Winnipeg | Portage and Main

[esquire]

Originally Posted by CoryB

Not exactly accurate. Yes, the very original plan included three towers, only one of which was ever built, but the courtyard became a much more important deal. There was about a three story building net to 213 Notre Dame until about 15 years ago and around that time it was actually home to the Impark office. True it was demoed with a plan to build a Canwest broadcast centre on the city but those plans included a number of significant upgrades to the existing courtyard including a version of the video screen that is there today. Yes when Canwest was sold and significantly downsized Winnipeg operations the plans for the broadcast center were withdrawn too and the courtyard was further expanded.

The important takeway here is the courtyard existed long before the building on Notre Dame was demolished.

I maintain my position. Canwest and Harvard were not in the business of developing parks. That pile of paving stones and obsolete jumbotron you are characterizing as some significant public amenity is a placeholder for future development and nothing more.

[CoryB]

Originally Posted by optimusREIM

My biggest problem with the whole discussion is that it was never a problem until browaty and Lukes made it into a wedge issue.

[...]

Most of us team open folks aren't some chauvinist snobs who eschew the average joe. In fact, most of us are the most average Joe's around. We just believe Winnipeg can do better, and should.

[...]

And I sure as hell don't want to leave a bad impression on people who are convinced to visit us by this amazing designation (it's a huge deal).
Our world reputation is on the line and we gotta uphold our image.

First, people aren't going to have a negative or positive impression on Winnipeg and Manitoba based on a single intersection unless locals are trying to steer them in one direction on it. World class cities around the global have things that divide and control pedestrian flows whether they be natural like rivers and mountains, or man made like highways (interstates) or grade separations of pedestrian crossings like Vegas and Winnipeg.

--

In terms of the origin of the P&M issue it has its routes way back in the 2014 mayoral campaign. Something people like to forget is the promise by Bowman was to have P&M open to pedestrians in time for the 2017 Canada Games. That it was still an issue on if something should be done long after that event has passed speak volumes of the failures of Bowman's first term as mayor. If that target had been hit it wouldn't have become the polarizing election issue of the 2018 campaign.

--

I want to thank you, optimusREIM, for actually trying to be respectful to people that don't support opening P&M. This is definitely an issue that team open struggled with including some of their most prominent voices as illustrated by my small quote snippet from earlier today.

Personally I too believe Winnipeg as a whole can and should do better but it doesn't start with a single intersection and a single traffic flow but rather it ends there. If Winnipeg had a city wide functional transit network, for example, delays to transit from opening P&M wouldn't happen. Not because they are "minor and immaterial" but because we would have means of quickly moving people out of and in to downtown. Further, New Flyer built buses are found all over North America in many global class cities. It is long overdue for Winnipeg to fully embrace this key member of the local community and build out the showcase BRT network that is inspirational for other cities to achieve.

For the cycling grid the city transportation department really needs to sit down with a wide range of people and rethink their plan to accommodate what cyclists want while also being respectful of others' needs too, especially those with accessibility issues. It is telling when I talk with a long time commuting cyclist about the bike lane built next to their office and they tell me they would likely never use it as it makes them feel unsafe and they would rather stay on the road with other vehicles.

For pedestrians it is nice to finally see some progress on getting the countdown lights pushed out. Those were long overdue here and make far more difference to pedestrians than opening a single intersection. It was this very week that those lights came up in conservation with someone crossing the street on foot in downtown Winnipeg. They are also far more helpful to tourists that opening P&M.

And that is merely just starting to scratch the surface of the larger issues downtown. Once downtown as a whole has started to turn the corner in the direction it needs to then it will make a lot more sense to relook at what should happen with P&M.

[CoryB]

Originally Posted by esquire

I maintain my position. Canwest and Harvard were not in the business of developing parks. That pile of paving stones and obsolete jumbotron you are characterizing as some significant public amenity is a placeholder for future development and nothing more.

And I strongly hold my position that the public space is more than you are giving it credit for. As a point of reference the same developer has had no issue letting the other part of the development sit as a bare gravel lot for decades on end. If the courtyard was just a "placeholder for a future development" why not just leave it as a gravel surface lot too? After all that would be a cheaper option.

