Regina Construction III

[PhotoJim]

Originally Posted by pappcam

You can't force people to purchase a place to live where they don't really want to be.

No, but if people's choices are going to cause economic externalities (like traffic problems), government can and should make policy decisions to make less impactful consumer choices more financially sensible.

[PhotoJim]

Originally Posted by pappcam

We're surrounded by nothing but open and barren land as far as the eye can see.

:s/barren/highly productive agricultural/

[jigglysquishy]

Cooperstown is also the last "easy" suburban land to be developed. Anything new will have to deal with immense traffic problems, nine figure servicing concerns, and swamp land.

[Dan0myte]

Originally Posted by jigglysquishy

Cooperstown is also the last "easy" suburban land to be developed. Anything new will have to deal with immense traffic problems, nine figure servicing concerns, and swamp land.

...and pollution/public endangerment concerns (directly north).

[UPP]

Originally Posted by djforsberg

As with all public policy, voters, the community. I would expect someone only recently belittling another person and implying they are inexperienced, would understand this.



Not in a liberal democracy and mixed economy is the consumer the sole decider of how our society grows. Again, we don't live in a free world as you are fantasizing about. And again, you should know this. I would prefer to not let developers, those with money and short-term profit motivations solely determine how our city grows.



I always knew you were the lowest common denominator type person who lacks any high expectations or vision for themselves and those around them. I am glad our city is not run by people like you. We already do much better than our neighbour to the north when it comes to controlling sprawl and I hope we continue to be our best selves.



A smart person like you presume to be should realize its the same things you are championing that causes our inner urban area to deteriorate. I really don't know why I discuss anything with someone who is clearly not debating in good faith. Did you not see the recent discussion on the problems with our public transit? The traffic congestion on Arcola? How about the lack of people downtown? Urban sprawl, unfettered growth and the free market, does not solve these issues.

Ironically, you contradict yourself all over the place with this post.

While it's of paramount importance to increase our population density and develop our infill, sustainable communities are fueled by families. Quite frankly, families, and not only in Regina but across the Euro/Western world, want to live in homes with yards, parks and schools nearby.

Regina's new neighbourhoods do a pretty decent job using space effectively considering we could develop for hundreds of kilometers in every direction. In fact, neighbourhoods like the Greens and Harbour Landing are far more densely populated than neighbourhoods like Old Lakeview, Douglas Park and Whitmore Park.

While Regina is certainly far from perfect, if you compare our footprint to similar North American cities like Fargo, Billings, Boise, Lincoln NE, we are much better off in terms of density and sprawl.

[Draftsman]

I just want to make an observation on 'suburban sprawl'. I think our city (and developers) have done a decent job recently when it comes to more densely populated neighbourhoods. I grew up in Whitmore Park in the 60's at a time when everyone wanted a suburban house with a big front and back yard. Most people spent a lot of time on their lawns and gardens and planted trees and shrubs and flowers. That was all fine back then, but times have changed. We are in the third year of a drought, and it costs a fortune to water said lawns, trees, shrubs and flowers. That said, these very yards are no longer being kept up as they were intended. People aren't even bothering to mow what little grass they have (more like a growth of weeds and dandelions). Flowers are relegated to a pot or two on the front steps. Everything is so much more costly these days, and even house repairs are being put off because of the high cost.

In Harbour Landing for example, there are several developments that have opted for artificial lawns. It looks nice to have a small patch of green (100 square feet?). No one needs to water or mow their lawn, but I wonder just how 'green' artificial grass is, as it probably manufactured from petrochemicals.

In all, I think it is a good transition from the suburbs created a half-century ago. Can we do better? Sure, but I think new subdivisions are definitely a step in the right direction. Unfortunately, bus service is terrible in these new, more densely populated areas which is something the city must work on.

[UPP]

Originally Posted by Draftsman

I just want to make an observation on 'suburban sprawl'. I think our city (and developers) have done a decent job recently when it comes to more densely populated neighbourhoods. I grew up in Whitmore Park in the 60's at a time when everyone wanted a suburban house with a big front and back yard. Most people spent a lot of time on their lawns and gardens and planted trees and shrubs and flowers. That was all fine back then, but times have changed. We are in the third year of a drought, and it costs a fortune to water said lawns, trees, shrubs and flowers. That said, these very yards are no longer being kept up as they were intended. People aren't even bothering to mow what little grass they have (more like a growth of weeds and dandelions). Flowers are relegated to a pot or two on the front steps. Everything is so much more costly these days, and even house repairs are being put off because of the high cost.

