Winnipeg Construction VIII

[Riverman]

Originally Posted by esquire

You're right in that if we just keep building roads and suburbia like it's 1972, it won't happen.

Nothing to do with suburbs. This is a winter city, everybody drives except those that can not afford to. Taking the bus here is horrible.

[biguc]

Originally Posted by Riverman

Nothing to do with suburbs. This is a winter city, everybody drives except those that can not afford to. Taking the bus here is horrible.

The biggest reason we need Simplicity back is because Riverman says waaaayyyy less unqualified bullshit when there's a decent right-wing voice around.

[Riverman]

Your opinion, like you, is worthless.

[biguc]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pWdd6_ZxX8c

[esquire]

Originally Posted by Riverman

everybody drives except those that can not afford to. Taking the bus here is horrible.

Demonstrably false.

[CoryB]

^^ Try taking a bus outside weekday rush hour service or going between two points in different neighborhoods that do not include downtown. If you stay within a very narrow score transit in Winnipeg is acceptable but move a little past that and you quickly learn how poor it is.

[Spocket]

Depends entirely on where you live.

If you live closer to the core then service improves because you have more options. If you live in the suburbs then it's pure shit.

[JamieDavid Exchange]

I wonder if Winnipeg will ever catch a lucky break.... Great news for Edmonton. http://www.mailoutinteractive.com/Industry/View.aspx?id=683211&q=870545713&qz=1abfff

[esquire]

Originally Posted by CoryB

^^ Try taking a bus outside weekday rush hour service or going between two points in different neighborhoods that do not include downtown. If you stay within a very narrow score transit in Winnipeg is acceptable but move a little past that and you quickly learn how poor it is.

For the purposes of most weekday rush hour downtown commuters in Winnipeg, transit service is somewhere between acceptable and excellent. This does not apply to some people on the far edges of town or those in exurbia, but that's what they signed up for.

Calgary has lost plenty of surface parking lots to development over the last 15 years but they seem to be getting by just fine... people take buses and C-trains, in a climate not all that much different than ours. How do they manage?

[trueviking]

Originally Posted by CoryB

Winnipeg already has businesses leaving downtown due to the "lack of parking". There are also many documented cases of condos being built in the Exchange where they are an extremely tough sale due to the "lack of parking". It definitely makes sense to then continue to reduce the available parking in the downtown area while also increasing demand. Running a quick search on Impark for monthly parking shows Winnipeg and Vancouver already have similar rates. Also sitting in your ivory tower suggesting people will find alternatives speaks volumes about how often you have actually taken public transit in Winnipeg. This is not Vancouver with a Skytrain network and we are a lifetime away from that. It has taken around 10 years and more than 30 years of talking before that to get a single rapid transit line built. Saying new developments downtown should be approved with little or no parking to replace surface lots is going to do far more to set the forward progress of Winnipeg back than tearing down a single story building every will. Saying any different is trying to present a textbook ideal vision rather than working to adapt to the local market conditions.

you are definitely alone on your vision of urbanism.

actual car ownership in osborne village is less than half a car per residential unit. Zoning requires 1.5 per unit. You build a real urban neighbourhood and you don't need parking lots.

You are right. this isn't vancouver with its skytrain network...and it never will be if we accept that the ideal for winnipeg is to be subservient to the car. You make the argument right there.

Get rid of the parking and the need for transit accelerates. Why do you think ottawa and calgary are scrambling to build as much transit as they can?...and why do you think most people here could not care less?.....it is a priority in those cities because they have successfully reduced their surface parking. One condition affects the other.

Your idea that we must have surface parking because we don't have a rapid transit is backwards. We don't have rapid transit because we have too much surface parking.

I can provide you with thousands of examples of great cities that function very well with very little surface parking. please provide me with one example of an active vibrant downtown that is also parking dominant.

[trueviking]

Originally Posted by biguc

The biggest reason we need Simplicity back is because Riverman says waaaayyyy less unqualified bullshit when there's a decent right-wing voice around.

i miss simplicity as well.

[trueviking]

Originally Posted by Riverman

Nothing to do with suburbs. This is a winter city, everybody drives except those that can not afford to. Taking the bus here is horrible.

winnipeg's biggest cop out...its too cold here to be a real city....its always -40 in winnipeg.

250 days per year the temperature is above freezing. How about we build a city for those days and let the other 100 take care of themselves.

[Bdog]

Originally Posted by trueviking

actual car ownership in osborne village is less than half a car per residential unit. Zoning requires 1.5 per unit. You build a real urban neighbourhood and you don't need parking lots.

And yet, wait lists for parking in osborne are deep, while empty spots are almost impossible to find. Go figure!

