Winnipeg Construction X

[rrskylar]

Originally Posted by Pinus

It's the Loserpegger mentality, typical of many in the city. I still fail to understand how this has become the mainstream mentality of the city. Yeah yeah, Panama Canal. Whatever. Its like some people believe that was what caused the city to decline. But give me a break, how was this city the only city affected by the opening of the Panama Canal? Utter bullshit and a pathetic excuse. Negativity is the dominant mindset of people in this (what is becoming again) a backwater burg. People are sick and tired of excuses, and the poor civic and provincial leadership which leads to the social and economic issues facing this place. People are also tired of living in a city that has, for all intents and purposes, become known as the unofficial laughing stock shithole of Canada. What do you do? Many of us who have been trying to remain positive over the decades are mentally exhausted from the daily battle of trying to stay positive when the leaders who govern us really don't give an honest shit, which is evident by a classic example of allowing crime to spiral out of control. It just never ends.

It's also devastating for those who have tried to make a physical difference but whose voices have either been ignored or silenced by the men in the grey suits, so to speak.

Listen to our current police chief who sounds like someone who has all but given up and as crime has spiralled out of control under his watch, seriously how does this guy still have a job when he has zero answers and zero results in combating crime!

Previous chief "hug a thug" Devon CLueless was a terrible police chief but this current mini cop police chief is even worse! And worse yet this guy doesn't have the respect of any of the rank and file!

[LilZebra]

Originally Posted by Peg forever

HI
I've been watching this forum for years. I'd like to remind all of us to go back to
the first page of Wpg Construction X and see the progress that's been made, and what's on tap. I've been a skyline fan for almost 50 years, and a Winnipeg booster for the same time. (Had to move for training reasons 30 years ago, and couldn't get back)
I get a buzz from offering Winnipeg travel tips to GTA people who are going for biz or pleasure, and hearing their reactions on returning. Almost universally positive, and some genuinely surprised. (Same with surrounding areas - Gimli, Whiteshell, etc)
It's also interesting that so many passionate posters weigh in so often on what's being planned, developed, created or changed in the REAL centre of the country. Sure, transit needs urgent sorting out, and progress on a lot of projects is slow. WPS building, BRT line about 20 years late, etc.
But I invite you to go sit in the daily parking lot on the QEW. 2 hours each way to work in winter, in spite of 4x the number of trains deployed in the past 5 years. Or be late every time you're supposed to go out to meet friends.
And these guys around here are Leafs fans from birth. Sad.
Bottom line: Winnipeg continues to improve. The challenges there aren't unique, but the solutions can be.
Thanks to those who post the pictorial updates.

You have a militry background?

[armorand93]

Originally Posted by rrskylar

Listen to our current police chief who sounds like someone who has all but given up and as crime has spiralled out of control under his watch, seriously how does this guy still have a job when he has zero answers and zero results in combating crime!

Previous chief "hug a thug" Devon CLueless was a terrible police chief but this current mini cop police chief is even worse! And worse yet this guy doesn't have the respect of any of the rank and file!

I'm amazed that WPS right now, is currently even able to function... the second they lose the OT, six-figure salaries and everything, it'll be a large-scale revolt. Especially with John Wayne in the force, emptying a clip right in front of someone with a camera... amongst other things.

Honestly, it kind of makes me wonder, if Winnipeg would just opt out of WPS, and just go with a contract for the RCMP instead. Like Surrey does. Considering how pissed off Bowman is, along with costs, lack of confidence among WPS by virtually all of Winnipeg, and the prospect of all of these "inquiries" - maybe it might just be better to bring in RCMP instead?

[CoryB]

Originally Posted by esquire

This is patently false, just look around you next time you're downtown.

Sure the days of downtown as a retail destination on par with Polo Park are gone, but there will always be some retail around. There is no way that we'll have a neighbourhood of 15,000+ residents and 40,000+ students and office workers and no retail whatsoever.

Let's see:

- Street facing retail on Portage Ave east of Donald? Outside of two dollar stores - DEAD
- multi-floor Eaton's department store - DEAD
- About 1/3 of CityPlace - demoed for the arena - DEAD
- About 1/3 of CityPlace retail converted to offices - (retail) DEAD
- street facing retail on Portage Ave between Donald and Colony - essentially DEAD
- Portage Place - already about 1/3 of retail space killed for office space and more to follow.
- 6 floor + basement Hudson Bay building - down to 3 floors and on serious life support.

