Why Vancouver's viaducts cannot be the High Line

Though City staff are set to release their report this summer, all signs are pointing to the Dunsmuir and Georgia viaducts getting the old heave-ho. Anyone paying a smidgen of attention to the talk at city hall, and specifically Cllr Geoff Meggs who has taken the viaducts on for awhile, would know that the preferred option is to see the viaducts removed in favour of more parkland, room for development, and a generally better stitched together neighbourhood. While careful traffic impact studies need to be done before the viaducts can be removed, car traffic into downtown has been decreasing steadily in the past decade and will probably continue to do so. The viaducts right now only handle a fraction of the car traffic they were originally designed to handle.

A design competition a few months ago sparked interest in alternative plans for the area and the viaducts themselves, and, given the success of New York's High Line park (which, unless you have been living under a rock, you'll know is an elevated rail trestle converted into an uber-design linear park), it's no surprise that some people are pushing for Vancouver to copy New York and turn the viaducts into something similar.

This is a bad idea.

While cities should look to other cities for design and planning ideas that they can incorporate, we've seen time and time again that many ideas--be they a pedestrian street or a casino or a Ferris wheel--are context specific and not necessarily transferable. You can't just take the idea for the High Line, transplant it onto Vancouver's viaducts and get the same result. It's tempting to think this way, but dangerous and costly.

They're expensive

The viaducts are expensive to maintain. Meggs estimates that the City will need to spend around $10 million over the next 15 years just to maintain the structures. I'm sure that price would be much higher if we were to load them full of dirt and plants and trees. At Toronto's annual Park Summit a few weekends ago, I heard Richard Hammond, one of the co-founders of the High Line, speak about how the High Line is an incredibly expensive park to maintain because of its high usage, but also because of the nature of its design. No doubt a park on the viaducts would be extremely expensive to maintain, more so than a traditional park, not only because of the aging infrastructure, but the landscape of the park as well.

photo by jmv from Flickr (cc)

They're ugly

The viaducts are hideous pieces of urban infrastructure. Originally supposed to be the on ramps to an urban highway that never materialized, they were never meant to be anything but utilitarian. From underneath they're about as inviting as an underground parking garage in a horror film. The High Line, while still a large and intimidating piece of infrastructure with its iron beams, doesn't have the same look as a concrete highway. Plus, its historic background as the route for goods being shipped into that part of the city gives it a kind of romantic tinge as a piece of New York history. Arguably, the viaducts are also a piece of Vancouver's history, but one that represents a short-lived moment and, ultimately, a mistake.

Additionally, the sheer bulk of the viaducts acts as much more of a neighbourhood killer than the High Line. The picture below typifies what the High Line looks like from the side. The infrastructure itself is less imposing and more elegant. It's also lower to the ground, and is already surrounded by significant development abutting it in many places.

photo by erikorama from Flickr (cc)

They're too short 

The High Line winds its way through a pretty long stretch of Manhattan, passing by many interesting areas of the city. The viaducts are simply too short to really offer what the High Line does--namely, a strollable stretch of carefully designed landscape. Park of the magic of walking the High Line is not only taking in how the design changes from block to block to block, but about how the city around it changes. The High Line offers an always evolving landscape and accompanying cityscape, something the viaducts do not. While the viaducts would offer a beautiful view of False Creek and probably some mountain views, this is not really something too hard to come by in Vancouver already. The city has more beautiful vistas than some countries.

So, what then?

The plan put forward by Dialog/Beasley/PWL/Green, which is featured in the City's slideshow about the viaducts and was one of the winners of its re:Connect contest, is an intelligent, beautiful, and, most of all, Vancouver-specific, solution to the problem of the viaducts. It would combine Pacific and Expo into one road, increase parkland in the area, introduce a winding stream leading out of False Creek into the urban fabric, and, most importantly, work to knit together Strathcona, Chinatown and the Downtown Eastside, to a waterfront they have been disconnected from for years.

