Surrey Condo Development Fire at Quattro
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I’m not usually one to break stories on my blog (leave that to the newsies) however this one hits very close to home.
The condo development Quattro, that claimed it was going to “bring Yaletown to Surrey”, is up in flames this afternoon (a message on Twitter from Airdrie led me to look in to this story).
“Surrey firefighters are battling a massive blaze on 138th Avenue near 107-A Avenue in Whalley. The red brick apartment building under construction went up in flames around 4 this afternoon… …It’s believed there’s a large crane in the middle of the fire, and Hydro poles in the area have also been caught in the blaze.” [News1130]
This isn’t the first time that a new condo block has been taken down by fire. Hopefully no one was injured and that this isn’t too much of a step back for development in the area.
Update: You can now read more about this on CTV as well as the Surrey Now that reports: “Quattro made news in May when pre-sale buyers snapped up 109 suites valued at $23 million the first day the project went on the market. Fortunately the building was not yet occupied.”
News1130 continues: “Around 100 customers are without phone and internet service and 4,400 customers are without power right now. The Quattro development was being built in several stages on a 10 acre site and would have included almost 400 condos, most of which had been sold out.”
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I saw this from the skytrain on my way home from work today.
And I saw it from the SFU Surrey campus. Simply awful! At the peak of it, the flames were higher than the construction crane… even more sad because I remember thinking, when I rode past the development recently, how wrong it seemed for such a large structure to be made completely out of wood.
GVRD Real Estate market chills and condos under development start catching fire. hmm..
i grew up one block from there. i hope those people aren’t gonna get screwed out of their investments. this isn’t the first time a development has been destroyed and had the pre-buyers get the shaft
Bring Yaletown to Surrey? You mean Surrey doesn’t have excessive noise pollution, fashionistas, iPhone addicts and over priced restaurants?
My friend got some footage of it. SHe was really clsoe too!
I was there. 🙂
I missed the biggest flames, but there should be a lot of them on the web soon – there were tons of people with cameras. I got a good shot of the cab of the crane on fire..
I’m sure a certain website should get it. heh.
Huh, we all got an email around 4 yesterday telling us not to drive down that street after work. I really hope the buyers had insurance.
I am an astronaut and I saw it from the moon.
@william s.: Did the little green men point it out to you?
To answer a few people’s questions, the units haven’t been turned over so it will be on the developer’s insurance, and he already announced he had adequate coverage. He did state that pre-buyers will have to understand there will extra time needed before they get their condos.
I doubt anyone will “get the shaft”; most who have had issues in the past had it happen not do to fire but rather to unscrupulous developers who wanted to take advantage of the increase in value that had happened during the building process. Real estate is in a slow down and so this developer will probably be quite happy to not have to try and re-sell these units.
I actually saw a pre-buyer on the news last night say “I hope this doesn’t affect our likelihood of moving in in December”. I hope they were just in shock and not serious.
This size of building being wood framed is not a safety risk; these are safer than the average house once built due to fire breaks, sprinklers and other required features. This one burned because it was still just wood; there were no drywall or other things designed to stop a fire installed yet.
Make this the third recent occurrence like this, I heard all the emergency vehicles for our under construction condo fire in Abbotsford but didn’t go out on my porch. Neighbours in my building tell me I could have taken impressive pictures of the flames over top of the trees.
I heard on the radio this morning that this is a suspected arson case. Footage of onlookers is allegedly being recorded to see if police can gather a list of suspects, since arsonists like to watch their handiwork. Was this standard police procedure before CSI became so popular?
I work at the site and was there from the start of the fire. I am sure it was arson because we had a fire on monday too. I think people are trying to stop us because the flamingo hotel is going to be demolished to make room for our next project.
I purchased a condo in quattro. It has been nightmare. They fooled us with big hype and ads – Yaletown in Surrey, largest development in Surrey etc. Finally it looks like we will be left with a crapy condo in Whally. We can get good apartments in Vancouver for the price we paid. I want to get out of this mess. I will pleased if they just return my deposits. I will never do any business in Surrey. I am singe parent with a one year old baby. I can not believe these people play with me. Any suggestion how I can get out this mess. Thanks
[…] happened to the basement suit? Those were the days. Just a few weeks after the Quattro fire (by the way, it’s worth taking a look at some of the comments on that post), Surrey largest […]
Quattro.. yeesh, I once lived on 138th Street near 106th. Long before the Long and McQuade appeared on 104th. The neighbourhood was and continues to be a veritable hellhole.
Firstly, the electronic monitoring branch still exists on that street – for convicted criminals who have that special house arrest bracelet… and it goes down from there.
But let’s go waaay back – back in the day, crazed pit bulls (mostly escaped from their loving families) wandered the street free. The next street over (137th Street) had no street lights (very scary at night) and the typical resident either sold crack from their doorstep or had numerous disassembled vehicles on display in their front yard – not cars, usually trucks.
Crime in the area is still high and save for Podhale Sausages, a couple strip clubs and a Pizza hut, there’s no services in the area, so I doubt a Yaletown-like neighbourhood will ever come into existence there anytime soon. (shudders)
Hi Peter,
A group of quattro owners are getting together and have hired a lawyer. Contact Praveena at [email protected] (604-831-0302) for more information.
Vancouver1
i think its absolutely disgusting the way in which the agressive marketting team has promoted these apartments actually being in yale town, when in reality they are in a sh*t hole known as Whalley.
What the f*ck and who the f*ck do Quattro think they are? considering that these apartments went up in smoke questions the motives of the construction company? insruance fraud or shoddy workmanship? you decide i feel sorry for the poor people who are getting fleeced by these idiots.
[comment expletives edited]