What’s up with Blaine? The border community is perking up with these new projects

Pulling off the freeway into this border town over the years, the first thing people saw was gas stations.

Blaine still plenty of places to fill up, but the landscape has changed. The first structure many drivers now see on Blaine’s main street is a 48-foot building that has the look of a lighthouse and is home to a Starbucks and a visitor center. The Starbucks opened July 26, offering a drive-through, fireplace and outdoor seating.

Near the new lighthouse building, an organic clothing retail outlet store recently opened, along with a vegan restaurant/organic juice bar. A taco restaurant is under construction near Starbucks. More restaurants, condominiums and retail stores are working their way through the planning stages, much of it along Peace Portal Drive in Blaine’s central business district.

In the past two years other eateries have arrived, including the Peace Arch City Cafe and The Vault Wine Bar. That’s in addition to plenty of new mail service businesses so Canadians can pick up orders from Amazon. It’s changed Blaine in a way Mike Hill hasn’t seen before. Hill, who has operated the Chevron gas station since 1992, was behind the development of the lighthouse building with his wife, Skye.

“Blaine has had a change in attitude,” said Hill, when asked why he chose now to build this building, called SkyeHill Station.

Other developers have started taking an interest in Blaine. Mike Mulder, whose family developed the Grandview Industrial Park, recently purchased an old building next to the new Edaleen Dairy store and ice cream shop. He’s planning on tearing the building down and constructing a three-story structure with commercial on the bottom and condominiums on top, overlooking Drayton Harbor and Semiahmoo Bay.

He hadn’t really thought of developing buildings in Blaine, but decided to check the town out at the urging of some friends.

“Blaine has been kind of a sleeper community,” Mulder said. “It’s been stigmatized as a bar town, but it’s now developed a different personality. It is becoming a small seaside place that people enjoy visiting for the day.”

Canadian visitors

The town remains a popular place for British Columbia visitors, despite the relatively weak Canadian dollar. One reason for the visits is something Blaine has offered for years: Lower gas prices, even with the stronger U.S. dollar. According to an article in Blaine’s weekly newspaper, The Northern Light, Blaine gas stations sold 2.14 million gallons of gas in June, a more than 50 percent increase compared to June 2017.

The other factor is e-commerce. To avoid international shipping fees and other delays, Canadians will set up a mailbox in Blaine and pick up items bought on popular websites like Amazon. Along with the Blaine Post Office, the community has around 20 mail service businesses in a town of around 5,315 people.

At Hill’s Chevron station, the typical new customer is a Canadian filling up on gas while picking up packages and maybe getting something to eat. Hill believes in some ways that e-commerce is Blaine’s Bellis Fair mall, given the amount of online shopping people do these days.

The completed projects seem to be drawing interest from other developers. Mike Jones, Blaine’s interim city manager, said they are seeing a lot of inquiries for food and beverage projects, like distilleries, breweries and a seafood restaurant. He’s also seeing people with interests in boutique retail, something he would like to see more of in the community.

“That kind of retail gives people a place to browse and spend some time, to window shop. Together with restaurants and bars they create a destination,” Jones said.

Housing also on the rise

Along with an uptick in commercial projects, residential building has also increased. According to the city of Blaine, it issued building permits for 16 residential units in 2014. That jumped to 30 units in 2015 and 72 units in 2016. After a dip to 46 units in 2017, Jones is projecting that the city will issue permits for 75 residential units this year.

Jones said downtown housing took a little more time than commercial development to get going, but that is changing now.

“It was kind of inevitable,” Jones said. “Blaine has a beautiful downtown with nice access to parks and the shoreline. It’s a very walkable place, but services were lacking. Now that services are coming, attracting housing just makes sense.”