The plan put forward by Dialog/Beasley/PWL/Green

This plan represents far more parkland than could be obtained from greening the tops of the viaducts, and, while the plan is not without its own expenses, would likely represent less of a maintenance burden on the city. No doubt a new urban stream, a new urban beach, and significant amounts of parkland would spur interest from developers--all this and without unsightly water-stained concrete slabs nearby.

While the High Line is a great park for New York and works wonderfully there, let's not kid ourselves into thinking that our viaducts represent the same opportunity. What we do have though, is an opportunity to create a new amazing part of Vancouver's waterfront and connect the rest of the city to it. Yes, I think Vancouver should be bold and creative, but being bold and creative shouldn't mean copy-pasting something from New York just because it worked there.

Event: Populating the New Transit Corridors

photo by sillygwailo from Flickr (cc)

A potentially interesting free event up at York University on February 22 from 5:30 - 7:30pm that looks at the planning of transit corridors in the future, with a focus on Vancouver's experience with the relatively new Canada Line and the Cambie corridor along which it runs. This is even more relevant to Toronto considering yesterday's decisive council decision to redeploy a network of light rails a la Transit City.

From the event info page:

For the Toronto metropolitan region, Metrolinx’s Big Move is an historically ambitious program for the investment of tens of billions of dollars in new transit over the next 25 years. Development along the transit corridors is expected to shape the future of our region, yet public discussion to date has focused almost entirely on transit line locations, technologies and costs. We should not be beguiled by the notion that development will automatically locate to the corridors.

It’s time to steer the discussion towards how future development will be deliberately induced to locate around the new transit corridors. Neglecting to do so is to invite the necessity of enormous long-term subsidies for building, maintaining, and operating new transit lines whose ridership is too low to cover the costs. For a region aspiring to be globally competitive, the stakes are high.

Metrolinx has taken initiatives in land use and design, in particular with its Mobility Hub Guidelines. A public discussion on systematic approaches to populating all of the transit corridors is required to avoid mistakes of the past.

As a living example of big picture planning along transit corridors, Vancouver’s Cambie Corridor Plan has timely relevance. Bailey and Kellett have collaborated on innovative processes and methods of integrating transportation, land use, and energy efficiencies. They will speak to plan outcomes to date, engagement processes, research methods, and diverse types of visualization.

Instagram and the City

Vancouver: Robson Square 

Vancouver: Sea Wall

Vancouver: Sea wall

Vancouver: Rezoning application near GM Place

Vancouver: Olympic Village

Toronto: Pink arrow 

Toronto: View from the 13th floor of Robarts Library

Vancouver: Vancouver Public Library 

Vancouver: North False Creek sea wall

Toronto: or, Oronto!

Vancouver's Cathedral Square

 

Cathedral Square in the eastern portion of Vancouver's downtown, right at the edge of Gastown, is one of those spaces that I've walked by a dozen times but never stopped to go inside and explore. Mostly it was because, despite the dramatic design of this public space, there was never any real draw to check it out. The square usually draws a cursory glance as people walk by to other things. It exists as one of those public spaces that were designed with the best intention, and then left to rot, untended.

Cathedral Square consists of a grassy expanse dotted by wooden benches on concrete platforms and a zig-zagged pathway. In the centre is a pool, the colour of the which makes it look less like a reflecting pond than your neighbours over-chlorinated and neglected backyard swimming pool, leafy detritus and cigarette butts magnified from their sunken spot at the bottom. This blue is "complemented" by Expo 86-style steel girders that make an open-air cage propped up on thick, concrete turrets. There is even a 'pier' should someone want to sit out and suntan. 

This cage sits atop a stepped plaza of sorts that is littered with trash, and mostly hidden from the street beside it. The site's architecture is imposing and unfriendly and almost prison-like in the huge concrete barriers and metal cage. Some of the benches are even missing, so all that remains is the concrete block on which they are supposed to sit.

Part of the reason for the site's lack of people, no doubt, is that the space is located in a inconvenient spot. As time passes in Vancouver the city's 'centre' has moved ever westward, from the pioneer days when the hot spot was what is now called the Downtown Eastside to contemporary times where most people are found along the commercialized spine of Robson Street in the West End.


