Opal and Picknelly drop the ball

The signs are down, the buildings are empty.  By now, the renovation of the historic complex of buildings that Clarke School sold to Peter Picknelly and his development group, Opal Real Estate, should be almost complete. Neighbors and the city were told the renovated high-end apartments overlooking the valley would be ready for occupation by the winter of 2014, then it was the spring of 2015, then neighbors were told that it would ready in the summer of 2015. But there have never been architectural drawings and no signs up boasting of their bank financing and showing what the area would look like.  The focus of the project kept shifting and last spring they were talking about adding more residential units and less commercial space. The last the building inspector's office heard from the developer was last spring, when they applied for a demolition permit to clear out the buildings to the bare walls.  The trucks came roaring up the hill, and by the early summer that work was done, and they left. And now almost a year later nothing is happening. Click and read the full story here