City breaks building permit record again

By Joel Wittnebel/The Oshawa Express

It’s hard to judge what its popping up faster: the houses or the numbers.

For a second straight month, through construction and development, the city has demolished building permit records that go back decades.

The month of July not only became the highest July on record, netting the city nearly $115 million in building permits (completely stomping the 2003 record of $84.4 million), but the month also totaled the highest month on record for residential permits, breaking the record recently set last month by $21 million.

The city has also experienced the highest amount of residential construction to date at a little more than $386.5 million, beating the 2013 record by nearly $100 million.

“These are spectacular construction permit for July,” says Councillor John Aker, the chair of the development services committee. “We will break most of the construction records we established last year.”

Not only are the dollars increasing and the development booming, Aker says there’s more benefits to the city.

“The permits are, in my opinion, the scoreboard. But what’s really happening is people in Ontario are choosing Oshawa to live in and invest in. It’s as simple as that,” he says.

According to Aker, more permits mean more jobs.

“We’re creating a tremendous number of construction jobs,” he says, pointing to the workers on the extension of Highway 407 and other projects around the city.

According to the city’s report, the major projects in July included the Bond and Mary apartment building, which was issued $50 million in permits, as well as another apartment at 710 King St. W., and the city’s own Fire Hall 6.

Over the last five years, many of Oshawa’s development sectors have seen an upward trend in growth.

Last month’s residential development permits were nearly three times higher than what they were at the same time in 2010.

The same trend is observed in commercial permits, which for July 2015 is nearly four times higher than in 2010.

Industrial development has also seen a slight increase in permits.

The only sector on the decline is governmental and institutional, which saw drops compared to 2010 and is also down for the first six months of 2015.