However, it's undeniable that the design of this square is not a welcoming one. I found some pictures from the Vancouver Archives of what the square looked like when it first opened in 1986 to find out if it was as unwelcoming looking back then as it is now. 

Vancouver Archives, CVA 7840-098

In these photos the concrete pillars are fresh and have not yet succumbed to the rusty discolourations from years of rain, and there are flowers and small trees. 

Vancouver Archives, CVA 784-099

The cage overhead is revealed to have once been the frame for a covering that shielded the space from rain, but they obviously found it too difficult to maintain so removed it. You can also see in the below picture how the southern edge of the square is cut off from the adjacent street due to a change in grade, making this part of the space feel closed off and private.

Vancouver Archives, CVA 784-101

It's unfortunate that this space gets so little play. Vancouver's downtown peninsula has a real dearth of public squares and plazas larger than those occupying a ceded corner of real estate on a busy downtown block (the small plaza at the corner of Georgia and Granville outside of the Sears building was such a corner until the city built an oversized entrance to the Vancouver City Centre Canada Line station there). For now Cathedral Square remains mostly discarded.

As it stands, however, Cathedral Square does seem to serve a function of providing shelter and privacy to those who may be living on the street. I came across two people sleeping in separate sections of the plaza behind the giant concrete pillars. So a "rediscovering" of this space by the City would likely result in inequities in terms of who is able to use this space and for what.

Book: The Vancouver Achievement by John Punter

Ah, Vancouver. That gleaming, sparkling, oasis of a planners wet dream. At least, that's what, at first glance, this book appears to say.

But if you look past the cringe-inducing boosterish title of John Punter's book you'll find a great documentation of Vancouver planning history and policies since the 1970s, up until about 2001, when the book was published. Punter, a professor of urban design in the UK at Cardiff University, has exhaustively catalogued the development of the city. While the title may give away just how Punter feels about Vancouver, he doesn't shy away from criticisms of affordability, architectural monotony, and exclusivity.

Particularly interesting was the chapter on Vancouver's single-family neighbourhoods and the infiltration of discretionary zoning and development controls sought by neighbourhood associations (usually wealthy ones) to preserve the "character" of their area. Punter describes how City Council and planners bent to the demands of these neighbourhoods, instituting zoning that restricted intensification and secondary suites. This obviously has had a severe impact on the affordability of Vancouver as a whole, confirming the power of these neighbourhoods in the political and planning process. It's hard not to see that the rhetoric of preserving a neighbourhood's character is often a guise for social exclusion.

There were a few things the book left out. There was no real mention of Metro Vancouver, or regional planning, which I think is a mistake. Many things are decided at the regional level and it would have been interesting to see how these interacted at the city level in Vancouver. Similarly, there was no real discussion of transit planning, except for a few paragraphs near the end. This, too, is an oversight. While SkyTrain is mentioned a few times, I would have liked a discussion of the planning and development around the stations and how it changed the city. Finally, Vancouver's elected Park Board only got a few brief mentions, even though there was much discussion of the provision of park space.

It's difficult to talk about planning in Vancouver without talking about affordability. The obvious question that runs through the book, and one that Punter does address (though not nearly enough, I think) is that, sure, Vancouver is shiny and mostly well-designed, but who gets to enjoy in this when the city is so utterly unaffordable? What does "livability" really mean if you find it hard to live there?

Map Breaks Down Vancouver Voting Patterns

The glorious map of voting patterns by divsion

Frances Bula, journalist for the Globe and Mail, pointed out this amazing interactive Google map that breaks down Vancouver voter patterns by division, giving you the numbers for mayor and party. Knock yourselves out. Bula has some interesting number crunching on her own blog from these stats. What's most interesting about this breakdown is what this reveals about the city if Vancouver were ever to approve a ward-based system, where councillors run in specific ridings or wards, instead of the current at-large, where councillors are elected city-wide.

