Uptown: gentle giant
Workers laying bricks are reflected in a pool of water on the floor of what will be the WalMart store in the Uptown shopping/residential complex.
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When the Uptown Shopping Centre at the corner of Saanich Road and Blanshard Street opens next year, the major anchor tenant, a new Wal-Mart Supercentre, is expected to draw huge numbers, but the general manager of the West Shore Chamber of Commerce said she isn’t concerned.
Ingrid Vaughan said she’s confident business in the communities she oversees – Langford, View Royal, Colwood, Highlands and Metchosin, won’t see a drop because the Supercentre isn’t enough to draw people away.
“I really don’t see it as having a huge appeal,” she said. “But it depends on people’s shopping preferences as well.”
Right now, Vaughan said, people on the West Shore typically are the ones shopping on the West Shore. And Costco is the biggest draw for people coming from outside of the five communities the chamber serves; the Wal-Mart Supercentre, she suspects, won’t change that.
“There’s already a Wal-Mart out here. I don’t see people making a 20 minute drive to go grocery shopping (at the Wal-Mart Supercentre) when we have everything here already,” Vaughan said.
The other major anchor tenants at Uptown – Future Shop and Best Buy – are already in Langford as well, Vaughan said, adding that the novelty of a one-stop shop Wal-Mart could be the only draw for people out of the WestShore.
“People come here from Victoria because they don’t want to do a normal grocery stop the way they’d be able to do at the Wal-Mart (Supercentre).”
Geoff Nagle, Morguard Investment’s director of development for Western Canada, said the geographic location of Uptown allows to serve the entire region.
“If you’re travelling the south Island, you pass this site no matter which route you’re going,” he said. “So we do expect that the centre will draw regionally.”
The existing Town and Country Wal-Mart was open before the Langford Wal-Mart, and the Saanich store didn’t see an impact to sales when the West Shore location opened.
kslavin@saanichnews.com
