The old Canadian Tire building on Fifth Ave will be getting a face lift in the coming months. Shovels are currently in the ground as the commercial space is being transformed to welcome new retailers and a restaurant.
Economic development manager with the Town of Cochrane, Mike Korman, explains two development permit applications were issued in April. One for a drive-thru style restaurant on the west side of the building where the garden centre used to be, and one permit for the whole building itself.
"We have an application to split it up into about eight different commercial units," said Korman, adding a facade improvement will be done to the outside of the building to make it look more appealing.
Although Korman does not know exactly which retailers or restaurant will be coming, he said there have been rumours that the fast-food chain Popeyes is the proposed restaurant and that Winners could be a tenant.
"I cannot confirm that in any way because the developer does not necessarily need to tell us who's coming," said Korman.
Korman said the development permit was approved about three or four weeks ago.
"My assumption is that they are going to work through the fall/winter and potentially be ready for the new year," he said. "Certainly the restaurant development permit will take longer obviously because it's a complete new build. It could be three to six months before we see anything."
It will be nice to have more services in Cochrane, Korman said, explaining that this will also create non-residential tax gains.
"It's always good to take these smaller or dilapidated stores and refresh them and then they have more of an assessment value in which we get more taxes from," said Korman.
He added it is especially important to get more buildings in the downtown core area because this will increase the tax revenue.