A Twitter Guide to the *New* City of Vancouver

"Tweet tweet, rezoning, tweet tweet" photo by Porfirio on Flickr (cc)

Twitter's not all about what you ate for breakfast or how cute your cat can be (although mine is frequently about the latter). It's also a good place to follow your local politicians and get the scoop about what's going on in the city. Here's a list of the Twitter accounts for the new City Council, Park Board, and School Board in Vancouver. I've also included a few candidates that weren't elected that are good to follow. Please add freely in the comments section.


Vision Vancouver - @visionvancouver
NPA - @npavancouver
COPE - @copevancouver

Greenest City - @greenestcity
Vancouver Park Board - @parkboard
Vancouver Archives - @vanarchives
City of Vancouver - @cityofvancouver

Council

Vision Vancouver 
Gregor Robertson - @mayorgregor
Heather Deal - @vanrealdeal
Geoff Meggs - @geoffmeggs
Andrea Reimer - @andreareimer
Tim Stevenson - None
Tony Tang - None
Kerry Jang - None
Raymond Louie - None

NPA
George Affleck - @george_affleck
Elizabeth Ball - @elizabeth_ball

Green
Adriane Carr - @adrianecarr

School Board

Vision Vancouver
Patti Bacchus - @pattibacchus
Mike Lombardi - @lombardimike
Ken Clement - None
Cherie Payne - @cheriepayne
Rob Wynen - @robwynen

NPA
Ken Denike - @ubcken
Sophia Woo - @woo_sophia
Fraser Ballantyne - @frasergb

COPE
Allan Wong - None

Park Board

Vision Vancouver
Constance Barnes - @constancebarnes
Sarah Blyth - @sarahblyth
Aaron Jasper - @aaron_jasper
Niki Sharma - @nikisharma2
Trevor Loke - @trevorloke

NPA
Melissa De Genova - @melissadegenova (hasn't tweet yet)
John Coupar - @johnccoupar


Unelected

Sandy Garossino (Independent) - @garossino 
RJ Aquino (COPE) - @ayoslang
Ellen Woodsworth (COPE) - @ellenwoodsworth
Mike Klassan (NPA) - @mikeklassen
Brent Granby (COPE) - @brentgranby
Sean Bickerton (NPA) - @seanbickerton

[edit: I've just been alerted by Andrea Reimer (via Twitter! See? It works!) that you can find the full list of City agencies and their respective Twitter, YouTube and Facebook accounts up on the City's website, so be sure to check it out]

Vancouver Election a Lesson in Every Vote Counts

Election results by division from Vancouver.ca

Last night I had some friends over for dinner, but as 11pm rolled around my thoughts were elsewhere. That's because all the way over on the other side of the country in my former city of Vancouver, where the time was just 8pm, the polls had just closed on what had become a pretty heated municipal election.

It was hard to gauge what the real feeling was like in Vancouver from my perch over here in Toronto where all I had to go on was Twitter, blogs, and newspapers. As polls rolled in that showed Suzanne Anton's NPA closing in on Gregor Robertson's Vision Vancouver--a trend attributed by the media mostly to the Occupy Vancouver protests--I started to wonder if Robertson could really lose a campaign that seemed like such a sure shot only a few weeks ago.

Well, wonder did not turn to reality. Vision has swept back in with a majority on council, taking the top seven spots, with the NPA taking spots eight and nine and, amazingly, Adriane Carr of the Greens squeaking into spot number ten. Sadly, COPE saw themselves shut out, which is a disappointment.

But as the night went on, it was the bottom spot on council where the action really was. As each wave of polls were reported (I think I almost broke the refresh button on my browser), the results for the bottom seat changed. It was the NPA's Bill Yuen, then it was the NPA's Mike Klassen, then COPE's Ellen Woodsworth began bubbling upwards, then it was Green's Adriane Carr, then Yuen again.

With all the polls reporting except one in the West End, even with Yuen still sitting in spot number ten, it was pretty clear that Carr was going to get that last council seat. The West End is her territory after all. I remember in past Provincial elections when I used to live in the West End, seeing Carr standing on street corners with BC Green Party volunteers back when she was the leader of that party.