[esquire]

Originally Posted by CoryB

And I strongly hold my position that the public space is more than you are giving it credit for. As a point of reference the same developer has had no issue letting the other part of the development sit as a bare gravel lot for decades on end. If the courtyard was just a "placeholder for a future development" why not just leave it as a gravel surface lot too? After all that would be a cheaper option.

Two reasons:

-Because that site is the de facto front entrance to the building, they can't just let it go to seed if they want to maintain their image as a premiere class A office tower

-More importantly, because the gravel lot has parking grandfathered as a use... there is no way that the City would let that happen with the little courtyard now

[Ando]

Originally Posted by Bdog

Well, it was a disappointing result tonight on the Portage and Main file. If there’s any silver lining, let’s hope that the discussion has brought to the forefront words like “vision” and “pedestrian” and will help keep them in the municipal political vernacular. Also, kudos to guys like True Viking who put everything they had into this campaign.

That being said, here’s my unsolicited (and sure to be unpopular) 10 reasons I feel like Team Open’s approach was off-base.

1. Condescension towards opponents: This is probably the biggest one, and I heard it again and again from friends and colleagues. It’s unfortunate to see fence-sitters or “indifferents” vote “no” because they couldn’t stand the arrogance, condescension, and sometimes outright mockery from *some* in the open campaign. Those who want it closed are “selfish suburbanites”, “uninformed”, “drive big trucks out to East St. Paul”. Scrolling back a few pages and we see that those voting no are implied to be “idiots”, “a**holes”, “coddled rich people”, or “objectively wrong”.

2. Traffic Study “Facts”: Team Open was adamant that everything in the traffic study was fact, and that we should follow what the engineering study says (even though I doubt many read the full study, and if they did, understand it in its entirety). Fair enough. Odd though that there seems to be a high correlation of those who take the “Dillon study” as gospel in this case, but denounced the BRT “Dillon study” as biased and without merit. If an engineering study came out tomorrow showing that the Oakbank Corridor was in fact needed, I wonder if this forum would defend it as fact.

3. Accessibility: A lot was made of accessibility in this campaign. Great, as this is a major issue and should be top of mind. There was concern amongst *some* in the wider accessibility community that the Open Campaign hi-jacked the conversation about accessibility to one project (which is not one of the top priorities for many who have mobility challenges). One block away, there are bike lanes making it impossible for Handi-Transit drop offs, and heritage buildings that can’t be accessed by those in wheelchairs. As an accessibility advocate myself, I look forward to the deluge of support for our cause from all those who call a closed Portage and Main a “Human Rights Disaster”.

4. Cherry picking stats: Transit delays and increased operating costs were ignored or downplayed, even if they were legitimate concerns. When describing traffic delays, the highest numbers (like the 5-minute delay) are dismissed as “only one movement has that delay”. That’s true! But then don’t use Ismaila Alfa’s 15-minute trek in a wheelchair as the example of delays for those with mobility challenges – it’s also the extreme case.

5. Cognitive Dissonance: When developers at Portage and Main want the intersection open, it’s “Listen to the business owners! They want it, they know best!”. When developers anywhere else in the City want something it’s “Greedy developers, only in it for themselves. Don’t listen to them!”

6. Business support: I kept hearing over and over that businesses are 100% behind this, including the 4 property owners, the Chamber of Commerce, the BIZ. Great! I also kept hearing that Portage and Main would be of a huge financial benefit to these businesses in proximity. Also great! But, if they stood to gain so much from opening the intersection, why not support the campaign more forcefully? Why not support the much-hyped Go Fund Me campaign (that got less than 15% of its goal)? If an intersection that’s been closed for 40 years is preventing me from developing the prime lot that I bought 5 years ago, I’m sure as hell going to be doing a lot more than signing a conditional letter of support and making a 1-minute Youtube video. But that’s just me.