In Harbour Landing for example, there are several developments that have opted for artificial lawns. It looks nice to have a small patch of green (100 square feet?). No one needs to water or mow their lawn, but I wonder just how 'green' artificial grass is, as it probably manufactured from petrochemicals.

In all, I think it is a good transition from the suburbs created a half-century ago. Can we do better? Sure, but I think new subdivisions are definitely a step in the right direction. Unfortunately, bus service is terrible in these new, more densely populated areas which is something the city must work on.

Considering Regina is fairly unique for a city its size in the way that so many people work in the same area at the same time (I'm talking govt workers) bus service and transit use should be a slam dunk in this city!

[JustACitizen]

The (lack of) planning dept. strikes again. Grant Rd. at Wascana Pkwy closed this morning 1.5 weeks before school ends, forcing all of the Campbell students to take Kramer Blvd. Wascana Pkwy was backed up south to Ring Rd., people were pulling into the University and doing Uturns to get onto Kramer, it was chaos. Could it not WAIT for 1.5 weeks until high school is out removing all of the Campbell and Leboldus traffic from the roads?

[JustACitizen]

Originally Posted by djforsberg

The point I was trying to make is that families should certainly be the ones driving the growth of cities but that the true cost of that growth should be attributed for by those choosing to live in the suburbs, instead of being subsidized by other parts of the city, in terms of public costs in upgrading and extending services outward, and the "donutting" out of the inner-city which also come with social and economic costs. I am trying not to get too political here but people like pappcam don't want to pay the cost of incentives for inner-city growth and prefer a more libertarian society but they completely gloss over these social and economic costs we all pay for unfettered growth, which is truly hypocritical.

When Harbour Landing was built, who paid for the infrastructure? Did the developers factor the costs into the sales of the properties or did the rest of Regina taxpayers pay for it? I seem to recall this was an issue and had people complaining. It seems to me logically the costs of infrastructure should be passed to the new home buyers not the existing neighbourhoods.

[Golks]

Originally Posted by JustACitizen

The (lack of) planning dept. strikes again. Grant Rd. at Wascana Pkwy closed this morning 1.5 weeks before school ends, forcing all of the Campbell students to take Kramer Blvd. Wascana Pkwy was backed up south to Ring Rd., people were pulling into the University and doing Uturns to get onto Kramer, it was chaos. Could it not WAIT for 1.5 weeks until high school is out removing all of the Campbell and Leboldus traffic from the roads?

It is closed for a day to fix a water break. If they were to leave it until after school is out someone else would be on here bitching that water is being wasted......

[jigglysquishy]

Originally Posted by JustACitizen

The (lack of) planning dept. strikes again. Grant Rd. at Wascana Pkwy closed this morning 1.5 weeks before school ends, forcing all of the Campbell students to take Kramer Blvd. Wascana Pkwy was backed up south to Ring Rd., people were pulling into the University and doing Uturns to get onto Kramer, it was chaos. Could it not WAIT for 1.5 weeks until high school is out removing all of the Campbell and Leboldus traffic from the roads?

I'm curious. Do you seriously think the planning department has any role in traffic construction?

[JustACitizen]

Originally Posted by Golks

It is closed for a day to fix a water break. If they were to leave it until after school is out someone else would be on here bitching that water is being wasted......

Thanks for that info, that makes total sense and emergencies need to be looked after. Still one sees that and the subsequent traffic jam and just makes you shake your head thinking 'what now'...

[J-Walker]

Originally Posted by JustACitizen

When Harbour Landing was built, who paid for the infrastructure? Did the developers factor the costs into the sales of the properties or did the rest of Regina taxpayers pay for it? I seem to recall this was an issue and had people complaining. It seems to me logically the costs of infrastructure should be passed to the new home buyers not the existing neighbourhoods.

Developers pay for everything in new neighborhoods. The developer pays all the soft cost (engineering, planning, zoning and subdivision fees) plus all the hard costs (roads, sidewalks, lights, water, sewer, etc). All the infrastructure is installed by the developer and the costs are recovered through land sales over time. The developer also build the parks and hands them over to the City at no charge. The developer also pays the City development levies which are well over 100,000 dollars per acre. So when people say that new growth is subsidized by the rest of the city, this is completely false. It is not, and if it once was, it no longer is.

What is subsidized in new greenfield developments is residential taxes. The taxes the City collects from new developments is no where near enough to cover the eventual cost to replace all the new infrastructure in 40 - 60 years when its reached the end of its useful life. And this is the problem the City has. It uses the taxes it collects from new neighborhoods (with brand new infrastructure) towards replacing infrastructure in older neighborhoods and when it comes time to replace the worn out infrastructure in the once new (now 50 years old) neighborhoods, they don't have the revenue to do it unless they pull the tax dollars from even newer neighborhoods. Its like a Ponzi scheme where you need more and more new neighborhoods to use the tax dollars from them to pay for the deficits in older neighborhoods.