At the end of the night, Carr won the seat over COPE's Ellen Woodsworth by a mere 91 votes. Let me say that again. 91 votes. You could squish that many people onto a bus if you really wanted to. If there was ever a lesson in every vote counts, that was it.

I'm sad to see Woodsworth lose the spot as I think she is a great, capable and down-to-earth councillor. I remember her showing up briefly to the magazine launch of OCW Magazine with bicycle helmet under arm to say hello, back when I was Managing Editor there. Out of all the councillors we invited, she was the only one who showed up.

The next time you hear someone say their vote doesn't count, you can point to that result. 91 people. That's all it took.

Vancouver's Capital Plan 2012-2014: A Love Story

photo by GoodnCrazy from Flickr (cc)

Ok, so it's not really a love story, but I figured no one would read this if I didn't grab their interest somehow. A Vancouver civic election looms, which also means that, yeehaw!, it's capital budget time! Over the summer Vancouver City Council consulted with Vancouverites on the upcoming capital budget plan, which coincides with civic elections so you can vote on whether to approve borrowing for the stated projects.

As boring as something called the Capital Plan might sound, it's mighty important in setting the agenda for the next three years of, well, building stuff. Important stuff. Like water mains and sewers and community centres.

So, here's the skinny on the final plan (the whole of which you can find here). This is the stuff you'll be voting on when you head to the polls on November 19th to elect a new city government.

It's All in the Details for Vancouver's Sea Wall

(This article originally appeared on OpenCity on August 17, 2011)

Vancouver has always been good at paying attention to the smaller design details that work to make up the larger picture. A walk along the lengthy, winding and continuous seawall that envelopes the downtown core and parts of False Creek is a lesson in details, with well-designed street furniture, beautifully landscaped parks, scatterings of public art, and a thoughtfully integrated system for both pedestrians and cyclists. It’s often said that Vancouver is a city that lives on its edges, and the seawall definitely helps propagate that.

On this particular trip, I was interested in checking out the new portion of the seawall at the site of the Olympic Village neighbourhood (now just called The Village). The area had been under construction for several years and then cordoned off during the Olympics, so I hadn’t gotten much of a chance to wander around the completed site. The stretch of the seawall along the neighbourhood is some of the best in the city, and, with the proximity to the mid-rise buildings that make up the Village, one that exudes the most urban feeling.

The thing that makes this portion of the seawall so charming is the attention to different details and how they all creatively fit together. Several different materials are used from wooden planks to grass to interlocking brick to sand to granite. The combinations create an interesting and ever-changing texture as you move from one portion to another, allowing also for different levels and separations between uses (lounging, cycling, walking).

The street furniture is comfortable and also ingeniously playful. For example, the metal chairs positioned on the board walk itself are rooted to a pole that allows the chair to spin in circles, so you can face whichever direction you want (or, if you’re me, spin around so fast you make yourself sick). And the street furniture ranges from single chairs, to benches with backs, to benches without backs, to stone blocks. The true accomplishment is how much variety is found without the space feeling disorganized or cluttered.

My favourite example of creativity is found in the long, wooden wave decks about one metre across that dipped every so often to create the perfect spot to fit a reclining body. We’re so accustomed these days to seeing street furniture that seems like it was designed so that no one would want to sit or lie down on it for very long, so it’s refreshing to come across something obviously made for people to be comfortable and enjoy themselves. Imagine that.

Six City of Vancouver Reports Just in Time For the Long Weekend

The City of Vancouver has been a busy bee. Six reports were released in the last few days on subjects ranging from the separated bike lanes to sustainable neighbourhoods projects to homelessness to pedestrian safety. I have yet to read all the reports, but here they are linked in all their multi-page glory for those of you who have some time during this long weekend to sit down with a cold beer and some good ol' fashioned municipal publications (note: these are all links to PDFs).

Improving Pedestrian Safety and Accessibility

Viaducts and False Creek Flats Planning: Eastern Core Strategy

Sustainable City of Sustainable Neighbourhoods Project

Vancouver's Next Community Plans

Downtown Separated Bicycle Lanes Status Report, Summer 2011

Housing and Homelessness Strategy 2011 - 2021

Happy reading!

photo of the Dunsmuir separated bike lane taken by the author

Vancouver's Parkades Under Parks

If you're going to have a car parkade, best to put a real park on top of it like this one here in Vancouver's Coal Harbour.