7. Not the be all end all of downtown, or Winnipeg, for that matter: Many good things have happened, and will continue to happen, in our downtown regardless of whether Portage and Main is open or closed. But many on team Open seemed to indicate that Downtown is on a downward spiral because the intersection is closed. Comments like “Canada is watching – they’re waiting to see the direction Winnipeg is going” permeated the Team Open feeds. Seemingly, somewhere in Toronto there’s a firm is waiting to invest millions in our City, but watching from afar, if we vote no, they’re out! How many posts do we need to see of some farmer’s market in Amsterdam with a caption “this is what happens when we have walkable cities”. Sure, well then maybe we’ll see a farmer’s market at Main and Broadway soon?

8. Exaggerated claims: In person and online, there have been some bold claims that border on hyperbole. Opening Portage and Main will “be a huge boost to tourism”, “create a large influx of tax revenues for the city”, “spur on a bunch of new development”.

9. Crime: The same people who for years have been telling us how safe downtown is, and that people shouldn’t be worried walking around downtown (“it’s just perception from those paranoid suburbanites, downtown is actually very safe!”) are now talking about how dangerous the underground is! This to me was a shocker, reading about how many Team Open volunteers had been assaulted or had felt threatened in Winnipeg Square or in the Circus. If this level of crime is concentrated down below, then we have much more serious issues than opening the intersection is going to solve.

10. All of the “urbanist capital” was spent on this one issue: This is a big one for me. Unfortunately, in large part to Team Open, this issue took centre stage in the election. All the urbanist capital was spent, rightly or wrongly, on this highly contentious issue. There was minimal discussion about major (and arguably more important) urban issues like Transit, bike lanes, infill development, affordable housing, etc. I get it – those issues weren’t on the ballot. But still, they definitely could have been part of the dialogue. A lost opportunity in my humble opinion.

Look you got your way. Give it a rest with all the condescension BS. Have some respect for a group of people who wanted to get something done and tried to lead.

[Ando]

Originally Posted by trueviking

Thanks for the criticism bdog. Didn’t see you anywhere volunteering your time with all the right answers.

Look, I think you know that the majority around here have a deep appreciation for the work that you and the Yes group did. Don't let it get you down. Referendums are tools to stop things from moving forward, not advancing them. The battle was lost but not the war. This isn't the end of the issue.

[Ando]

Originally Posted by Bdog

Don't take it personally Vike. That's just my take of the campaign, and I found your tone to be much more positive than some of the other Team Open members and I appreciate your efforts.

You are correct that I didn't volunteer my time officially to Team Open, but I did convince probably at least two dozen friends, family, and colleagues to vote open. I engaged with many more than that in the discussion, and that's where a lot of my comments above came from.

Really? You did a pretty grim post mortem for a guy who claims to be a supporter.

[esquire]

Originally Posted by Ando

Look, I think you know that the majority around here have a deep appreciation for the work that you and the Yes group did. Don't let it get you down. Referendums are tools to stop things from moving forward, not advancing them. The battle was lost but not the war. This isn't the end of the issue.

The barricades will come down. It's just a matter of time. The only question is will it be closer to 5 years out, or closer to 20.

[Ando]

Originally Posted by Bdog

For those who claim to have never seen anything but positivity from Team Open, here are the types of comments I'm referring to. As I've said a few times, there's going to have a be a different approach if we're going to reach the larger public on future urban goals.

Methink thou dost protest too much. Give it a rest.

[Ando]

Originally Posted by esquire

It was a council decision, but a more effective leader would have never lost control of the issue in the first place. Bowman folded his hand so as to deprive Motkaluk of what would have been a big issue for her.

To Bowman, inaction on Portage and Main for the next decade is a price he was happy to pay to smooth his way to re-election.

Exactly, he had a mandate to open it up and he dithered around for four years until it was too late.

[CoryB]

The whole plebiscite was heavily flawed from the time it decided the question was a "yes" or "no". From the honest conversations I had if there was a third choice along the lines of "need more information" it would likely have crushed both of the choices voters were given. And "Team Open" wasn't the source of OFFICIAL information a lot of voters were looking for. Sure in the dying days they put out their own proposal for how to reroute traffic but it was as binding as my own "proposal" to have Boring Company build hyperloops to all the suburbs.

