Public Services and Procurement Minister Jean-Yves Duclos speaks to reporters in the Foyer of the House of Commons in Ottawa, on Nov. 18.Adrian Wyld/The Canadian Press
For years, officials in Whitehorse could only dream of turning this gold mine into housing treasure: a rare 12-acre parcel of partially empty federal land in the middle of a city with one of the fastest growing populations in the country.
City officials had asked Ottawa about the land repeatedly. They made a strong case. The city needed more homes, and the land was located on a major road with sewage upgrades, next door to the hockey arena and fronting on the municipal hiking trail. Hundreds of families could potentially live there, with plenty of space for businesses – and yet, on that tantalizing, square parcel, there was an aging heritage office building, a few smaller offices and parking.
Tuesday, Ottawa finally makes it official: The land is up for grabs, making it number 83 of the federally owned properties now on the block to be leased out and redeveloped into much-needed homes for Canadians.
“It’s fantastic,” Whitehorse Mayor Kirk Cameron said on Monday, already imagining what might now be possible on that valuable parcel on Range Road, in a city with few such opportunities. “We have been hungrily watching it for years now.”
Altogether, according to the federal government, the land now available for inquiries or proposals totals more than 2,500 hockey rinks in size. But, as The Globe and Mail’s project Wasted Space revealed, compiling the list will be far easier than actually building homes quickly on all that land.
In April, the Liberal government announced ambitious plans to put housing on every possible piece of federally owned land and reduce its office footprint by 50 per cent. Instead of selling the land, as the government had done in the past, Ottawa would negotiate long-term leases with municipalities, non-profit groups and private developers. The first step was creating the Canada Public Land Bank, to identify and openly list all the available parcels.
The federal government will announce Tuesday that 12 new public properties have been added to that list, with more on the way, and that proposals to build homes on five properties are now being assessed, while the date for submissions closes shortly on three others.
In an interview, Jean-Yves Duclos, Minister of Public Services and Procurement of Canada, said that the government had received 320 inquiries about land on the overall list but declined to say how many official proposals had been submitted.
But he also said there are still many more properties to be considered, especially since the government has not finished working with Crown corporations, including Canada Post, to identify all their potential land.
Federal properties are now available for housing proposals in all provinces except for Prince Edward Island. In addition to the parcel in Whitehorse, there are also two in the Northwest Territories. The properties include post offices, half-occupied offices, armouries, military land, a former penitentiary. But not all that land can be easily turned into housing.
In June, The Globe, working with urban planners, published a months-long study analyzing all federal land in communities with a population of more than 10,000 people and identified properties that were close to housing and at least half an acre in size, either vacant or with buildings that were only one or two stories – conditions that make the land more accessible for housing construction. Proximity to existing residences also means the land is more likely to be close to infrastructure such as sewers, and amenities such as schools and hospitals.
Comparing The Globe’s findings to Ottawa’s current list of public land offering, only about one-third of the 83 properties fall into this definition of urban lazy land. The other properties were not included in The Globe’s final count because the land was considered too small, too rural or was owned by departments such as DND or Corrections Canada, or already up for sale. The Globe also excluded parks and greenspace, while a few parcels that made the government’s list fall into this category.
Altogether, The Globe identified enough lazy land with the potential to create homes for 750,000 Canadians. Canada Post, for instance, owns 157 post offices and depots close to housing in more than 100 municipalities, often in the heart of urban neighbourhoods where housing is expensive and in short supply. Developing all of these post office locations – even leaving space for Canada Post on site – could create roughly 33,000 homes.
“We don’t expect all those properties to be developed at the same speed,” said Mr. Duclos, adding that some of the most well-located, and accessible, urban properties will naturally attract more interest from developers and lead to housing sooner. But there also may be unexpected interest in the more complicated parcels, he said. “We prefer to have a broad set of properties to be fully inclusive.”
In Whitehorse, Mr. Cameron says the city is eager to assist with any proposal that comes forward. After all, he can already see families walking steps to the hockey rink for a skate, or strolling on the trail, creating community on land ready and waiting for a second life. “We have to keep in front of the curve,” he said, “to develop enough affordable housing to enjoy the lifestyle here.”