Toronto Vs. Vancouver: Garbage Can Edition

photo by JBcurio from Flickr Creative Commons

I'm not sure what it says about me that I take pictures of garbage cans when I'm on vacation, but I couldn't help snapping a few photos of some of Vancouver's newest additions to the trash scene when I was there last week. I never really gave garbage cans much thought before I moved to Toronto and encountered the ugly, non-functional and corporate-branded AstralMedia garbage cans that dominate the Toronto streetscape (see above photo).

These hulking, plastic bins feature a step-bar that is meant to open a flap so you don't have to soil your hand while throwing something away. Great idea. Except that 99% of the time it's broken. The company that provided them, AstralMedia, recently admitted that their garbage cans are, well, garbage.

I'm not sure when these were put up, but Vancouver's new all metal compost/recycling/garbage receptacles, which I found down near the Vancouver Convention Centre are great. Best part about these that I can see? They're easy to clean. No curving lines, weird plastic or hinges. Just hose these suckers off and they're shiny as new.

I also found some new receptacles near the Olympic Village that featured a similar functional design with multiple compartments for different recyclables, and also a solar-powered trash compactor. I have my doubts that people are going to be using the compartments exactly as labeled. Most times people just chuck their junk into the nearest opening without checking to make sure whether it's for newspapers or banana peels. However, the thin slot for the newspapers bin discourages people who would ignorantly toss in the remains of their Bic Mac.

These two designs are much better than the often over-flowing garbage cans that Vancouver began installing en masse several years ago. Those garbage cans allowed no place for recyclables or compost (granted, at the time the City didn't collect compost). They did however, contain a spot that was meant for cans and bottles so that "binners"--people that collect cans and bottles for their refund--didn't have to reach into the garbage can to collect them. Unfortunately, these trays simply filled with garbage most times.

photo by Carolyn Coles from Flickr Creative Commons

Of course, we could just get rid of garbage cans altogether and install a system of trash-sucking pneumatic tubes like those found on New York's Roosevelt Island or Stockholm's Hammarby Sjostad neighbourhood. Just don't fall in.

photos my own, except where noted.

Wayfinding Signage Without the Ads

So while I was away on vacation it seems a newly designed Info-To-Go pillar was presented to City Council here in Toronto. I think wayfinding signage around town is completely essential, but am disappointed to see that the ratio of city information to advertising on these pillars is pretty terrible--even more terrible than the previous design (you can read Torontoist's article on the previous pillar design here). Apparently if you want to find your way, you only get a sliver of spot to look at, but if you're interested in new diamond rings, well, look no further.

One of the places I went on my vacation was back to Vancouver to visit some friends and family. Vancouver began installing info pillars before the Olympics in 2010, but the program has seen a lot of expansion since I left just over a year ago. They were all over the place. A typical pillar was a skinny strip with a map, directions to things nearby, and a listing of local business. The opposite side of the pillar contained the same information. There was a giant 'i' on top. There are no ads (unless you consider the local business listing an ad). Here is one for Coal Harbour:

Now, to be fair, Vancouver's info pillars on busy downtown streets like Robson contain an ad on one side and information on the other, but the vast majority of the pillars are like the ones pictured above. No ads, just info.

Why can't Toronto do something like this?

Video: Rear Window, Canucks Edition

Here's what part of downtown Vancouver sounded like when the Canucks scored a tying goal with seconds left.

video uploaded by chloejohns

Video: Silent 1940s Film of Vancouver's Parks

Have you ever walked around Stanley Park and wished you could watch a 45 minute silent documentary film from 1940 on Vancouver's parks? Well, look no further than this video from the Vancouver Archives. The video features footage of Memorial West Park, Grandview Park, Trout Lake, Queen Elizabeth Park, and many more. Of particularly interest are shots of Victory Square in the Downtown Eastside, which captures Vancouver's old streetcars going by in the background.