[Ando]

Originally Posted by CoryB

First, people aren't going to have a negative or positive impression on Winnipeg and Manitoba based on a single intersection unless locals are trying to steer them in one direction on it. World class cities around the global have things that divide and control pedestrian flows whether they be natural like rivers and mountains, or man made like highways (interstates) or grade separations of pedestrian crossings like Vegas and Winnipeg.

--

In terms of the origin of the P&M issue it has its routes way back in the 2014 mayoral campaign. Something people like to forget is the promise by Bowman was to have P&M open to pedestrians in time for the 2017 Canada Games. That it was still an issue on if something should be done long after that event has passed speak volumes of the failures of Bowman's first term as mayor. If that target had been hit it wouldn't have become the polarizing election issue of the 2018 campaign.

--

I want to thank you, optimusREIM, for actually trying to be respectful to people that don't support opening P&M. This is definitely an issue that team open struggled with including some of their most prominent voices as illustrated by my small quote snippet from earlier today.

Personally I too believe Winnipeg as a whole can and should do better but it doesn't start with a single intersection and a single traffic flow but rather it ends there. If Winnipeg had a city wide functional transit network, for example, delays to transit from opening P&M wouldn't happen. Not because they are "minor and immaterial" but because we would have means of quickly moving people out of and in to downtown. Further, New Flyer built buses are found all over North America in many global class cities. It is long overdue for Winnipeg to fully embrace this key member of the local community and build out the showcase BRT network that is inspirational for other cities to achieve.

For the cycling grid the city transportation department really needs to sit down with a wide range of people and rethink their plan to accommodate what cyclists want while also being respectful of others' needs too, especially those with accessibility issues. It is telling when I talk with a long time commuting cyclist about the bike lane built next to their office and they tell me they would likely never use it as it makes them feel unsafe and they would rather stay on the road with other vehicles.

For pedestrians it is nice to finally see some progress on getting the countdown lights pushed out. Those were long overdue here and make far more difference to pedestrians than opening a single intersection. It was this very week that those lights came up in conservation with someone crossing the street on foot in downtown Winnipeg. They are also far more helpful to tourists that opening P&M.

And that is merely just starting to scratch the surface of the larger issues downtown. Once downtown as a whole has started to turn the corner in the direction it needs to then it will make a lot more sense to relook at what should happen with P&M.

Do you actually read your posts? You come off as tremendously holier-than-thou in your yes people are elitist snobs arguments. Your — also stinks.

[vjose32]

Originally Posted by Ando

Exactly, he had a mandate to open it up and he dithered around for four years until it was too late.

What mandate? He won the election last time, it wasn’t just because of that intersection. I voted for him and not for that reason and I’m sure I’m far from the only one.

[buzzg]

Originally Posted by Bluenote

If Sam Katz was still in power though. THis would have been done already and he didn’t listen to anyone except the deep pockets of the business community. And tbh he was right. That’s downtown. It’s the business owners that should have the say. Not the traffic and the people that’s don’t have a vested interest in the downtown.

This vote should have just been for the inner city and owners of downtown buildings. The suburbs shouldn’t have had a say tbh. That’s like having downtown say you cannot have Bishop fixed or the South perimeter nor Cory’s dream of a super highway to some tax evading folks in OakBank.

Bingo for the bolded part. Downtown provides about 20% of tax base, yet has around 2% of the population. That alone should allow the businesses to have more pull in a situation like this.

Originally Posted by wardlow

Never underestimate the power of Council's inability to say no to big businesses pitching an idea. It's a force that's been more effective in shaping the city than voters' rabid love for inertia. It's what closed the intersection in the first place, and it's what may just open it up again. The key is for the property owners at Portage and Main to be vocal about their wish to have the intersection opened. Council wouldn't vote against that kind of pressure.

Other reasons why this intersection could very well be opened before Bowman's time as mayor ends: a human rights/accessibility challenge, coupled with finding out how much it will cost to make a closed intersection accessible (through numerous new elevators, etc).

