Hazel on Hamilton

[realcity]

"But what's generating excitement among planners is the idea of "community nodes" anchored by smaller, often tired shopping centres such as Meadowvale, Erin Mills, South Common and Sheridan, and at major intersections such as Dundas St. and Dixie Rd., that can become real "places" – just like Port Credit and Streetsville, established communities with their own vibrant street life. In place of vast hectares of surface parking around the mall, these nodes would sprout six- to 12-storey buildings and a commercial presence at street level to encourage walking and use of transit. Surface parking would be mostly eliminated."

this is impossible for Miss. What are they supposed to do with the 6-lane super roads? They'll never be able to turn any part of Miss into Port Credit.

1. It's physically impossible. Unless you blow the city up and try to start over.
2. The people will never have it. They live there because that's what they want. They don't want to walk or take public transit or have inconvenient parking.

[adam]

Try a mental exercise: Replace the word Mississauga or Miss. in the past post with the word Hamilton. I disagree with your statements for any city. You are insulting the entire city of Mississauga. At the current rate of growth not only will Mississauga be able to put money into a downtown, but it will make a vibrant downtown before Hamilton. This would be a true embarrassment to us.

I'd like to think both cities can improve their downtowns. It will be a real embarrassment if Mississauga has a more vibrant downtown than us in 15 years.

[realcity]

Mississauga's 'growth' will be in a world of trouble in 15 years. It's relied on this year's sprawl to pay for the previous year's sprawl, now it's running out of space to sprawl. The money train is coming to a halt. This is why Hazel is now asking other governments to support cities. For heaven's sake their roads haven't even been repaved yet, the sewers and watermains are still under warranty. The city grew over 20 years which also means the entire city infrustructure will need replacing over 20 years, just about the same time when the sprawl paying for sprawl business model collapses.

Checklist for Hamilton and Mississauga, what city has the following?
1. a Coliseum/arena with more then 6,000 seats
2. a Stadium with over 20,000 seats
3. a University (not a satellite campus)
4. Professional Sports Teams
5. an Art Gallery (on the national scale and part of international exhibits)
6. Radio Stations (that are part of national networks)
7. a Daily Newspaper
8. National TV Station
10. a Convention Center (that isn't a wedding reception hall)
11. a Symphony Company
12. history/historical significance
13. a downtown
14. a seaport
15. an Ontario college (not a satellite campus)

[adam]

Hamilton!

[salvius]

Originally Posted by realcity

Yes but it will always be a fake downtown. a contrived city core, like Disneyland.

Not really. As I was just writing elsewhere, St. Petersburg was almost entirely master planned back in 1703, and the 1850 complete retransformation of Paris' core was also completely master planned. Are these places fake?

Now, Mississauga isn't expecting anything like THAT, but this idea that all cities are 'organic' outgrowths is actually false, as is certainly the idea that Mississauga's downtown could never amount to anything. Many cities are planned, but they DO change their character over time. Indeed, St. Peterburg and Haussmann's works were derided for being 'intentional' back in the day, though they were hardly first. I'm really not sure I get all the hostility towards Mississauga on here and am indeed starting to think it's an ill-conceived defensive reaction where none is warranted.

[flar]

Originally Posted by salvius

I'm really not sure I get all the hostility towards Mississauga on here and am indeed starting to think it's an ill-conceived defensive reaction where none is warranted.

Hostility to Mississauga is almost universal on this site, not specific to Hamiltonians. But we are jealous of their huge economic growth.

For me, I don't like Mississauga and therefore don't want to emulate it. Furthermore, I think its situation is much different than Hamilton's. I fail to see what Hamilton can learn from Mississauga.

[raisethehammer]

Originally Posted by adam

Try a mental exercise: Replace the word Mississauga or Miss. in the past post with the word Hamilton. I disagree with your statements for any city. You are insulting the entire city of Mississauga. At the current rate of growth not only will Mississauga be able to put money into a downtown, but it will make a vibrant downtown before Hamilton. This would be a true embarrassment to us.

I'd like to think both cities can improve their downtowns. It will be a real embarrassment if Mississauga has a more vibrant downtown than us in 15 years.

you're clearly missing my point - there is NO downtown in Missy. None. You can't just create one out of thin air.

[raisethehammer]

Originally Posted by realcity

Mississauga's 'growth' will be in a world of trouble in 15 years. It's relied on this year's sprawl to pay for the previous year's sprawl, now it's running out of space to sprawl. The money train is coming to a halt. This is why Hazel is now asking other governments to support cities. For heaven's sake their roads haven't even been repaved yet, the sewers and watermains are still under warranty. The city grew over 20 years which also means the entire city infrustructure will need replacing over 20 years, just about the same time when the sprawl paying for sprawl business model collapses.