Also, check out the Vancouver Archives' new blog, AuthentiCity.

A Tale of Two Transit Companies: TTC vs. TransLink

TransLink is an entirely different beast from the TTC.

The TTC is run by a board of nine Toronto city councillors, while TransLink is a regional transportation authority of Metro Vancouver, encompassing several municipalities in the region (much like pre-amalgamated Toronto's regional governance structure). TransLink is constructed of a mayors council (made up of twenty-two mayors of communities around and including Vancouver), an appointed board of directors, and a regional transportation commissioner that is supposed to oversee the process.

Also, unlike the TTC, TransLink is responsible for much more than busses and SkyTrain, and has its hand in bikes and roads as well, meaning that it is well-suited for more comprehensive planning strategies that encompass different forms of travel.

While Toronto gets jerked around by politicians who enjoy sticking their finger in the transportation pot and stirring it around, Metro Vancouver's regional structure means there is less opportunity for a single mayor's whim to vastly derail plans. TransLink is far from perfect, however, and there is always concern about funding and delays in project timing (the Evergreen Line has been on the books for quite some time and still seems hazy), but the regional structure means that decisions are negotiated between many mayors. However, that same regional structure leaves some municipalities feeling as though they're not getting an equal piece of the transit pie, causing squabbles to break out about what transit lines should have priority and which municipalities they serve.

But it's not just the structure, scope and governance of the two transit companies that makes them so different, it's the approach to public consultation. My impression with the TTC and transit planning in Toronto, is that Torontonians are told what kind of transit they are getting instead of being involved in the conversation. David Miller says Toronto is getting a light-rail network, so Toronto is getting a light-rail network. Then Rob Ford says everything has to be underground, so everything has to be underground. Presto, change-o.

This week, TransLink released their UBC-Broadway corridor alternatives study, which is the second phase in a public consultation and planning process that seeks to find the best solution to rapid transit for the busy Broadway corridor. The website, which includes seven alternatives complete with easily understood graphics and comparisons, seeks public input on which one speaks to Vancouverite's needs the most. After the disastrous public relations fiasco that was the Canada Line, which saw law-suits as construction ripped up Cambie for far longer than TransLink originally said, it seems TransLink has learned that the way to a more successful project is to get people on board early and make them feel they have a say it the outcome.

It's a stark difference from the way transit planning takes place within the TTC, where public consultation seems to be more about disseminating information on already made decisions. Small concessions over station entrances/exits might be made, but all the major planning decisions have already been carved in stone--that is, until a new mayor says never mind.

It's been frustrating the last few weeks watching Rob Ford sweep away years of transit planning in Toronto with seemingly little official opposition, and then propose a privately-financed scheme that is shockingly fiscally irresponsible for a politician so focussed on fiscal responsibility. Transit planning and construction usually takes more than one political term in office, so if each successive mayor decided to rejig the transportation system to his or her personal preferences, Toronto would end up with an abundance of transit dreams and little else.

I like drawing transit lines on paper too, but eventually someone needs to actually build them.

Think You Love Vancouver?

Chances are this woman loves it more.

Ford Nation, Jane Jacobs Dissed, Vancouver's Modern Treehuggers, and a Concert Hall that Doubles a Bomb Shelter

"It took a while, but for Mayor Rob Ford the reality check is no longer in the mail: It has arrived." I wish I could take credit, but leave it to The Star's Christopher Hume to come up with that zinger in discussing Rob Ford's plea for money from McGuinty. But if Ford has indeed received his reality check, he certainly hasn't cashed it in as it emerged last week that Ford has threatened to unleash Ford Nation on McGuinty in the next election, causing people all around the city to throw up a little in their mouths. But, as it turns out, Ford Nation is a real thing. Only it won't be called Ford Nation. It will be called the Respect for Tax Payers Against Gravy Trains Above Ground And Also Those Wasteful Spending Pinkos Action Group.

There must be some megalomania in the water, as the Conservatives have also decided to create their own moniker and rebrand the Government of Canada as the Harper Government. In keeping, I have decided to rename my neighbourhood Jaketown. I mean, the Annex, who thought that one up?

