Major 12-storey development proposed for uptown Saint John

Plans are not finalized, but a major 12-storey retail, office and residential development at the top of King Street in Saint John is being put together by developer Percy Wilburas a replacement for the abandoned former Woolworth's store he bought in November.

That's substantially larger than his original plans for the property.

"It's been pretty exciting," said Wilbur.

"There'sa lot of people in the city anxious to see something happen to that eyesore of a corner that's been sitting there for so long."

Current plans call for two floors of underground parking and amain floor retail space that Wilbur is hoping will be a grocery store.Above that will be two levels of office space sitting underneath up to 90 residentialunits on nine upper floors, many with unobstructed panoramic views of the city.

Wilbur believes there is demand for that much more living space in the uptown area, but can scale the number of apartments back to 70 on seven floors if required.

He is currently deep into construction of an 85-unit residential building on Wentworth Street and said it's already 25 per cent taken nine monthsbefore it will be finished.

"People are wanting to come back into the city.If you look through some of the city's research, the growth of Saint John in the downtown core is quite phenomenalover the next few yearsand to meet that demand they are going to need more apartments," he said.

Drawings of the King Street building have not been released publicly yet, but local architect Malcolm Boyd has been hired to design the structure. Wilbur promises it will fit in with the brick and sandstone facades used by other large buildings aroundKing Square.

Boyd's firm, Murdock Boyd, previously designed the Saint John Law Courts building.

"We're going to respect the surroundings.It will be a combination of the red brick and sandstone look," said Wilbur.

In January, to make room for his growing plans, Wilbur bought the building next door at 85 and 87 King St., currently home to the popular restaurantTaste of Egypt,and a local insurance broker.

The pair of properties cost $1.4 million to acquire, but because engineering work on the old Woolworth's building showed it to be "unsalvageable," according to Wilbur, both buildings are to be torn down.

Restaurant owner Paula Radwan-Donovan said she already has plans to move to a new, larger location and she hopes to make an announcement about that later this week.

Wilbur said he is in talks with grocery stores and other businesses to lease space and will need firm commitments before construction can begin.

"It is essential we have a couple of tenants in there first, so that is what we are focusing a lot of our attention on," he said.

"We'd like to have shovels in the ground by summer andhave something well underway by fall."