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By Claire Piech

The Resort Municipality of Whistler and developer Rod Nadeau are once again at odds.

On Tuesday night – just two months after The Woods at Rainbow lawsuit was dropped – council voted against Nadeau’s latest plans for his remaining seniors’ housing building on Lot 11 at Rainbow.

“There is nothing you can do that the mayor and council will support at Rainbow,” said Nadeau on Wednesday morning after learning about the decision. “Every time we have an initiative to make things better, there is push back from the municipality.”

This time around, Nadeau was hoping to get the rezoning necessary to increase the building from 20 units to 22 units. The increase was already approved in the development permit he received in November.

“That was authorized by council in the development permit, but when we went to get a building permit, they realized there was a contradiction between the development permit and the zoning,” explained Nadeau. “So it wasn’t my mistake. It was their mistake.”

Nadeau said those two extra units would have allowed him to create smaller, more affordable units in the Rainbow condominium building.

“We were trying to be versatile and offer less expensive homes, but I guess council doesn’t want us to offer less expensive homes,” said Nadeau. “Or maybe they didn’t take that into consideration.”

Tension between Nadeau and the municipality has been palpable for months.

At one time, Nadeau was set to develop two buildings of seniors’ housing at The Woods at Rainbow, Lot 10 and Lot 11. Each building was originally supposed to have 20 units, although Nadeau negotiated to put 16 units in one building and 22 in the other.

Since that time, council voted in a closed-door meeting to reject the proposal and take over the Lot 10 development. Council was concerned that Nadeau’s pricing was too high for a resident-restricted seniors’ housing complex. But Nadeau withheld turning over the Lot 10 building, hoping that down the road he could convince future council members to change their minds.

The municipality then filed a lawsuit against Nadeau in mid-May; Nadeau handed over the parcel the following week.

Tuesday night’s vote came after Mayor Ken Melamed spoke strongly against the rezoning proposal.

The mayor is concerned that The Woods’ unique selling schedule means anyone can now buy into the development that was designed for seniors only.

“It was presumed this would be seniors’ housing,” said Melamed. “Now it is not. It is essentially market housing.”

The units went on sale in February. In the first month, the selling schedule allowed only seniors who are retired or residents to buy the condominiums. In the following month, any senior could purchase. And in the third month, the units went onto the open market.

“The only reason we grant new bed units in Whistler is for resident housing or for items which come out of that clause of the Official Community Plan which provide clear and significant benefit to the community,” said the mayor. “I won’t support this recommendation.”

The mayor voted against Nadeau’s proposal, as did Councillors Grant Lamont and Chris Quinlan. The 3-3 vote caused the motion to fail. Councillor Eckhard Zeilder was absent.

Meanwhile, Nadeau said six of the 20 units at The Woods have sold. Five of those sales were to seniors; one went to a younger couple.

He added: “The interesting thing is it is still mostly Whistler seniors who seem to be looking at them.”

“Because the time period has expired on the right of the seniors to buy them first, anybody can buy them,” said Nadeau. “But the interesting thing is it still is mostly Whistler seniors who seem to be looking at them.”

When two-thirds of the units sell Nadeau will begin building the market housing.

Council votes to increase convenience store to 2,400 square feet after oil companies showed little interest

By Claire Piech

Whistler moved one step closer to getting a second gas station on Tuesday night, after council unanimously voted to increase the size of the Rainbow station’s convenience store.

The store will be 1,300 square feet larger than originally proposed.

Now, thanks to council’s decision, the owner of the future gas station, convenience store and the grocery store at Rainbow said he can bring in the gas station as quickly as the municipality allows.

“We are motivated to make it happen,” said Sam Brovender of Calgary-based company Rainbow Canucks Properties Ltd. on Wednesday morning.

“The faster we go through the process, the faster we will get that thing open and started. We need to go as quickly as we can so the community can have the benefit of having that amenity.”

But council’s decision this week was a crucial step, said Brovender.

Up until now, Rainbow Canucks Properties, which acquired the property earlier this year, was having a hard time finding an oil company willing to move into the spot at the north end of Whistler.

The main deterrent has been low traffic in the area, said Brovender.

Oil companies that were interested in the space said they would only move in if the convenience store’s size was increased from 1,100 square feet to 2,400 square feet. That’s because a large chunk of their profits come from convenience store sales, not gasoline sales.

“When I spoke with them, they were numbers oriented,” said Brovender of the five major companies, Husky, Esso, Chevron, Shell Canada and Petro-Canada.

“Of the five major gas stations, three have passed,” said Brovender. “And two were only interested if we got this zoning, otherwise they were not interested.”

Brovender also clarified that the 2,400 square foot convenience store will not just be filled with “chips and pop.”

Half of that space will go to bathrooms, storage and office space. And a quarter of the retail space will be dedicated to car products like wiper blades, oil and anti-freeze.

Comparatively, the Husky gas station in Whistler is 3,000 square feet.

Also, the Rainbow gas station will likely have six pumps, as opposed to Husky’s nine pumps.

Right now, the Husky station in Creekside is the only gas station in Whistler.

Petro Canada once operated in Creekside but was closed in 2006. Chevron also tried to bring a station into White Gold but was denied permission by the council of the day.

Since that time, residents have consistently pointed out that not having a second place to fuel up in Whistler is a problem.

During Tuesday’s council meeting, Tom Thomson spoke to this need and said “a gas station north is a very valuable and viable necessity in today’s world.”

But the Rainbow station isn’t the only potential Whistler gas station on the books. The five-acre First Nations’ legacy land at Function Junction is also zoned for a gas station.

At one time there was talk of building that gas station prior to the Winter Olympics, but those plans never panned out. Currently, no concrete time lines have been announced.

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