Quote:
Originally Posted by aberrant
A well respected, well travelled urban planner from Toronto was brought in to help with a Tactical Urbanism session sponsored by Warehouse District and Downtown last month.
He checked out the downtown plaza and couldnt believe what a mess it was.
We all know this. The more frustrating part is that there is no plan to fix it.
He also noted the major problem Regina has regarding downtown is that there is no City liason working directly with the Downtown BID. When I attended the International Downtown Conference last fall, it was repeatedly stated that this is critical to accomplishing any meaningful improvement to a downtown.
Literally the only plan the City has for downtown right now is to one day maybe think about doing something about the outdated parking meters.
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I'd love to see the Downtown BID do a better job... but I feel like they keep waiting for the City to step up, and the City keeps waiting for the BID to step up. At the end of the day, the City's responsible for downtown's biggest issues. And, as BD2 notes - downtown needs a good City Council. We can fund all of the studies, reports, liaison meetings, public consultations, etc that the City/DT BID like, but if Council continues to be a directionless, spineless group of paper-shufflers, nothing will change - City Admin isn't going out on a limb* without Council's explicit endorsement.
We were just up in Saskatoon - the differences in attitude/ approach to downtown are stunning. Benches; tables; bike racks; public art; traffic calming measures; sidewalks properly maintained (aka: there isn't a significant tripping hazard every 15-20'); blocks & blocks of street-level retail; signage that is helpful & aimed at both pedestrians & drivers; parking that is easy to use & actually encourages people to explore downtown; etc.
Yes, Saskatoon's downtown is a natural draw due to river/riverwalk, so this may be a chicken or egg situation... regardless of what initially drew people/businesses/restaurants to downtown Stoon, the City has clearly put a concerted effort into making the area into a well-maintained, attractive place for people.
Look at Regina - sidewalks are crumbling (
Hamilton/12th & Cornwall/11th are the only major sidewalk work done downtown in the past 5-7years. At best, there've been small patch jobs to decrease liability) & covered with hazards (
anyone else love the steel plates randomly scattered across DT sidewalks... most with at least one dog-ear, and many falling into the holes they're 'covering?"); then there's a the jumble of parking meters cluttering up the sidewalk (Regina's incoherent DT parking clusterduck is a post of its own); other than the chairs/tables/bike racks on the Plaza, and at the corner of 12th/Hamilton, there's no public benches/tables/racks downtown - this sends a message. The entire core is clearly oriented to drivers (with the exception of Scarth St Mall). A few traffic calming measures would do wonders for downtown.
All of the above takes leadership, vision, and commitment - something all but 3 or 4 City Councillors lack.
And the tough part is that entrepreneurs in Regina have been doing their part - they've been opening restaurants, pubs & businesses (yes, some have closed, that's the nature of the beast) downtown & giving the area a vibe... even though Regina has long been regarded as a suburban city. They've been drawing crowds. At some point, the City needs to step up to the table.
* for clarity "out on a limb" in Regina is called "day-to-day operations" in most other cities.
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