New Student Housing-An Economic Spinoff of the Waterfront Campus

Posted on Monday, May 2nd, 2016

When Algonquin College started seriously talking about building a new campus in Pembroke in 2006, the project vision became known as Renaissance Square. The project envisioned a new beginning for the College and for Pembroke’s historic downtown, which had struggled for many years as the retail sector pushed away from the city’s inner core.

Now, four years after the Waterfront Campus opened, Pembroke is really starting to experience a renaissance. The most obvious example is the opening of two privately owned and operated student residences, and the recent start of construction on a third purposefully built apartment building for students.

AMNA Student Living was the first residence to open in the fall of 2014. The former Lakeside Medical Clinic had been vacant for a few years before it was purchased by a developer who took advantage of its close proximity to the new campus. The building was gutted and renovated to include spaces for 49 students. Most of the units are singles, and the residence includes a common kitchen and lounge area for students to socialize.

The second residence, Algonquin House, opened in the fall of 2015 in the former Algonquin College Pembroke Campus. After the College sold the building, the new owners made extensive renovations to allow the front of the building to be used for doctor offices and a pharmacy, while the larger portion of the building was converted to a student residence for more than 70 occupants.

Construction on the third residence started a few weeks ago. This residence doesn’t have a name yet, but the developer plans to have it ready for the summer of 2017. The four-storey building will accommodate approximately 50 students in three-bedroom apartments.

The Campus has been gradually growing its enrolments and now attracts almost 50 percent of its close to 1,000 full-time students from outside of Renfrew County. The growing out-of-town student population has built a strong business case for private investment in student housing, generating new tax revenue for the city of Pembroke and creating more options for out-of-town students who are looking for accommodations while studying at the Waterfront Campus.
And it’s not only the student housing market that is benefiting from the Waterfront Campus. The entire downtown has a much more positive vibe. Storefronts that were once vacant are filling up, shop owners are improving their facades, developers are buying up properties and investing in them, and merchants are welcoming Algonquin’s students to their businesses.

The building of the Waterfront Campus is the best thing to happen to Pembroke’s downtown in decades and it may be just the tip of the ice berg. The renaissance is well underway.

Posted by Jamie Bramburger, Manager of Community and Student Affairs

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