GNWT to begin a major move
Licensing office to be on first floor of seven-storey 49 Street tower set to house transportation, health departments
Shane Magee
Northern News Services
Monday, June 29, 2015
SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
The location to get a driver's licence and other motor vehicle paperwork will be changing later this year as a new GNWT-owned office tower opens on 49 Street.
This newly-opened seven-storey building on 49 Street will house the GNWT health and social services and transportation departments. Employees are moving in over the coming months. - Shane Magee/NNSL photo |
The seven-storey tower will house 250 employees in roughly 6,000 square metres of office space.
The Department of Transportation will occupy the first four floors of the building while Health and Social Services will have floors five through seven. The two departments began moving into the new space Tuesday. The motor vehicle space will be on the first floor and will take over from the 50 Avenue location in September.
"We're quite excited to have a new building in Yellowknife," said Brian Nagel, director of infrastructure operations and accommodations services with the Department of Public Works and Services, which oversees GNWT construction.
There's no rush to move, however.
"We would like to have an orderly move," he said. Shifting the two departments from several different buildings around the city is expected to be complete in mid-August.
There were two bids submitted to move the departments. Best Movers bid $45,000 and won the contract while DC Moving & Office Relocations Ltd. had bid $167,968.
Transportation currently has space on the fourth floor of the YK Centre tower, the first floor of the Highways Building and the second floor of Lahm Ridge Tower.
Health now has space in the Centre Square Tower. It will still have offices on the seventh and eighth floors.
Once vacated by those departments, Nagel said the spaces will be repurposed by other GNWT departments.
He said the space in the Highways Building was expected to be listed as surplus, or not needed, however, there's since been interest expressed in reusing it.
"We're in discussions with the landlords of that space," Nagel said.
In 2012, Clark Builders won the $25 million contract to construct the new tower. The tower, yet to be named, brings the GNWT-owned office space in the city to 14,135 square metres. It leases 44,173 square metres of office space in the city.
Nagel said the GNWT has aimed to increase its owned space to about 40 per cent of utilized office space from its current 32 per cent. Asked why, he said provincial governments typically own about 50 per cent of their office space.
Yellowknife Centre MLA Robert Hawkins, whose riding includes the office, said he supports the government owning and operating the building because it will help save money.
"We just can't afford to lease everything, and leasing everything comes at a higher cost," Hawkins said.
It's projected the building will save the GNWT $100 million in leasing costs and operations-and-maintenance costs over its 40-year lifespan.
A wood pellet boiler in the building that also supplies two other buildings is expected to save the government $70,000 and $100,000 per year in heating costs.
"That's a significant savings to government," he said.
Nagel was unable to provide an expected cost to operate the building per year, saying that kind of information will be available after the structure has been in use for a full year.
He said the cost would be consistent with what the GNWT pays for other space in the city, which he roughly estimated at $450 to $500 per square metre. He added that the boiler will lower the cost for the new building.
