Downtown Plan Update

I'm writing this while listening to a CD called Worser by the indie Canadian supergroup Duplex. It's just been released on Mint Records as a folow-up to 2006's Ablum, and I'm reviewing it for the Sept. 24 issue. I like it, even though it's aimed at "small people" a.k.a children. But because Vedda Hille, Geoff Berner and other indie stalwarts are behind it its uber-cool. There's a hard-rocking song about the noble gases (Helium, Neon, Argon, Krypton, Xenon and Radon), and another bouncy-tune called Orange Popsicle. So overall, pretty hip stuff.

Not hipster hip. Legitally hip.

Earlier today, I attended a 10:30 a.m. news conference at city hall where civic officials finally unveiled the long awaited Downtown Neighbourhood Plan. I'd picked up a hard-copy of the 260 page document (on-line version here) on Thursday. Skimming it last night, a sentence leapt out at me on page four of the Introduction. "Great places are not created by accident."

That got me thinking. Regina has just gone through a complex two year process involving input from numerous experts in multiple fields of urban planning and development. Some were paid by the city, hundreds of others volunteered their time. All focused on the problem of how to revitalize the downtown which for a good 40 years has basically been hung out to dry by city powerbrokers enthralled with relentless suburban expansion.

We've seen the results on a far grander scale in cities like Detroit and Buffalo. Most right-thinking Reginans don't want that here. For maybe 10 years, the city has been taking tentative baby steps to revive the downtown. Now, it's decided to fully commit itself. Paul Dechene will have more on the plan's details in our Sept. 24 issue but it's pretty comprehensive, with sections governing the creation of public space in the downtown, the type of architecture and design that will be allowed, the integration with surrounding neighbourhoods, the regulation of parking, and all sorts of other things.

"Great places are not created by accident." When I read that I thought, these days, that's definitely true. But what about with much older, and truly great cities like London, Paris, Rome and Athens. Did city fathers there go through exhaustive planning processes like the one we just did, or did things happen more organically (and intuitively) back then?

People didn't have cars, remember. They mostly walked. That limited both the distance they could travel, and the amount of stuff they could carry. Without steel-frame technology, light construction materials and elevators, buildings could only be so high. The neighbourhoods that developed, therefore, were all human-scale. People could interact, and together, forge a great base upon which to build an even greater city.

Built in a much more technologically advanced age, cities like Regina have too often failed in their growth and development to be people friendly. The Downtown Plan that Office for Urbanism devised tries to correct that by shifting development priorities in the downtown so that people are able to interact more comfortably there. It's nothing radical. It's already happening a bit Monday to Friday from 9 a.m.-5 p.m. But at night and on weekends, things are pretty bleak. Some positive things have been happening in the last few years, admittedly. But there's still a long way to go.

With this plan, Regina has a chance to get there. It worked in Portland (Wikipedia). It can work here (on a smaller scale). But the committment has to be there. The downtown is Regina's heart. It's a showcase for the city. When people visit and stay at a downtown hotel, it might be the only area of the city that they get a really good look at. Right now, downtown Regina does not exude a "happening" vibe. It's got tons of potential. But it needs some help. And that's what this plan is about. Hopefully the political, economic and civic will will be there to see it through.