Northland buys chunk of golf course land, plans new dealership
A $15 million deal reached this week will see some significant changes on Highway 16 near the Prince George Golf and Country Club.
Brent Marshall of Northland Chrysler Jeep Dodge has reached a deal with the city and the golf club to purchase an eight-acre parcel of land that the driving range and tennis courts currently sit on.
“We’re going to build a huge, state-of-the-art Chrysler Jeep Dodge Fiat and Alfa Romeo dealership there,” he said Thursday.
Northland Nissan will move to the current Northland Chrysler Jeep Dodge location on 20th Avenue.
The Highway 16 property uses the same access as the new Signature Sandman. The new dealership will displace the driving range and the tennis courts. Marshall says new tennis courts will be built and the golf club will be a beneficiary of the deal.
“They get money to make improvements to get their facility upgraded for the (2015 Canada) Winter Games,” Marshall said.
The deal has been in the works for some time as Northland went after the golf course lands about five or six years ago, when the city was looking for developers. However, fears arose of an auto mall at the corner of Highway 16 and Highway 97 and the city looked elsewhere for developers.
“It’s come full circle after all the other deals fell apart,” said Marshall.
However, he is quick to stress the property on the corner by the intersection will not be loaded up with trucks.
“We’re going to make the corner park-like,” he said. “We want it to look beautiful for the city.”
Marshall praised the work of Ian Wells, who was the city’s manager of real estate services and earlier this year was made direct of the city’s planning and development department, and IDL Projects.
“They made it all happen,” Marshall said.
He adds there is enough room at the new site to have between 800 and 1,000 vehicles on the lot at a time.
Construction will begin “as soon as possible,” and, Marshall stresses, it will all be done by local contractors.
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