Inglewood residents will soon see a new neighbour moving into the building located at the corner of Bellerose and Inglewood drives.
Council reviewed an application for new use and occupancy on Monday that would allow local refreshment services supplier Amazon Springs Water and Coffee Co. to operate out of a portion of the building.
Formerly owned and occupied by Standard General Construction, the building located at 23 Bellerose Dr. was sold to Houle Properties Inc. in early 2015. It is currently occupied by Ram Mechanical, a heating and plumbing service.
An application to allow the specialty store to occupy the remaining portion of the building was put to council because the property is located within a Direct Control land use district. Under the Land Use Bylaw, council is considered the developing authority for this land use district and can approve development permits for any use it sees fit.
Currently, permitted use for the land parcel is construction services. The application asked for approval of a specialty store, which is a permitted use within the Commercial Corridor land use district.
Amazon Springs Water and Coffee Company is a St. Albert-based water and refreshment supplier that provides bottled water, office coffee services, vending services and break room supplies to offices, homes and industrial sites across the province.
The company was founded in St. Albert 13 years ago and is currently operating out of a facility in east Edmonton, with its head office located in the downtown Perron District.
“It’s really for us about getting everything under one roof for business purposes and commuting purposes,” said Houle Properties spokesperson Ben Battjes.
The company would occupy 2,594 square-metres, or 77 per cent, of the Bellerose building. The floor plan includes a front retail and reception, office spaces and a rear warehouse component.
As the largest supplier of bottled water, office coffee services, full vending services, and break room supplies in Alberta, the company employs the use of 20 delivery trucks. The trucks would leave at 7:30 a.m. and return around 3:30 p.m. They are expected to remain in the warehouse overnight, where they will be stocked for the next day’s deliveries.
The report presented to council states “vehicles will be loaded indoors and back-up noise outside of normal business hours is not anticipated.”
Battjes said there were many questions about noise levels during the open house held on Oct. 20, 2015.
The site contains a portion of undeveloped land. Battjes was unable to confirm at this point what Houle Properties’ plans for infill would be, but indicated that self-storage came up as a popular use during the open house.
“They really liked the idea that storage was secure, low traffic, no noise. They had experienced some noise issues with the previous users,” he said.
Councillors lauded the new permitted use, saying that it was a much better fit for the neighbourhood.
“Considering what was there before, this is a definite improvement from the residents’ point of view. Certainly the business that was there before was viable, but it’s much more difficult to have lay down yards in the middle of the city,” said Coun. Sheena Hughes.
When the building was constructed, it was located at the “edge of town” pointed out Coun. Cam McKay, now that this is no longer the case he considered the move a “wise evolution of land use.”
Wrapping up debate, Mayor Nolan Crouse thanked Standard General Construction for choosing to keep its head office in St. Albert.
Before moving into its current location in the Campbell Business Park in spring 2014, the major construction contractor was considering moving the head office to its site in Acheson due to space concerns, but chose to remain in St. Albert. The company has been in the community for over 40 years.
