Four years after Canadian Tire began looking at Canmore as a franchise location, construction has begun on the retail giant’s store.
Vice president of sales and development for Devonian Properties Brian Talbot said site development has begun at the store’s future location between Safeway and Sobeys.
Devonian is a general development partner with Albian Properties and co-owner of the land with Alberta Mining Corporation.
Talbot said it is expected that the Canadian Tire and Mark’s Work Warehouse will be open by the end of this year.
“The landowners are pleased construction is underway on the Canadian Tire and it is anticipated that it would open at the end of 2011,” he said. “We are pleased that after years of work with the Town and Canadian Tire construction has commenced.”
Canmore Planning Commission approved the development permit for the 50,000-square-foot retail store, automotive and equipment repair shop and garden centre with three variances at the end of September.
It was the second development permit issued for a Canadian Tire in four years. The first, in 2008, involved Calgary-developer Axis Projects Corp. and included residential units above the retail store.
Economic conditions saw that proposal stalled and this time around Canadian Tire itself made the application on behalf of the landowners and itself.
The project also passed the Sustainability Screening Report last summer.
As part of the SSR Canadian Tire offered $288,000 to Canmore Community Housing Corporation (CCHC), which could use the money for several options proposed.
Those include using the money to purchase a market unit and convert it to Perpetually Affordable Housing (PAH) or purchasing new construction for PAH and using it to provide rental PAH housing.