Speaking of the Annex--I mean, Jaketown--Edward Glaeser, author of the book Triumph of the City: How Our Greatest Invention Makes Us Richer, Smarter, Greener, Healthier and Happier had the nerve to come to Toronto and diss Jane Jacobs. Oh, no you didn't! He says that tall buildings are good for cities and that Jacobs had it wrong when she said that old, low-rise buildings were important to keep in the housing stock to ensure affordability and street activity. He also said she was wrong about books with shorter titles conveying their meaning in a more concise way. Like, really, The Economy of Cities, what's that even about?

Just don't ask a Canadian about the economy. A recent Globe and Mail article mapped the huge disparities in Canada's math skills--but don't worry, the report uses pretty pictures and colours so we can all understand the information. Like, for instance, did you know that twelve out of every seven Torontonians can't do basic addition or subtraction? It's scandalous!

In other scandalalous news, Toronto has recently been focussed on the fall of the Urban Affairs Library and the Toronto Community Housing Corporation, but for resident's of Vancouver's Sixth Avenue it's been all about the proposed removal of thirty giant Elm trees from their street. The Park Board decided to hold off for the time being, but look unlikely to budge on the issue. Yeah, I bet those tree-hugging Vancouverites are gonna channel their inner hippie and chain themselves to those Elms, just like old times! But it looks like they've decided to go the more modern route and form a Facebook protest group instead.

Vancouver architect Bing Thom has proposed an idea that buries a concert hall underground in front of the Vancouver Art Gallery, which sounds like a great idea! What could possibly go wrong with building a giant theatre deep in the earth in a city holding its collective breath waiting for The Big One? No word yet on whether the concession stand would also stock a variety of canned goods, flashlights, blankets, and a wind-up radio.

Lastly, someone has been giving out $5 bills to cyclists in Toronto as a thank-you for riding. But what about the car drivers? Who's going to give them money for driving?

Ford's I-Told-You-So Moment, a Provincial Oh-Snap, and Vancouver's Casino Conundrum

It looks as though spring has finally stuck her cute little button nose out between the heavy drapes of winter as temperatures rise above freezing and the skating rink that was my back alley now resembles a very nice, gray swamp.

The Toronto Community Housing Corporation is on similarly thin ice after an auditor general's report about inappropriate spending, which has the Brothers Ford barely able to contain their glee as details emerge about expensive chocolates, massages, and lavish Christmas parties (however, there have been no reports of actual, non-metaphorical gravy). Rob Ford seems to be basking in his I-told-you-so moment, biting his lip in the effort effort to stop himself from jumping up and down chanting: nah nah nah nah.

In a well-timed oh-snap moment from the Province, it emerged that Dalton McGuinty has shot down Ford's request for $350 million in funding. But don't expect Ford to be out taking too many questions from media about this, or any issue at city hall, as it seems his ability to answers questions runs to an average of, oh, say three minutes and twenty-three seconds. Maybe that's because when he does speak for longer than this it unravels into a confusing, cringe-inducing mess. leading everyone to wonder if we have, in fact, elected a mayor who's taken his public speaking advice from an Abbott and Costello routine.

But Toronto's not the only city with spending woes. Vancouver's much criticized construction of a new 680,000-square-foot waterfront casino to replace the current Edgewater Casino that will see, among other things, the number of slot machines rise from 493 to 1,500, will be before council on March 7, 2011 at 7:30pm. This is after council pushed back the hearing not once, but twice. The official line was that it was because so many people had signed up to speak in opposition, probably due to Vancouver Not Vegas, a vocal non-partisan group in opposing the project. The Vancouver Sun reported a few days ago that if the casino didn't get approved, funding for the new retractable roof/crown on BC Place stadium could fall through. Keep in mind that this roof is already nearing completion, which brings up the question: didn't they possibly maybe kind of see this problem coming?

And if all that has left you in a steaming pile, here's a video of a cat who steals things to cheer you up. Look at the klepto kitty!