[Stormer]

Originally Posted by J-Walker

Developers pay for everything in new neighborhoods. The developer pays all the soft cost (engineering, planning, zoning and subdivision fees) plus all the hard costs (roads, sidewalks, lights, water, sewer, etc). All the infrastructure is installed by the developer and the costs are recovered through land sales over time. The developer also build the parks and hands them over to the City at no charge. The developer also pays the City development levies which are well over 100,000 dollars per acre. So when people say that new growth is subsidized by the rest of the city, this is completely false. It is not, and if it once was, it no longer is.

What is subsidized in new greenfield developments is residential taxes. The taxes the City collects from new developments is no where near enough to cover the eventual cost to replace all the new infrastructure in 40 - 60 years when its reached the end of its useful life. And this is the problem the City has. It uses the taxes it collects from new neighborhoods (with brand new infrastructure) towards replacing infrastructure in older neighborhoods and when it comes time to replace the worn out infrastructure in the once new (now 50 years old) neighborhoods, they don't have the revenue to do it unless they pull the tax dollars from even newer neighborhoods. Its like a Ponzi scheme where you need more and more new neighborhoods to use the tax dollars from them to pay for the deficits in older neighborhoods.

Correct, the development levies are supposed to pay for infrastructure even outside of the new development like arterial roads, rec centres, fire halls and water treatment plants.

[jigglysquishy]

They're supposed to, but don't cover the full range of infrastructure. Schools, transit, police, and fire are all excluded from the calculations.

Infrastructure projects must be identified at point of development or they can't be charged. Adding lanes onto the Arcola bridge isn't eligible for development levee money, but it would only be needed due to growth in the Green/Towns/Creeks.

At $50,000,000 for some 7000 houses that comes to $7000 per new house. Instead, it'll come from general revenue and debt servicing.

[Stormer]

Originally Posted by jigglysquishy

They're supposed to, but don't cover the full range of infrastructure. Schools, transit, police, and fire are all excluded from the calculations.

Infrastructure projects must be identified at point of development or they can't be charged. Adding lanes onto the Arcola bridge isn't eligible for development levee money, but it would only be needed due to growth in the Green/Towns/Creeks.

At $50,000,000 for some 7000 houses that comes to $7000 per new house. Instead, it'll come from general revenue and debt servicing.

Yes but new areas pay far more than their "share" of general revenues through annual property taxes.

[city rep]

Suggesting owners in new greenfield subdivisions should have to independently fund 100% of schools, and arterial upgrades is ridiculous. They are paying far more than they have in the past already -at a time that they too are struggling after our explosion of growth.

Cost for new home buyers are already high and for first time owners asking them to pay more is wrong. Already lots of 25 year olds are choosing their first homes to be in the Greens and Harbour Landing. Positioning them to pay more would largely backfire.
Also on a macro economics scale Regina is far from its own enclosed area. If we choose to raise the price for developers more in those areas the young talent graduating from schools here would leave and choose a city that they can afford better than Regina. If people care to improve Regina taking away sections of our market for growth will not help to keep things moving along at a strong pace.

The answer isn't to create an unfair environment for those choosing to live a type of lifestyle. The answer is to promote inner city improvements and to change the state of mind for developers and to show them that large projects, not just new neighborhoods can be profitable and liked by everyone.
If developers and private companies saw a change in populous to live inside the city they would pressure council and powers that be to make more opportunities happen.

[Festivus]

Originally Posted by city rep

The answer is to promote inner city improvements and to change the state of mind for developers and to show them that large projects, not just new neighborhoods can be profitable and liked by everyone.

If developers and private companies saw a change in populous to live inside the city they would pressure council and powers that be to make more opportunities happen.

You can only change the minds of developers through changes in fees and taxation, however. They aren't going to decide to do the right thing and focus on dense infill when there is less return there.

[city rep]

I am very pro infill development, however it's not the developers job to think long term development. They are a business trying to make money-nothing to fault them on there.
It's the citizens demands and what we all deem as a normal life style that drives all that Greenfield development. The whole "my parents bought a new house with a yard, so I need to do the same."
Also I'm pretty sure the average person doesnt understand the sustainability of cities is tied with density so cant blame them for lack of their own understanding.

[StealthGirl]

No, it's not on the developers to think long-term. The challenge is that our mayor seems to think all development is good development and the city doesn't stick to any sort of a plan. The developers have been allowed a lot of leeway to get rid of elements they don't like, even when city plans stated otherwise. We are not a consistent city.