But yeah, downtown retail is set for a major growth spurt. /s The trend is obvious is you take a minute to actually get away from your keyboard posting rants about how you think things should be and go outside and look a little.

Originally Posted by GarryEllice

Can we tone down the hyperbole? Downtown retail is far from dead. Obviously the retail scene is not thriving like it did decades ago, but there is lots of retail downtown. It's not a city-wide retail destination anymore, but there's still a broad selection of stores that serve the needs of the local area, pretty similar to the current state of Grant Park and Garden City. Just because it's not #1 doesn't mean it's going to die.

If people stop with the hyperbole about how downtown retail is thriving in Vancouver and Toronto and Winnipeg is going to make a come back I can stop posting about how downtown Winnipeg retail is dead and never coming back. It is a tough reality but one we need to face if we want downtown to keep moving forward. It is different than Garden City and Grant Park too but if you don't realize that its going to be a very long post explaining why Home Depot isn't going to open at Portage and Main on the vacant lot and why that is actually a good thing.

Originally Posted by GarryEllice

You might want to wait until Staples actually closes their Winnipeg stores before you start gloating about being right about the death of in-person retail.

Staples has been closing stores fairly widely as they struggle to remain viable. It isn't exactly a secret that the Portage Place location hasn't seen an interior refresh since it opened, that most higher valued products are locked up in the backroom, unlike other locations, and the inventory that is exposed to the floor is short stocked v other Winnipeg locations. Having the landlord come to them about the site development would be the perfect out for Staples from downtown Winnipeg without looking like a villain for abandoning the community. It is identical to how Coffee Time left the downtown Winnipeg market when their property was sold to make way for Hydro Place.

Originally Posted by trueviking

i love when I hear people say bricks and mortar retail is dead....just like everyone said music is dead when technology changed it. Retail is far from dead, it is just changing.

I also love when I hear people who were dead set against opening Portage and Main to people say there is nothing you can do to bring retail back to downtown Winnipeg. There is a lot we can do. Downtown storefront retail exists in almost every other major Canadian city. We have just designed it out of ours by putting the priority on downtown being a thoroughfare to drive through, instead of a place to be.

Yes, retail is changing from bricks and mortar "warehouses" to showroom spaces for online ordering that cover a much wider geographic region than the "Warehouse" model filled with racks and racks of the same item.

I also love how the "Team Open" Portage and Main crowd continues more than a year after they lost the vote to talk about how connecting four buildings on the edge of downtown to the rest of downtown would "save" all of downtown. Reality of downtown is people in towers tend to move in about a two block radius of their starting point. With the existing underground connections of the buildings at Portage and Main it would have limited impact to the spread of people from east of Main to the west side. There is also nothing east of Main that would pull the west side people to that side that they are not already getting to in other ways.

As for the two block radius? I have worked my whole career downtown and know what co-workers say about where they go for lunch etc. To go from say Portage and Main to Hargrave St Market, about six blocks, would be viewed as a major excursion, similar to travelling well outside downtown for the same purpose. I also know going four blocks from Portage to Broadway is viewed in a similar way. That points to the maximum distance the majority of people are willing to walk downtown is in the 1-3 block range. But yeah, facts and hard truths are the sort of thing "Team Open" didn't want to discuss as it did not support their narrative.

Originally Posted by optimusREIM

Did you short the winnipeg downtown retail market or something? You seem awfully invested in its failure.

Methinks thou dost protest too much.

No protest here, just telling the truth. I used to be out frequenting downtown retail on a daily basis. I am still downtown but there is no retail to go to anymore. Been a downtown retail customer for over 30 years and hard to ignore the significant changes over time yet somehow the majority of the posters here seem to ignore the obvious signs.

Wish I could short the downtown retail market v most of the people there as I could make a major profit simply by people ignoring what is right there in front of them.

Originally Posted by LilZebra

But I'd like to ensure that it has amenities that were there before. A movie theatre, the long promised grocery store, some sort of good retail not a relocated Dollarama. I want to ensure that this space is well lit and constantly patrolled by WPS to keep the criminal element away from the site.

1. A downtown grocery store is NEVER happening. It is more likely that Portage Place announces the following new tenants as opening in 2020 than a single downtown grocery store open in next 10 years.