Yup. I have heard from people in an unnamed organization that works with all 4 property owners that they are ALL forging ahead with their renovation plans to re-orient their buildings to the intersection and upgrade plazas/streetscaping. It could/probably will force the city's hand to do something.

Sounds like they'd even consider legal action if councillors vote to keep it closed, as there's some unclear wording in the original contract. It says that the owners can reenact the clause for another 40 years if they want, but it's not clear about what happens if they decide not to – the city may not even have a choice.

Originally Posted by optimusREIM

This adequately sums up what I think our legitimate fears have been over the course of the campaign.

Funny how it's the yes is all along Portage Avenue and Main Street – you know, the people that interact with the area the most, and stand to be affected the most either way.

[Ando]

Originally Posted by vjose32

What mandate? He won the election last time, it wasn’t just because of that intersection. I voted for him and not for that reason and I’m sure I’m far from the only one.

He ran on a platform that included a commitment to open Portage and Main and he won the election. Do your homework man.

[buzzg]

^Ya. He also committed to doing the entire BRT network by 2030, and we've barely even had a conversation about the second leg yet lol.

Clearly his word doesn't mean anything, which actually bodes well for reopening hahaha.

[optimusREIM]

Originally Posted by buzzg

^Ya. He also committed to doing the entire BRT network by 2030, and we've barely even had a conversation about the second leg yet lol.

Clearly his word doesn't mean anything, which actually bodes well for reopening hahaha.

I think the rapid transit network promise was ill-fated from the start. It was a good political message but ultimately meaningless unless there were some concrete action plan to get it done. I have yet to see someone articulate a real vision for transit. It's way past due to get something done for that.

As for Portage and main, bowman could do whatever he wants if he has no ambition for a third term.

[buzzg]

Originally Posted by CoryB

The whole plebiscite was heavily flawed from the time it decided the question was a "yes" or "no". From the honest conversations I had if there was a third choice along the lines of "need more information" it would likely have crushed both of the choices voters were given. And "Team Open" wasn't the source of OFFICIAL information a lot of voters were looking for. Sure in the dying days they put out their own proposal for how to reroute traffic but it was as binding as my own "proposal" to have Boring Company build hyperloops to all the suburbs.

Completely agree. The city did nothing to present the public with information required to make an informed decision, and the fact it was a stark "yes" or "no" is ridiculous, especially considering the leading plan for opening involves only partially opening it.

Originally Posted by optimusREIM

As for Portage and main, bowman could do whatever he wants if he has no ambition for a third term.

Thought this from the start. And I really can't imagine him wanting to go through it all again... Wouldn't be surprised if he makes his decision based on if someone is willing to run that he supports.

[CoryB]

Originally Posted by buzzg

Sounds like they'd even consider legal action if councillors vote to keep it closed, as there's some unclear wording in the original contract. It says that the owners can reenact the clause for another 40 years if they want, but it's not clear about what happens if they decide not to – the city may not even have a choice.

The city could pass a highly targeted "frontage levy" of sorts that is binding on the four P&M property owners forcing them to bare the brunt of the costs to changes at the intersection if it wanted. Basically a "local improvement" levy of sorts without needing the consent of property owners. They have done similar in more residential areas where a new development needs a sewer installed and the old property owners, typically residential, without sewer hook ups are told they have no choice in the matter.

Originally Posted by optimusREIM

As for Portage and main, bowman could do whatever he wants if he has no ambition for a third term.

While Bowman may have no ambition to seek a third term any changes to P&M would likely need a full council vote. To go against the plebiscite in the next four years (at minimum) is going to be political suicide for any councillor wanting another term in 2022. For that reason alone this is likely an issue that gets put on ice for at least four years now.

[Gm0ney]

A lot of people don't know this, but the route between the Transcona CN Machine Shop and the Spike runs right through Portage and Main, so not surprising to see a hard pass from TCone.

But perhaps we can reach some compromise - maybe if we coat the intersection with beige stucco and put a double attached garage prominently on each corner, the suburbs will come around on opening it up to pedestrians.