Quote:
Originally Posted by ssiguy
As the downtown population of Edmonton increases so will the vitality of the city but it has an exceptionally long way to go and certainly more than any other {non-suburban} city of over 200,000 in the country. I've been to all of them and Edmonton stands out as being the worse by a long shot.
You need people to create vitality but you need more than that. Despite it's growing downtown population, there isn't one single block of a "complete street" in the entire city centre. A restaurant beside a bank tower beside a parking garage entrance beside barber shop beside an office tower beside a hotel is not a complete street. A complete street is basically one where you can sit and watch the people go by and the entire inner city of Edmonton doesn't have one.
This is in very stark contrast to Calgary where the entire inner city is nothing but one complete street connected to the other. Considering they have always had roughly the same size, same natural resource based economies, similar historic founding, similar high incomes, and relatively same weather, the 2 couldn't have more dissimilar urban development if they tried.
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I don't know if Calgary has one single "complete street" in its downtown by your overly strict definition. Lots of bank towers, office towers, hotels, and barbershops in downtown Calgary. By your logic that elimates entire blocks from contention...
I would agree that downtown Edmonton has work to do. But to say there isn't one place to sit and watch the world in inner city of Edmonton is an exaggeration. Rice Howard Way, 104 st, Leg grounds would all fit in my eye.