Portage Place Upgrade Gets the Go Ahead

Portage Place was originally built for $80 million in 1987 which is about $160 million in today's terms. It wasn't the only project on North Portage. Investors Group, Air Canada, Relax Hotel (Holiday Inn) and several apartments also went up. Some of those developments continue to exist today and are successful. However, the mall like much of downtown shopping suffered. Polo Park doubled in size around the same year. Eaton Place and Winnipeg Square were built less than ten years earlier. In short, Winnipeg was over-malled and the suburbs won the battle. Well, almost. Unicity failed before Portage Place.

The just under 1000 car parkade was the jewel under Portage Place. Generating millions in profit each year, it kept The Forks afloat from 1994 on. Cadillac Fairview and successor companies never owned the parkade. If they had, things might have been different. However, it is possible they might have just sold it as the downtown Bay sold theirs to make quick cash. The Forks North Portage Partnership on behalf of the three levels of government receives the parkade's profits. And those have all gone to The Forks since 1994.

 It is worth a passing thought to think what $3 or $4 million a year from the lot might have done for north Portage. It is likely though The Forks would have gone bankrupt. Today it is in much healthier shape. And the sale of the parkade to Truth North will result in a possible windfall of cash to The Forks to the tune of $35 million. On the profits generated by the parkade alone and the usefulness to Jets' owners, the deal will certainly generate cash. The millions spent by event parking that didn't go to the arena will now go to the arena.

Some critics are withering about anything going up downtown. Some says they haven't been for years. That is entirely possible for those who don't go to concerts, conventions, theatre, hockey, basketball, work or The Forks. Perhaps they live and work in the suburbs or just out of town. However, the downtown is where all three levels of government are located. The reason they are there is convenience for the services they provide and for the amount of workers needed.

The Chipman and Thomson families who own the Jets have been doing their part to make downtown dynamic. It has been a building block process. First it was to redevelop the old Eaton's site and move the AHL Moose to the building. Then it was to bring the Jets in. A exhibition hall was next and then a redevelopment of the block across the street with a combination of parkade, Alt Hotel, restaurants, condo and offices. Then it was True North Square and several office towers, residential units and hotel. In just over 20 years hundreds of millions has been spent and has transformed the arena district.

Portage Place will easily be the biggest redevelopment downtown since True North arena was built in the early 2000s. It will have multiple partners in all levels of government, True North, Southern Chiefs Organization and Pan Am Clinic. For those who say they will not ever go downtown, they certainly will go if that is where their knee surgery will be. 

For the next 35 years, the Pam Am Clinic will be on east side of the former mall and take over the space that was the food court and movie theatres. It will be 12 storey centre of excellence for surgery. It will occupy 265,000 square feet. By comparison, the present location by the Pam Am Pool is 72,000 square feet. By any measure this a massive expansion to help bring down waiting times for healthcare. The present Diamond Athletics is 10,000 square feet and will be moving as well. Presumably, they will also increase in size.

On the west side of the former mall will be a 13 storey apartment that will be a partnership of Chipman/Thomson and Southern Chiefs Organization. Affordable units will be part of the building. There will be 200 units built with about 40 per cent allotted lower income. The skywalk will remain connected throughout including to the former Bay. The Southern Chiefs Organization has a budget of about $130 million for that building alone which will also include housing.

As for the rest of the mall, it was revealed a grocery store has signed a letter of intent for about 19,000 square feet. Other mall residents such as Prairie Theatre Exchange are expected to stay. However, actual plans and tenants have not yet been revealed. Work is set to begin in 2025 and be complete by 2028.

For the first time 100% of Portage Place, the parkade and additional buildings will be owned locally by one group but in partnership with several other groups. Long tern planning is already part of the core mission of the facility. A health centre that is needed and wanted is key to people coming there every day of the week.

Mixed developments are central to long lasting success. Portage Place was simply too much retail and not enough street presence. It turned its back on the street and in many ways, turned away from ground floor in favour of the skywalks. As seen in the above picture, the new Pam Clinic will have a street presence. There has to be handicapped access and pick up/drop off spots out front. You simply can't have a surgical center with no road access. For this reason Edmonton will go through where the escalators and clock are now to connect Portage and Ellice.

There appears to be a few park-like areas in front of the new Pan Am entrance and around the new mall entrance. Without a doubt there will be high security to keep the area from becoming like the pocket park of Air Canada in terms of an encampment and more like what True North Square is. That is to say the park will be there for citizens to use but not to take up residence in. There will be simply be too many people going in and out of what is essentially a hospital.

There are around 80 encampments around the city now. It is important that more is done to find people housing, treatment and not have more areas become permanent outdoor settlements. Certainly it would appear the goal of True North and Southern Chiefs Organization is to build affordable housing. Many people this winter could suffer if it is colder and snowier than past years. Living on the street or the river is dangerous.

There are a lot of moving parts to Portage Place but working with The Bay conversion by Southern Chiefs, it is a near $1 billion amount of work. The inclusion of health and housing ensures vitality seven days a week. This was always a flaw of the old mall. Evenings and weekends were not strong. There was just not enough people living in the area.

In recent years around the Art Gallery, there has been a number of apartments built, same for Truth North Square and along Portage Avenue. In the past week, there have been several apartment projects in the downtown approved to begin immediately. There are more coming next year and possibly in years after even with a federal change of government.

The truth is that there can't be any ten years or more breaks where literally nothing is getting built. And that is what has been happening in Winnipeg and longer at times. The hoarding of land for parking spaces have left large areas under utilized. Downtown has football fields of space, some of which has not seen a return of traffic since the end of the pandemic. Shopping malls are coming to the conclusion that too much of their lots are not being used regularly. Space is being converted to other uses including apartments.

The initial Portage Place mall attracted tens of millions of other investment. It is likely the new initiative will do the same. Still, it will take three years to see much of this come to pass. By then, perhaps, True North's Sutton Place Hotel and Suites will be complete as the need for additional hotels downtown has grown. It often takes a very long time to get shovels in the ground.

Still, this new project is a step in the right direction and a great improvement on past proposals. No one development alone with save the downtown but, like The Forks, step by step action will make that area a vital component if rejuvenation.