York employment trends - Changing office locations

NRU
Oct. 21, 2015
By Geordie Gordon

The nature of employment is changing in York Region, and with it a corresponding change is occurring in the desirable physical characteristics of its employment lands. The shift away from manufacturing to service-based activities means pressure on employment areas to be more compact, pedestrian-oriented and transit-supportive.

Watson and Associates highlights this shift in employment over the past decade in a recent report commissioned by York Region. Since the economic downturn in 2008 there has been a decline in manufacturing jobs. York Region, like the GTA, has recovered well but economic activities have evolved to more service-related businesses such as finance, professional and scientific services, for example.

But York Region policy research and forecasting manager Paul Bottomley says this change isn’t a new trend, but one that has been developing since the economic downturn.

“[The report contains] what are the key trends that are occurring today and likely to continue moving forward, and obviously it’s no surprise, we’ve seen a shift from traditional industrial sectors to more service-based sectors,“ he told NRU. “[The report also points to] trends to more mixed-use, amenity-driven employment areas. I think employers have been mentioning that a lot of new employees want to work in areas that have all sorts of amenities, where they can do many things other than just work. So access to support activities, etcetera, [is important]. ... We just wanted to get a handle on some of those key trends and how that might impact what we’re doing on our forecasting and land budget side.”

This shift in the nature of employment is playing out more specifically in communities such as the City of Vaughan where two major trends are impacting employment lands in very different ways. An increase in the goods movement sector is causing growth in warehousing operations.

At the same time, demand is growing for transit-oriented office locations with easy access to amenities.

Vaughan economic development officer Michael Launslager says that Vaughan’s locational advantage makes it attractive to a mix of businesses. This means that Vaughan will continue to require greenfield areas to accommodate large operations with often very specific needs that can limit their ability to redevelop and locate in existing employment areas.

“We have a rich infrastructure of transportation in terms of rail, highways. We’re close to the airport. So I think we’re starting to see more of these really large-scale warehousing distribution facilities come to Vaughan ... In terms of the scale in that sector there’s definitely been a shift to some really huge buildings,” he told NRU.

But Launslager says what the report really highlights is the evolution of office uses in the region, which is impacting the location and design of office spaces in Vaughan.

“The other sector that [Watson’s report] really zeroed in on is the creative and knowledge-based sector. From that side of things we do understand that the York region is becoming more attractive to those industries and specifically office users that would define that industry. We’re really cognizant of the fact that business in these industries-their priorities-is changing as [is] their employees and employee base. In the 905 specifically, I think there has been more of this greenfield office development. You think of somewhere like Meadowvale where there is just office tower after office tower, but we’re really seeing an opportunity to move away from that and build more complete communities.”

Vaughan is responding to new demand in office space, in part, through its approach to building office space in the Vaughan Metropolitan Centre.

“[The Vaughan Metropolitan Centre] shows how we’re taking a more holistic approach to building the physical office environment for some of these growing industries. And we do realize for companies to really be able to attract and retain really good employees, really strong, smart, younger employees, they need to have more than office space in a greenfield somewhere. There’s got to be restaurants, transportation, access to shopping, and those kinds of things that are beyond just the traditional office [uses],” Launslager said.

Unlike traditional employment areas which tended to be isolated car-oriented swaths of land, the new emphasis is on better connectivity to transit and hence a shift in location to centres and corridors.

“I think the preference is for a larger amount of that type of employment to go towards our centres and our corridors where the transit is, that only makes sense. Recognizing for the most part that the majority of that type of employment today and in the past has located in employment parks, what we’re really looking at is a bit of a shift in terms of location for major office development. ... We’d like to shift a larger portion [of office uses] to our centres and corridors. There’s always going to be demand for major office [buildings 20,000 ft 2 or larger] on employment lands. The more we can get where our transit is, the better off we are,” Bottomley said.