- Harry Rosen
- Louis Vuitton
- Gucci
- Prada
- Channel

2. The movie theater in Portage Place has too small a lobby by modern standards and there is no room to expand. A sizable piece of movie theater revenue is from the lobby due to the high share of the box office that go the the movie producers in the first few weeks of release. Also with only three screens it is hard to generate enough volume of traffic to bring in those revenues. Add in the high lease cost v revenue potential which resulted in The Globe closing. Short of the landlord taking a significant drop in their income from the space and a local independent operator coming forward that won't happen. Cineplex is highly focused on building out alternative entertainment spaces like Rec Room to be willing to take on a project like this and Landmark won't be interested as they were the company behind The Globe name.

3. New retail tenants? That also seems doubtful when the current landlord has effectively announced they are winding down retail operations in Portage Place. If the skywalk being moved to the front of the building and the open air replacement aren't enough clues they also talked about moving towards the street level units on Portage Ave being open to the street. Basically inside "the mall" is going to be for tenants only with limited public access.

[kalabaw]

Originally Posted by BAKGUY

About Winnipeggers/ Whinypeggers...Do nothing, No good. Do something, no good.Sick of the whiny A_holes.. Yes..My late grandfather told me when I was a kid.. The major reason why Winnipeg was not over a million people decades ago was for the large minority or small majority of sourpuss, nasty small town minded people with tunnel vision..and so many of their offspring still think backwards today. The negativity is their own lack of self confidence.. many positive people leave for where the pessimism is dialed down. I used to hear how MTS Place will be a loser complex .. 3rd busiest in Canada, 19th busiest in N America 50th in the world. The most ignorant of all is the many who trash our city to potential visitors and investors from elsewhere. It tells a lot about them.

It's like you can't win at all with most people here. And I remember how anxious I was when I was about to move here. Because a lot of Winnipegers trash the city, it does not have a good reputation even within Canada. I was afraid of what I will see here, but lo and behold, four years later, I am still here.

I actually wonder if it is because most people here have not experienced life or travelled elsewhere. I am not talking about going to Mexico or Carribean for a week or two. I'm talking about actually living in a different part of the world and gaining experience there so they can expand their views. Most of the people I meet in our office have always lived here and have no plans to ever experience life somewhere else. They are not even aware of working holiday opportunities in Europe or Australia. I do not hold a Canadian citizenship, but man, if I had that opportunity when I was younger, I would have grabbed it.

[CoryB]

Originally Posted by armorand93

Honestly, it kind of makes me wonder, if Winnipeg would just opt out of WPS, and just go with a contract for the RCMP instead.

There is a local precedence for this. RM of East St Paul operated their police force until it was disbanded by the Justice minister after the whole Taman incident.

That said it would not be as simple as flipping a switch. The RCMP would need to majorly staff up, add resources (vehicles, gun, other equipment, etc). to take over. Reality of such a change is what would likely happen is RCMP would be brought in as the leadership of what is current WPS, all existing equipment would be gifted to the local operation and RCMP would essentially badge over the existing force and covert it to their own operation over time. That also glosses over the issues with the RCMP themselves.

[esquire]

Originally Posted by CoryB

Let's see:

- Street facing retail on Portage Ave east of Donald? Outside of two dollar stores - DEAD
- multi-floor Eaton's department store - DEAD
- About 1/3 of CityPlace - demoed for the arena - DEAD
- About 1/3 of CityPlace retail converted to offices - (retail) DEAD
- street facing retail on Portage Ave between Donald and Colony - essentially DEAD
- Portage Place - already about 1/3 of retail space killed for office space and more to follow.
- 6 floor + basement Hudson Bay building - down to 3 floors and on serious life support.

But yeah, downtown retail is set for a major growth spurt. /s The trend is obvious is you take a minute to actually get away from your keyboard posting rants about how you think things should be and go outside and look a little.

Hey, I'm not arguing that downtown retail isn't in decline. It has been declining pretty well since Polo Park opened its doors. But you said that it's "dead" which is simply and obviously wrong.

[LilZebra]

Originally Posted by CoryB

Let's see:

- Street facing retail on Portage Ave east of Donald? Outside of two dollar stores - DEAD
- multi-floor Eaton's department store - DEAD
- About 1/3 of CityPlace - demoed for the arena - DEAD
- About 1/3 of CityPlace retail converted to offices - (retail) DEAD
- street facing retail on Portage Ave between Donald and Colony - essentially DEAD
- Portage Place - already about 1/3 of retail space killed for office space and more to follow.
- 6 floor + basement Hudson Bay building - down to 3 floors and on serious life support.

