Clock ticks down for $200M Saskatoon proposal

A deadline is looming in connection with a proposed $200-million hotel and condo project in Saskatoon's River Landing district.

Lake Placid Developments of Calgary has until Nov. 1 to prove it has the money to go ahead with the development.  

That deadline was set after an earlier Lake Placid deal to built the complex on prime riverfront land fell apart more than a year ago.

Lake Placid spokesman Michael Lobsinger asked for another chance and received it. Today, officials are not exactly brimming with optimism the project is ready to go.

"We'll have to wait and see," Mayor Don Atchison said. "But when November the 1st comes, that certainly is the end of the line."

The company has been in the news in Calgary recently for another large proposed development that never saw construction cranes.

Lake Placid dug a three-storey deep hole in downtown Calgary in 2007. It was to be the first stage of a multi-million-dollar condo project, but that's as far as the company got.

"From Lake Placid, Michael Lobsinger, we're being told that it was just finances weren't there," City of Calgary special projects officer Cliff de Jong said.

In September, the city ordered the company to fill in the hole.

Lake Placid appealed and got an extension. It now has until this Friday to start work on the project.

"We have to act like as if Lake Placid is not going to be able to comply with this order," de Jong said. "Our level of confidence in Lake Placid to deliver on this is not very high."

Lake Placid officials did not return CBC calls requesting an interview.