Plans to reimagine the building at Cavendish and Kildare begin to take shape

Aaron Bitton has big plans for the office building at the corner of Cavendish and Kildare. Via his family’s company, Holand Leasing, he has already submitted two zoning amendment requests to city council to add a pharmacy and a café.  A public consultation meeting was held on July 11 and nobody showed up. Those changes will be formally adopted on August 14.

Aaron Bitton with me in front of the building.

Aaron, 31,  grew up in Côte Saint-Luc and his father Gad raised the family here and remains in the same house. Gad is the ultimate success story. His group of car dealerships and real estate holdings continue to grow. Aaron had been living in Israel for a decade. When he returned home with his wife  Dalia and their five children last fall he was tasked with a number of projects including this building in the heart of my District 2.

For years the building housed Police Station 9. The Royal Bank remains anchor tenant.  Aaron has his sights set on attracting medical and dental clinics, massage therapists, music studios, professionals and a daycare. While there is no present-day zoning for the latter, a trial run has been in place for months. Hebrew Academy’s daycare has been parked here temporarily after a pipe burst in its headquarters. I  accompanied Aaron to the building recently. Drop off was scattered between 7:30 am and 9 am. There is an entrance via the back parking lot, so if this comes to council a lot of the obvious questions will already have answers.

The café will have an outdoor entrance and a terrasse. Aaron hopes work can begin on this soon. I believe this will be a wonderful addition to the neighbourhood. As for the pharmacy, I did express some concern about this given the fact we have one of the best in the business across the street. Pharmaprix Cavendish is expertly run by the husband and wife team of David Banon and Sarah Ettedgui and serves the community well. Aaron has assured council he is looking to add a very small pharmacy that will there to handle prescriptions for the medical clinics he hopes to attract.

Aaron would also like to see if he can lure  clinics for blood tests and radiology. Family Physician Dr. Norman Sabin, a regular council meeting attendee who practices out of the Queen Elizabeth Health Centre, said he’d relocate to the Cavendish/Kildare building if such services would be offered.

As for parking, there are 96 indoor and 76 outdoor. Unquestionably, with thousands of people living within easy walking distance, potential medical clinics would not necessarily require people to arrive via a vehicle.

“Last year one of our major tenants left after having been here for 10 years,” Aaron explained. “That left us with a 75 percent vacancy rate. We intend to fill all of those spots in a way that the neighbourhood benefits as well.”