But yeah, downtown retail is set for a major growth spurt. /s The trend is obvious is you take a minute to actually get away from your keyboard posting rants about how you think things should be and go outside and look a little.

If people stop with the hyperbole about how downtown retail is thriving in Vancouver and Toronto and Winnipeg is going to make a come back I can stop posting about how downtown Winnipeg retail is dead and never coming back. It is a tough reality but one we need to face if we want downtown to keep moving forward. It is different than Garden City and Grant Park too but if you don't realize that its going to be a very long post explaining why Home Depot isn't going to open at Portage and Main on the vacant lot and why that is actually a good thing.

Staples has been closing stores fairly widely as they struggle to remain viable. It isn't exactly a secret that the Portage Place location hasn't seen an interior refresh since it opened, that most higher valued products are locked up in the backroom, unlike other locations, and the inventory that is exposed to the floor is short stocked v other Winnipeg locations. Having the landlord come to them about the site development would be the perfect out for Staples from downtown Winnipeg without looking like a villain for abandoning the community. It is identical to how Coffee Time left the downtown Winnipeg market when their property was sold to make way for Hydro Place.

Yes, retail is changing from bricks and mortar "warehouses" to showroom spaces for online ordering that cover a much wider geographic region than the "Warehouse" model filled with racks and racks of the same item.

Yeah, I guess Staples is leaving The writing on the wall has been there for years.

I also love how the "Team Open" Portage and Main crowd continues more than a year after they lost the vote to talk about how connecting four buildings on the edge of downtown to the rest of downtown would "save" all of downtown. Reality of downtown is people in towers tend to move in about a two block radius of their starting point. With the existing underground connections of the buildings at Portage and Main it would have limited impact to the spread of people from east of Main to the west side. There is also nothing east of Main that would pull the west side people to that side that they are not already getting to in other ways.

Only thing east of Portage and Main is the baseball park and its active seasonally. There's also the Richardson Innovation Centre, but that's only office/clinical research space. Should have gotten them to open a retail space there. Nutty Club, as nice a building as it is should eventually move to an industrial park somewhere else and make way for a mixed use building. Pack Portage Ave. E with something other than the baseball stadium to give people a reason to cross over all year round. This is the problem we have today and why the P&M vote went the way it did.

As for the two block radius? I have worked my whole career downtown and know what co-workers say about where they go for lunch etc. To go from say Portage and Main to Hargrave St Market, about six blocks, would be viewed as a major excursion, similar to travelling well outside downtown for the same purpose. I also know going four blocks from Portage to Broadway is viewed in a similar way. That points to the maximum distance the majority of people are willing to walk downtown is in the 1-3 block range. But yeah, facts and hard truths are the sort of thing "Team Open" didn't want to discuss as it did not support their narrative.

When I worked near P&M at 269 Main St. or 167 Lombard Ave. and would have 30 mins. or 45 mins (using up my mid-afternoon break time) yeah, it'd be a far stretch to visit Eaton Place/cityplace. Kept within the Winnipeg Sq. and Lombard Concourse areas, had lunch inside the office building I was working in. Better transit would have made it easier to travel further. And if so, I would have gone to the Paddlewheel resto. sometimes...if Graham Ave. Transit Mall or Portage supported underground rail from Main @ Lombard, a stop at Portage @ Donald, getting off the train at Portage @ Memorial like there's supposed to be.



A year or so ago, I was at Mood Disorders around 12 noon and had a scheduled appt. back there at 1 pm. Said to myself, hey, there should be enough time to go to the Subway restaurant in Ft. Garry near Windermere. Did that and just squeaked by at 1:05 pm. Wouldn't have even considered that without our 'rt'.

No protest here, just telling the truth. I used to be out frequenting downtown retail on a daily basis. I am still downtown but there is no retail to go to anymore. Been a downtown retail customer for over 30 years and hard to ignore the significant changes over time yet somehow the majority of the posters here seem to ignore the obvious signs.

Wish I could short the downtown retail market v most of the people there as I could make a major profit simply by people ignoring what is right there in front of them.

1. A downtown grocery store is NEVER happening. It is more likely that Portage Place announces the following new tenants as opening in 2020 than a single downtown grocery store open in next 10 years.

- Harry Rosen
- Louis Vuitton
- Gucci
- Prada
- Channel

Those would be nice and expected in any major city. But somehow (cough cough) Winnipeg is "different" and we can't have nice things like those. (cough cough).

