to learn from Monaco, Singapore or Texas even. Texas has an 8% state tax (high for the US) and very high real estate taxes, but no state income taxes. That is the model that BC should use. We ought to monetize this resort far better. The latest CPP tax grab is another step in the wrong direction as even more folks will find ways to shift their incomes elsewhere. Our valuable real estate is under-taxed and incomes overtaxed. And yes, more subways would be better than more polluting and slow wobbly diesel buses ! Befroe I depart into a grave by 2058 I might even see a subway to UBC.
Miami is becoming more and more appealing. The Perez and Art Basel Miami are established. The above article tells us that the Swire Group is developing the $1 billion Brickell project. This is one of the old hongs, originally from Liverpool 200 years ago and based in Hong Kong and London. This is a $52 billion international conglomerate. They own Cathay Pacific Airways. Cathay has regular flights to Miami.
You have to love the way they promote this luxury development. It makes sense to include transit. They will need lots of staff and many maids.
“Luxury brands will be located throughout the street-accessible first floor of Brickell City Centre’s retail component. Others will open on the second and third floors, emphasizing premium and contemporary retailers along with a mix of beauty, home decor, jewelry, apparel and other stores. The food and beverage offerings, an integral piece of the Brickell City Centre retail concept, will be situated throughout the fourth floor, offering a mix of fine dining, casual fare and new international brands opening flagships in the U.S.
Brickell City Centre will offer a unique vertical shopping experience, a successful shopping model common in international cities and well-recognized by global travelers.”
Lululemon and Porsche Design are in too.
Years ago the BBC reported that Miami had become the capital of affluent Latin America. All the wealthy Latinos fly up to Miami to shop and get their money out. (Checked out the fun in Caracas lately?)
Close to 70% of the population of Miami is Hispanic.
“Mercedes Guinot, a real estate agent, sells many houses to well-to-do Latin American immigrants. She estimates that 80% of her clients are from Latin America, paying an average of about $450,000 (£311,000) for three or four-bedroom houses with a large yard and a swimming pool.
“They tend to pay in cash”, she says approvingly, before taking off to see a prospective client in Weston, a Miami suburb of manicured lawns and lush landscaping that is home to so many Venezuelans it is often referred to here as “Westonzuela”.
A growing vibrant stylish resort. LEED gold too.
The future.
What am I not seeing in the article? The luxury / resort assets are intermingled within the ordinary working city.
Aren’t the cruise ships and luxury hotels cheek-to-jowl with container ships, CPR trains, delivery trucks, universities, tech campuses, hospital districts, churches, office towers, innovation labs, tech hubs and the noise and accoutrements of 250,000 residents of the inner city from all incomes, ethnicities and ages?
Monaco — or Whistler — and other truly resorts are not even close on the socioeconomic diversity scale.