(Quebec) Create a “piece of town”. This is the goal of the promoters of the Fleur de Lys project in Quebec, worth $1.5 billion. With its green spaces, shops, housing and entertainment, the future site will set a precedent in the way of redeveloping shopping centers, they argue.
A shopping center with a large parking lot, built with concrete walls without windows and where it is difficult to find the exit: this is the description given by William Trudel, President and CEO of Trudel, of the current Fleur shopping center de Lys, which he acquired with his brother Jonathan in 2018.
This portrait corresponds to the image of many shopping centers built in the 1960s, according to him. But with his development project on the current site of Fleur de Lys, Mr. Trudel has every intention of putting an end to the reign of this type of shopping place.
With its campus of the Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières (UQTR), its 3,500 rental units (social, affordable housing, adapted for people with disabilities), many of which will be ready at the beginning of 2025, its 700,000 square feet of commercial premises, its 150-room hotel, its green spaces, its 2,500 trees, its meeting places, its office spaces, the project, presented Wednesday at the end of the day to the population of Quebec, completely redefines the concept of shopping center, according to William Trudel, met earlier this week not far from the construction site of the future site.
PHOTO PATRICE LAROCHE, LE SOLEIL ARCHIVES
Brothers William and Jonathan Trudel, owners of Trudel Alliance, photographed in June 2021
“A mall’s viewing spectrum is no longer based solely on retail. Your shopping center is no longer a place where you go only to pick up a product. You can live there, you can work there, you can study there. »
“We are going to go from a dark site from 5.30 p.m. to a lively site”, illustrates the associate architect and urban designer Érick Rivard.
Pour élaborer ses plans, Trudel, fonds immobilier commercial d’acquisition et de développement de projets, a consulté pendant cinq ans près de 70 commerçants et une soixantaine d’organismes communautaires.
En chantier
Lors de notre passage, les grues et les amoncellements de terre prouvaient que le chantier était déjà bien entamé. Les commerçants demeurent ouverts pendant toute la durée des travaux. La plupart, comme Maxi et Walmart, qui génèrent un gros achalandage, seront partie prenante du futur centre commercial. Il a toutefois été impossible d’avoir le nom des nouveaux détaillants qui s’y installeront. Situé non loin du Centre Vidéotron, enclavé par plusieurs autoroutes, le futur site ne risque-t-il pas de générer davantage de trafic routier ? Il aura plutôt l’effet inverse, croit le principal intéressé.
« Présentement, le trafic converge à Fleur de Lys parce qu’il y a un grand stationnement. Les autos restent là et elles repartent à peu près toutes en même temps. On va reconnecter des rues qui existent déjà [et qui vont passer à travers le site], which will create multiple input and output options. »
The Government of Quebec has invested 43 million in the Trudel brothers’ project, initially estimated at 750 million in 2022.