More worker accommodation to be built in Yellowknife

With hundreds of workers expected to arrive in Yellowknife in the coming months, efforts are under way to build places for them to stay.

Richard Skinner says he has spent the past decade building NWT worker accommodation, which he describes as being like small hotel rooms with private washrooms.

On Monday, he told city councillors about plans to build more worker accommodation in Yellowknife this year.

“There is quite a bit of demand,” he said.

“I know a lot of construction happened this last summer and a lot of people stayed in apartments, like four or five people to an apartment.”

Skinner said his company has already built a new facility on Utsingi Drive, which currently has 76 rooms. In March, he said, the company plans to increase the number of rooms to accommodate people working on a water treatment plant at the Giant Mine site.

The company is also housing workers involved in a lithium project just outside Yellowknife, he added, and expects more workers to arrive in the spring related to the construction of a Department of Defence building and filming of a movie.

Skinner said demand is so great that his company plans to apply for a development permit to build four more modular units on another piece of land, which will have around 38 rooms each. By the end of September, he expects to have a total of 240 rooms.

Several projects are expected to attract hundreds of workers to Yellowknife, including the remediation of Giant Mine, but there are few housing options.

Last month, a city development officer approved a permit for a 98-unit workers’ accommodation building on Utsingi Drive. Last week, another permit was approved for workers’ accommodation on Ellesmere Drive.

Northern real estate developer Homes North Ltd has expressed interest in installing a facility that could house around 450 workers on Deh Cho Boulevard.

While work camps are currently prohibited under Yellowknife’s community plan, worker accommodation is allowed in some areas.

According to the city’s bylaw definition, worker accommodation is “a facility constructed to provide housing for workers in the form of complete dwelling units, typically for related business for an appropriate project, term or seasonal purpose.”

By the definition included in the city’s community plan, a work camp is a “temporary and moveable structure built to accommodate workers for a specific project or job. Usually work camps are located in remote areas with little access to permanent dwellings.”

Charlsey White, the city’s director of planning and development, told councillors on Monday that research they had requested from city staff on workers’ accommodation should be released soon.