2. The movie theater in Portage Place has too small a lobby by modern standards and there is no room to expand. A sizable piece of movie theater revenue is from the lobby due to the high share of the box office that go the the movie producers in the first few weeks of release. Also with only three screens it is hard to generate enough volume of traffic to bring in those revenues. Add in the high lease cost v revenue potential which resulted in The Globe closing. Short of the landlord taking a significant drop in their income from the space and a local independent operator coming forward that won't happen. Cineplex is highly focused on building out alternative entertainment spaces like Rec Room to be willing to take on a project like this and Landmark won't be interested as they were the company behind The Globe name.

3. New retail tenants? That also seems doubtful when the current landlord has effectively announced they are winding down retail operations in Portage Place. If the skywalk being moved to the front of the building and the open air replacement aren't enough clues they also talked about moving towards the street level units on Portage Ave being open to the street. Basically inside "the mall" is going to be for tenants only with limited public access.

Cineplex was sold last week to UK based Cineworld.
https://variety.com/2019/biz/global/...ex-1203439380/

[bomberjet]

Better listen to Cory everybody. Says retail is dead. But the champs on about street facing units on Portage.



I'm no expert here, but I'm pretty sure people have been hocking their wares for 1000's of years in shacks. No reason they're going to stop now because of internet.

[BigG]

Originally Posted by kalabaw

It's like you can't win at all with most people here. And I remember how anxious I was when I was about to move here. Because a lot of Winnipegers trash the city, it does not have a good reputation even within Canada. I was afraid of what I will see here, but lo and behold, four years later, I am still here.

I actually wonder if it is because most people here have not experienced life or travelled elsewhere. I am not talking about going to Mexico or Carribean for a week or two. I'm talking about actually living in a different part of the world and gaining experience there so they can expand their views. Most of the people I meet in our office have always lived here and have no plans to ever experience life somewhere else. They are not even aware of working holiday opportunities in Europe or Australia. I do not hold a Canadian citizenship, but man, if I had that opportunity when I was younger, I would have grabbed it.

I hear you and I feel you, man. I immigrated here as a four-year-old kid over forty-five years ago because my parents wanted the best for them and their kids. It was absolutely the right move. My dad has passed on now but in his final years, he was very proud and happy with what he and his family accomplished in life. All of that was done here - in Winnipeg. Sure the city has its' share of problems, but what major city doesn't? I've seen a lot of this country and other cities in the world. Friends have asked me why don't you move here or there? Why stay in Winnipeg? My answer is always, "Why not in Winnipeg?" I'll tell you if you can't make it in Winnipeg, you'll be hard-pressed to make it anywhere. Some will laugh at what I just stated but that's okay. There have always been Winnipeggers who like to shit on their own city. It doesn't really bother me anymore. The truth is there are a lot of places that are far and away worse than our city. All one needs to do is travel and see other places for themselves. Please don't get me wrong, Winnipeg has its fair share of problems but it also has gems. This is an exciting time for our city. I haven't seen construction and investment like this in my lifetime. That's from the 70s, 80s, 90s 2000s. Just a proud Winnipegger here and that's something no one can ever take away.

[rrskylar]

Originally Posted by BigG

I hear you and I feel you, man. I immigrated here as a four-year-old kid over forty-five years ago because my parents wanted the best for them and their kids. It was absolutely the right move. My dad has passed on now but in his final years, he was very proud and happy with what he and his family accomplished in life. All of that was done here - in Winnipeg. Sure the city has it's share of problems, but what major city doesn't? I've seen a lot of this country and other cities in the world. Friends have asked me why don't you move here or there? Why stay in Winnipeg? My answer is always, "Why not in Winnipeg?" I'll tell you if you can't make it in Winnipeg, you'll be hard-pressed to make it anywhere. Some will laugh at what I just stated but that's okay. There have always been Winnipeggers who like to shit on their own city. It doesn't really bother me anymore. The truth is there are a lot of places that are far and away worse than our city. All one needs to do is travel and see other places for themselves. Please don't get me wrong, Winnipeg has its fair share of problems but it also has gems. This is an exciting time for our city. I haven't seen construction and investment like this in my lifetime. That's from the 70s, 80s, 90s 2000s. Just a proud Winnipegger here and that's something no one can ever take away.

Nice post!

[BigG]

Originally Posted by rrskylar

Nice post!

Thanks rrskylar. Cheers right back atcha!

[drew]

Originally Posted by BigG

I'll tell you if you can't make it in Winnipeg, you'll be hard-pressed to make it anywhere.