[Wigglez]

Originally Posted by Bdog

And yet, wait lists for parking in osborne are deep, while empty spots are almost impossible to find. Go figure!

And yet, in-spite of lack of parking, Osborne village is still Winnipeg's most densely populated neighbourhood.

Perhaps a well built neighbourhood will attract residents who want to enjoy an urban lifestyle even if they cant park their car reliably.

[BAKGUY]

Originally Posted by esquire

No one doubts that some parking is needed, but look at a Google Map satellite image of that area... there is a sea of parking around there and it is far more than could be reasonably said to be necessary.

I agree with you re: the old Gio's. I was thinking about it the other day as I drove by. It looks like an abandoned building now... is something actually going to happen with that site anytime soon?

Although the owner of the building was intending to put up a 20+ floor condo, the latest I heard a week ago was none other than McDee's was seriously considering building there .. Eeew! I guess if it were to be enveloped in a 20 + level condo, apartment, office, hotel or combination tower I could tolerate that!

[steveosnyder]

Originally Posted by trueviking

you are definitely alone on your vision of urbanism.

actual car ownership in osborne village is less than half a car per residential unit. Zoning requires 1.5 per unit. You build a real urban neighbourhood and you don't need parking lots.

You are right. this isn't vancouver with its skytrain network...and it never will be if we accept that the ideal for winnipeg is to be subservient to the car. You make the argument right there.

Get rid of the parking and the need for transit accelerates. Why do you think ottawa and calgary are scrambling to build as much transit as they can?...and why do you think most people here could not care less?.....it is a priority in those cities because they have successfully reduced their surface parking. One condition affects the other.

Your idea that we must have surface parking because we don't have a rapid transit is backwards. We don't have rapid transit because we have too much surface parking.

I can provide you with thousands of examples of great cities that function very well with very little surface parking. please provide me with one example of an active vibrant downtown that is also parking dominant.

It's not just too much parking, but prioritizing automobiles above everything and everyone else.

Originally Posted by Bdog

And yet, wait lists for parking in osborne are deep, while empty spots are almost impossible to find. Go figure!

Perhaps we should start charging for on-street parking in the village. Our councillor there has a bit of cognitive dissonance. On one hand she claims to be an urbanist, but on the other she refuses to add parking meters to the 2 areas of her ward that need it.

[Cyro]

Originally Posted by steveosnyder

Perhaps we should start charging for on-street parking in the village..

No. A Maximum 2 hour parking limit will suffice with proper enforcement by the COW. Don't send visitors who will still visit the Village/Crescentwood(corydon), areas by vehicle onto the nearby residential streets to turn a horrible problem into a total clusterfuck.

[esquire]

I can't say I'd be crazy about the idea of metred parking around the Corydon and Osborne strips... it's not even all that crazy-busy in there during the daytime really, it tends to be more in the evenings that parking becomes a real challenge, and meters are typically off duty by that point anyway.

However, it makes you wonder why they don't have it when Selkirk Avenue, of all places, does.

[steveosnyder]

Originally Posted by Cyro

No. A Maximum 2 hour parking limit will suffice with proper enforcement by the COW. Don't send visitors who will still visit the Village/Crescentwood(corydon), areas by vehicle onto the nearby residential streets to turn a horrible problem into a total clusterfuck.

2 hour max parking with enforcement ends up costing the city money more than it makes. The other thing is the mentality that the people "visiting" Corydon/Osborne are all taking their cars. Talk to people in and around Osborne/Corydon and you will find that a lot of them are there from within the neighbourhood.

Originally Posted by esquire

I can't say I'd be crazy about the idea of metred parking around the Corydon and Osborne strips... it's not even all that crazy-busy in there during the daytime really, it tends to be more in the evenings that parking becomes a real challenge, and meters are typically off duty by that point anyway.

However, it makes you wonder why they don't have it when Selkirk Avenue, of all places, does.

They justify the meters on Selkirk because they say that people commute to the businesses on Selkirk and park for 8 hours at a time. They are trying to drive those people to off-street parking stalls so the businesses there can use the on-street ones.

[esquire]

Originally Posted by steveosnyder

They justify the meters on Selkirk because they say that people commute to the businesses on Selkirk and park for 8 hours at a time. They are trying to drive those people to off-street parking stalls so the businesses there can use the on-street ones.

Virtually everywhere that isn't downtown, the U of M or a hospital, this is dealt with by putting in parking restrictions, e.g. max 2 or 4 hours. I live close to Riverview Health Centre and that's how many of the neighbouring streets are signed... I'm not sure why it isn't feasible to do the same on Selkirk.