My basic desire is something that provides the atmosphere and energy of a public market. But maybe I've been tainted by travel and watching too much Parts Unknown.

sounds very fishy. I'll bet they are not even from Gimli.

I'd like to see something along the lines of the Milwaukee public market. It was built in 2005 at a cost of 10M, i think the area could definitely support something on this scale, especially given how popular farmers markets have been downtown in recent years.

https://milwaukeepublicmarket.org/

http://www.platomadison.org/Resource...c%20Market.jpg

https://media.mnn.com/assets/images/....838x0_q80.jpg

^ It's actually surprising that we don't have a big permanent market like that. All we have is the St. Norbert market. I think The Forks Market could have played that role, but it's unlikely that they would ever go from being the quasi-retail mall they are now to being a food market.

Something like the Milwaukee market would be perfect for the Marketlands site. It could fit into the northernmost 1/3 of the block.

That would be amazing – the good thing about something like that with kiosks is that it can be a mix of food and retail. Would be good for local artisans/makers to have a little shop.

The number one major set back for The Forks is it's isolated location from the rest of Downtown. A food market is going to thrive on 6-7 day a week activity and will heavily rely on foot traffic from the surrounding population. Being that many of a food market's items are perishable (cheese, meats, fish, baked goods) the office worker lunch time crowd and permanent residential population is key to it's success. The Forks market is too segregated from that downtown lunch time office crowd, on a one hour lunch break it's too far of a walk especially in winter. I could see things changing in the future as the forks better integrates it's connectivity with the downtown and grows it's residential population and relays less on being a drive to destination.

Agreed, i could see many businesses setting up a satellite location, like some of the fantastic bakeries that have opened over the years or coffee shops, meat/butcher deli, Bothwell cheese...

Wow, spend a little time and cruise around in the Historic Third Ward area of Milwaukee on Google Earth. What a great neighborhood (similar to the Exchange). Also love how they utilize their waterways, 5 -10 storey apartments all along, boat parking. I know our river water levels fluctuate a lot but we could be a little more creative in living along them. I will have to visit this area.

That was the point I was trying to get across. There are many fish here but they are poorly promoted. If only we could have them in markets and restaurants on a bigger scale.

It's totally worth a visit! My wife and I were in Milwaukee a couple of years ago and we loved it. There's definitely a great small city "vibe" there that we felt could be emulated in Winnipeg. Also, go to dinner at The Safe House, a very fun theme restaurant (with great burgers).

^ multiple chefs I know have also complained about how they would like to feature more Manitoba fish on menus but how many difficulties there are getting it...

Considering the proximity to one of the largest fresh water lakes in the world and that the commercial fishery is producing more fish now then anytime in it's history, local fish should be more of a staple in the southern Manitoba diet. in recent years The lake is producing unheard of yields of bigger meaty fish.

It is an excellent model. I have been there only once but man what a great city.

I think now that the freshwater fish marketing corporation is out of Manitoba, we hopefully may see more types of fish on the market. I just hope Lake Winnipeg survives. Commercial fresh water fishing is so behind in Manitoba.

The FFM is not out of Manitoba, it just no longer has a monopoly. Unfortunately, nothing effective has yet emerged to pick up the slack.

will take time to replace ffm with competitive entities as all the folks that knew how to run and do that sorta buisnes are all retired or passed away as the change happend so long ago

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DstxP6nU4AALB8I.jpg
https://twitter.com/centreventure/st...74241664204802

Goodbye Public Safety Building.

I saved a picture of it just in case I wanna look at it sometimes.

So there will be affordable housing there? What exactly does that mean? Subsidized housing controlled by Manitoba housing? Seems like a weird place to put affordable housing.