Checklist for Hamilton and Mississauga, what city has the following?
1. a Coliseum/arena with more then 6,000 seats
2. a Stadium with over 20,000 seats
3. a University (not a satellite campus)
4. Professional Sports Teams
5. an Art Gallery (on the national scale and part of international exhibits)
6. Radio Stations (that are part of national networks)
7. a Daily Newspaper
8. National TV Station
10. a Convention Center (that isn't a wedding reception hall)
11. a Symphony Company
12. history/historical significance
13. a downtown
14. a seaport
15. an Ontario college (not a satellite campus)

You can actually do multiples for numbers 3 and 15:

Redeemer University College
Columbia International College (largest international boarding school in Canada)

[ryan_mcgreal]

http://raisethehammer.org/blog/1142/

Place-Making in Mississauga
By Ben Bull
Published 2008/11/05

The de-sprawling of Mississauga continues apace, now that the municipality has no place left to build. City planners are looking to retrofit some of the more ailing malls in the area - Sheridan, Meadowvale and Erin Mills, to name but a few - by removing parking, adding condos and integrating transit.

"That's the focus of a visioning exercise called Downtown 21," reports the Star, "that wants to reinvigorate the core area, including building smaller city blocks and doing away with surface parking - another staple suburban convenience.

[W]hat's generating excitement among planners is the idea of "community nodes" anchored by smaller, often tired shopping centres such as Meadowvale, Erin Mills, South Common and Sheridan, and at major intersections such as Dundas St. and Dixie Rd., that can become real "places" - just like Port Credit and Streetsville, established communities with their own vibrant street life.

In place of vast hectares of surface parking around the mall, these nodes would sprout six- to 12-storey buildings and a commercial presence at street level to encourage walking and use of transit. Surface parking would be mostly eliminated.

Here's hoping that Hamilton's open spaces get concreted over fast so that sensible city planning can begin here too.

[matt602]

lol @ the comments to that Star article:

Thats why I live in the burbs.

If I wanted to have no parking while shopping and use transit or pay for underground parking I would move into Toronto. I live in South Mississauga and enjoy the fact that I can park when I shop and not have to drive around Toronto streets, wasting more gas, trying to find parking or paying for parking to spend money at restaurants and stores. As a customer of retail establishments I expect parking and realize its built in somewhere into the costs. Building high density mixed use areas will only drive up retails costs because the value for the commercial property will cost more and provide less and those costs will be passed on to the consumer.

[salvius]

^ you'll always have people like that. Quite a lot of them, unfortunately.

[adam]

@ fellow Hamiltonians: Those in glass houses shouldn't cast stones.

[adam]

Originally Posted by matt602

lol @ the comments to that Star article:

Thats why I live in the burbs.

If I wanted to have no parking while shopping and use transit or pay for underground parking I would move into Toronto. I live in South Mississauga and enjoy the fact that I can park when I shop and not have to drive around Toronto streets, wasting more gas, trying to find parking or paying for parking to spend money at restaurants and stores. As a customer of retail establishments I expect parking and realize its built in somewhere into the costs. Building high density mixed use areas will only drive up retails costs because the value for the commercial property will cost more and provide less and those costs will be passed on to the consumer.

There are a lot of Hamiltonians who feel the same way. Not my cup of tea, but seriously wake up people.

[flar]

Originally Posted by adam

There are a lot of Hamiltonians who feel the same way. Not my cup of tea, but seriously wake up people.

Most people everywhere feel that way.

[raisethehammer]

Originally Posted by adam

@ fellow Hamiltonians: Those in glass houses shouldn't cast stones.

???

[Millstone]

Originally Posted by raisethehammer

you're clearly missing my point - there is NO downtown in Missy. None. You can't just create one out of thin air.

There are several downtowns in Mississauga, like there are several downtowns in Hamilton.

[FairHamilton]

Originally Posted by Millstone

There are several downtowns in Mississauga, like there are several downtowns in Hamilton.

I'd love to hear your definition of a "downtown". Personally, I would refer to many of those satellite areas as commercial nodes, not downtowns.

[realcity]

Originally Posted by Millstone

There are several downtowns in Mississauga, like there are several downtowns in Hamilton.

maybe Port Credit qualifies, but it's the size of downtown Caledonia

[adam]

Port Credit has a nice streetscape lined with shops and a walkable sidewalk. They have many community-oriented activities going on like buskerfest, caroling in the park, Check out this link: http://www.portcredit.com/video/buskerfest.flv looks awesome.

[salvius]

^ Port Credit is indeed a pretty nice (if small) strip, but its success has everything to do with the fact that it actually predates Mississauga by some 170 years.