Totally agree.

Winnipeg should be the test market for everyone. We are a finicky bunch here, and quick to move on from something when the shine wears off.

[bomberjet]

Yes, cheers Big G! I work with people from other provinces regularly. Calgary specifically. They always make comments. I always tell them I like living in Winnipeg so why move. Move to Calgary for what, the C train? I make a good living here doing what I do.

[BigG]

Thanks BJ.

[EdwardTH]

So weird, I bought literally all of my Christmas presents from brick & mortar stores downtown because I hate having to drive out to the mall especially at this time of year. But I couldn't possibly have done that because downtown retail doesn't exist anymore according to the wise CoryB.... so where the hell was I shopping?

[CoryB]

Originally Posted by esquire

Hey, I'm not arguing that downtown retail isn't in decline. It has been declining pretty well since Polo Park opened its doors. But you said that it's "dead" which is simply and obviously wrong.

Actually downtown retail was going fairly strongly for about 30 years after Polo Park opened. Black Monday (stock market crash in 87) had a large role in the downturn of retail in downtown Winnipeg. The crash ended up sending Cadallic Fairview into bankruptcy leading them to restructure and drop assets, one of which was the management contract for Portage Place. With CF out of the picture leveraging its weight to bring in top tier shops to Portage Place the decline started. The two rounds of bankruptcy for Eaton's and the old building siting vacant for years afterwards just further pushed the loss. It also wasn't until this decline really started to hit that St Vital to come into its own. Without CF propping up Portage Place by strong arming retailers to take up space there to get into Polo Park that St Vital really became the #2 mall without question.

In the years since the market crash of 1987 Portage Place has bounced between multiple owners that aren't focused on retail in the same way as CF. That is turn has lead to mall to struggle. The lack of anchors was also said to not help but reality is it positioned to mall as somewhat of a test water for the retail landscape we are entering.

Ultimately though when it is cheaper for companies to sell you something from your browser than bricks and mortar it stops mattering what the consumer prefers as the volume will always follow the lowest price. Once the volume is lost the fight to keep brick and mortar opens is lost too. As a society we have long past that point and there simply is no going back.

Originally Posted by bomberjet

Better listen to Cory everybody. Says retail is dead. But the champs on about street facing units on Portage.

Let's see. Cutting retail space by over 75% in Portage Place to leave some street racing retail units. Definitely a sign of a major "boom" in downtown retail. Just waiting for those first to market luxury brands to sign their leases. Odds seem higher that those spaces ultimately end up as Winnipeg's first safe injection site...

[Spocket]

Why are people arguing about this? Retail downtown hasn't been a draw for, what, 60, 70 years?

There will always be a market for some retail downtown so long as people live or work there but arguing that it's even comparable to what was once there or that it's coming back any time soon is downright naive. The city had exactly this mentality for years and it's precisely why Portage Place was built. Some tall forehead at city hall got it into his or her head that we could "save" downtown from itself by building a ton of retail downtown. To see how that turned out, well, just take a look. That being said, it's still a lot better than it was at its lowest point. When the core reaches some sort of critical population mass, it will draw retailers in again. Until then, please, it's insulting to suggest that the place could be full of unique shops and stereotypical boutiques just because some heads are in the sand.

[drew]

Downtown retail in Winnipeg:

Not quite dead.

Not quite alive.

therefore

Zombie Apocalypse!

[armorand93]

Originally Posted by CoryB

There is a local precedence for this. RM of East St Paul operated their police force until it was disbanded by the Justice minister after the whole Taman incident.

That said it would not be as simple as flipping a switch. The RCMP would need to majorly staff up, add resources (vehicles, gun, other equipment, etc). to take over. Reality of such a change is what would likely happen is RCMP would be brought in as the leadership of what is current WPS, all existing equipment would be gifted to the local operation and RCMP would essentially badge over the existing force and covert it to their own operation over time. That also glosses over the issues with the RCMP themselves.

True... it would be costly, but at least the RCMP get shit done. And without the corruption and overkill, either. No more racial issues either - RCMP will actually run a lie detector on recruits, pass them through full training, and to be brutally honest, I've NEVER seen an Aboriginal WPS officer. Tons in the RCMP. So least it's alot less bias, as well. I'd rather trust a Mountie than WPS, if it came down to it. And seems Bowman is rapidly approaching the "RCMP is the answer" point, on everything from the HQ, to policing, to all sorts of stuff. So why not just let the RCMP patch/badge over WPS?