Canadian real estate investment trust Allied Properties is moving forward with plans to develop a 10-story AI data center in downtown Vancouver, marking the company's return to the data center sector after divesting its Toronto carrier hotel portfolio to KDDI in 2023. The municipally approved site at 150 West Georgia represents a significant shift from the location's original commercial development plans, which had called for a mixed-use tower with office and entertainment components.
The project has secured a substantial power commitment from local utility BC Hydro, which has agreed to provide 39 megawatts of capacity with a clear pathway to expand to 50 megawatts and potential for up to 100 megawatts. This power availability positions the site as a viable location for AI workloads, which typically demand significantly higher power densities than traditional enterprise data center applications. Allied indicated that the facility could be integrated with Creative Energy's district heating network, potentially allowing waste heat from the data center to serve Vancouver's downtown core.
The development timeline has been extended as the project pivoted from its original office-focused design to a data center configuration. Allied Properties announced during its most recent quarterly earnings that it has extended a loan to Vancouver-based real estate developer Westbank on the 150 West Georgia site through the end of December 2026, with additional security provisions to accommodate the project's new direction. Westbank had previously planned to develop a 17-story commercial building and six-story entertainment complex on the same parcel.
The site itself has a lengthy industrial history, currently housing a natural gas heating plant dating back to the 1970s that is being replaced and upgraded. Underground construction tied to Creative Energy's heating network began approximately two years ago, though vertical construction of the original commercial project never commenced. The property had previously been addressed as 720 Beatty Street and 701 Expo Boulevard before the current 150 West Georgia designation.
Recent reporting from DH Urbanized had indicated the site would be developed into a 48-story mixed-use hotel and residential tower with a data center component, totaling 700,000 square feet. The relationship between those previously reported plans and Allied's newly announced 10-story data center remains unclear, as the company has not shared full details of the planned project's specifications or footprint.
Allied Properties and Westbank have outlined plans to sell a major portion of the completed site to a Canadian operator, which would partially repay Allied's loan while both development partners retain a minority interest in the facility. The companies have not disclosed whether they have identified or secured commitments from a potential operator for the site. Allied Properties specializes in owning and developing urban office space across Canada and previously operated three carrier hotel data centers in the Toronto area.
Separately, Westbank is pursuing a different data center conversion project less than two miles south of the Allied site. The company has filed plans to convert the existing office building at 111 East 5th Avenue into a dedicated data center facility within the current structure. Known as M3, the three-story building was constructed in 1977 and previously housed social media management software provider Hootsuite.
The proposed conversion would dedicate 83,245 square feet of the 133,125-square-foot building to data center use, with underground parking areas converted into support space for the facility. Westbank's plans include maintaining a restaurant on the ground floor while the bulk of the structure transitions to technology infrastructure. The company's portfolio spans multiple real estate categories including residential, hotels, retail, workspaces, district energy, housing, exhibitions, and public art.
Vancouver has established itself as one of Canada's three primary data center markets alongside Toronto and Montreal, attracting both international operators and regional players. Current data center providers with presence in the city include Cologix, eStruxture, Hut 8, and Equinix, along with several locally focused companies. The western Canadian city's combination of relatively cool climate, hydroelectric power availability, and connectivity infrastructure has supported steady expansion of digital infrastructure in recent years.