Former Yangtze Restaurant building in Ottawa’s Chinatown sits empty as property owner looks for new tenant

The Somerset Street Chinatown BIA is searching for a new tenant for the former Yangtze Restaurant building. CTV’s Kimberley Fowler reports.

The Somerset Street Chinatown BIA is working with the owner of the former Yangtze Restaurant building to find a restaurant to move into the vacant property, with the BIA’s executive director saying the neighbourhood is in need of an anchor business to host events.

There is a listing on Realtor.ca looking for a new tenant to lease the building at 700 Somerset Street West, after the Yangtze Restaurant closed in 2024.

Yukang Li tells CTV News Ottawa that the building is one of the “biggest venues” in the Chinatown area, and the BIA is working with the building’s owner to find a new restaurant to occupy the building.

“It used to be a community anchor hosting large-scale community events like birthdays, weddings and other important events. But now, following the closure of Yangtze, we have no place to go for bigger events,” Li said Tuesday morning.

“So, it’s a gathering place and it’s part of the community’s history.”

The building was sold for $3 million in 2024, but Li said a deal for a “high-end seafood restaurant” to move into the property the deal didn’t come together, and it’s now listed for lease.

“The property was sold to a new owner, and since then the new owner and the BIA have been working closely to bring in a new business, ideally a similar business – a restaurant business that resonates with what Yangtze has been serving for the community in the past 40 years,” Li said.

“We are hopeful. The BIA has been assisting the property owner to find, potentially, a restaurant business to take over.”

According to the listing on Realtor.ca, the property has nearly 10,000 sq. ft. of flexible space over two floors and is “newly renovated with modern finishings.”

The owner of Yangtze Restaurant told CTV News Ottawa in March 2024 it was time for the family to close the restaurant and put the building up for sale. Yangtze had been serving up dim sum, Cantonese and Szechuan cuisine since it opened at the same location in 1982.

Difficult time for small and medium-sized businesses

The Canadian Federation of Independent Business (CFIB) says it’s a difficult time for small and medium-sized businesses in Canada.

“Rising costs, whether that’s insurance costs, rent costs, operational costs, the entire budget of a small business has increased in the last couple years,” Michelle Auger, CFIB director of trade and marketplace, told CTV News Ottawa on Wednesday. “Businesses are dealing with a lot of red tape and some of them are even saying they’re having challenges finding the right staff, the skilled labor that they need to help grow their businesses.”

Auger says politicians need to pay more attention to the needs of small businesses.

“For the first time ever, there are more businesses exiting than businesses starting,” she said. “It’s a really, really hard time for a lot of small business owners and alarm bells need to be rang for politicians to wake up and reverse this trend.”

Auger says the CFIB is calling on government to reduce regulatory burdens and address labour shortages.

With files from CTV News Ottawa’s William Eltherington and Kimberley Fowler.

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