Why a Crown corporation thinks Amazon is a perfect fit for Shannon Park

The man in charge of overseeing the Shannon Park land redevelopment says Amazon's values mesh well with what the Canada Lands Company wants to do with the site.

Last week, Halifax submitted a bid for the online retail giant's second North American headquarters. The proposal includes a three-campus model for Amazon that would involve land in a logistics park, the Cogswell Interchange in Halifax and Shannon Park in Dartmouth.

"Amazon is looking for innovative design and energy efficiency and environmental responsibility and complete communities because that's the environment they want to work in,"said Chris Millier, director of real estate with Canada Lands, the federal Crown corporation responsible for overseeing the redevelopment of Shannon Park. "And those are the principles that underlie all of our concept planning work."

As well, Millier cites affordable housing as another overlapping vision component.

Amazon said the new campus could hire up to 50,000 workers with an average salary of $100,000 US.The company said it requires more than 500,000 square feet of office space by 2019, and up to eight million square feet beyond 2027.

Opposition to Amazon

Critics have dismissed Halifax's bid, pointing out that the city doesn't meet the criteria. Amazon also could risk turning the city into a congested company town, diluting the quality of life Halifax is so quick to boast about, opponents have said.

According to a Halifax council report, the abandoned military enclave hasmore than 30 hectares of waterfront real estate across from Halifax's core.

The location has opportunities for mass transit, active transportationand sustainable building technologies like seawater cooling and heating, the report said.

It's also located next to a nearly four-hectare site owned by Millbrook First Nation, and the staff report said discussions were held to potentially include the land in the bid.

In its request for proposals, Amazon said it was searching for metropolitan areas with more than one million people. Halifax's population, including its surrounding region, is about 425,000.

Project timelines

If Halifax's bid moves to the next stage, Millier said he's willing to help refine the bid to cover details like how it would work in terms of location, distribution of uses and types of development.

The timing may also work.Concept planscould be approved by next spring withengineering work expected to get underway afterthat.Construction is expected to take place inphases over the next decade.

Redevelopment of theCogswellInterchange is also in the early stages.