Surrey’s Health and Technology District is expanding once again.
Lark Group held a groundbreaking event for the City Centre 3 building Friday (Nov. 16). Representatives from the City of Surrey, Lark Group, Surrey Board of Trade, Downtown Surrey BIA, Helius Medical Technologies and the Health and Technology District attended the event.
Kirk Fisher, vice-president of Lark Group, said Lark Group first bought land in the city in 2004.
“Laurel Place started in 2006. Kinsmen place started in 2008. City Centre 1 in 2012. City Centre 2 in 2015 and City Centre 3 in 2018. We have City Centre 4 to City Centre 8, that will go at about that same pace.”
At a groundbreaking event for the @healthtechdist City Centre 3 building. Here are some artist renderings of the building while I wait for the event to start. #SurreyBC @SurreyNowLeader pic.twitter.com/sj83hff1U4
— Lauren Collins (@laurenpcollins1) November 16, 2018
Ryan D’Arcy, president & chief scientific officer of Health Tech Connex, says the goal at the @healthtechdist is to “lay the smack down” on brain injury and brain disease. #SurreyBC
— Lauren Collins (@laurenpcollins1) November 16, 2018
Mayor Doug McCallum says “we’re happy” to have the Lark Group working in the city. The Lark Group is behind the Health and Technology District. #SurreyBC
— Lauren Collins (@laurenpcollins1) November 16, 2018
City Centre 3, according to news release from Lark Group that is developing the district, will be a 130,000-sq.-ft., 10-storey LEED Gold certified building with street-level retail space and a rooftop terrace. It will be the third building in a series of “up to eight tech buildings.”
“Upon completion, the overall District will consist of over 1.5 million square-feet and estimates over 15,000 jobs, and will contribute over $1.1 billion annually into B.C.’s economy,” the release reads.
The Health and Technology District “is one of B.C.’s most rapidly growing and dynamic new health-tech sectors located in Surrey’s emerging innovation ecosystem.” The district is located across from Surrey Memorial Hospital.
“The District is where a collaborative cluster of multinational and start-up companies, international partners, clinical and research facilities, scientists, innovators and entrepreneurs, work together in partnership to accelerate the implementation of technologies and solutions towards health care impacts and improvements.”
Fisher said the people and groups that are working in these buildings “are changing the world.”
This past spring, Lark Group unveiled the City Centre 2, a 185,000-sq.-ft., 12-storey building located at 9639 137A St. City Centre 1 was completed in 2014.
The news release states the Health and Technology District “continues to build at an exciting rate,” highlighting the tenants of City Centre 2 and the launch of Fraser Health’s Surrey Urgent Primary Care clinic at the district.
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Anchor tenants in the new City Centre 2 development will be longtime Surrey-based tech company Safe Software and Surrey’s independent school Regent Christian Academy, which were expected to move in this fall.
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Mayor Doug McCallum was on hand at the groundbreaking, and congratulated all those involved with the district.
“Although we weren’t involved in the health and technology area here, certainly when I have turned and looked around, it’s a great district,” he said. “As we grow in the world and as we grow in Surrey, there’s no better industry, no better facility than you have here in the district than health and technology.”
Ryan D’Arcy, president and chief scientific officer of HealthTech Connex, said the Health and Technology District and City Centre 3 are about “continued growth” and “unleashing the potential of our brain and all our brains together.”
“We’re looking at concrete reality; changes that were imagined and then demonstrated in very, very short time,” D’Arcy said. “Our goal here in the Health and Technology District… is to lay the smackdown on brain disease and brain injury, and to show that you can use technology to touch lives radically, immediately and in ways that you can’t imagine.”
– with files from Amy Reid
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