Sunday, October 20, 2019

Scorched earth : 1 : a failure of leadership

The Molnar residential project on Kennedy-Machleary application for Official Community Plan amendment and zoning variances was defeated 6-3 by Nanaimo city council at public hearing last week. There was well organized vocal opposition to the increased density and the citizens group successfully stopped the project but I doubt anyone in this process feels victorious.
The outcome as it stands now is scorched earth with much harm done and nothing accomplished. In my opinion the process that brought us to this point failed everyone and I want to a look at the process to try to find how it could have gone so wrong. How it could have done such harm and accomplished so little.
The large site is unlikely now to attract the kind of investment that building a badly needed mix of housing types in the city centre requires, Developers, investors, and lenders would know that the organized citizens group will effectively petition council for a lower level of density and they (developers, investors, and lenders) will instead build without resistance in car dependent sprawl. This city council has approved a number of these already, essentially putting sprawl on steroids by the introduction of hundreds of cars into unwalkable areas of the city.
And related, this outcome has made the pre-existing allowable institutional use probably the only viable alternative. This would allow a 240 unit seniors care facility to proceed with no requirement to consult with the neighbourhood: several dozen staff, 24 hours a day seven days a week with shift changes through the night; visitors; support workers; doctors and nurses; supply vehicles; maintenance and repair crews; and emergency vehicles.
I’m kicking myself now that I didn’t realize in time the red herring that the “corridor” designation introduced into an already complex discussion. I long ago came to the realization that what planners call things in their plans have little to do with what happens in the real world. They could have designated these streets “airstrips,” it being about as likely that this area could ever be what most of us would consider a “corridor” as it being airstrips.
I asked City of Nanaimo Director of Development Dale Lindsay if he’d explain why the application was coupled with the corridor designation. He responded quickly and clearly that staff felt that as corridor is used throughout the community in many areas transitioning to higher urban densities, that it was preferred over a new designation that would only apply to this one site. I'm thinking, and I figure some people within the planning and development department are thinking, this was a blunder, allowing the conversation to focus on the alarming notion of a corridor destination.

Scorched earth : 2 : council's authority given away cheaply https://nanaimocommons.blogspot.com/2019/10/scorched-earth-2-councils-authority.html

Saturday, October 19, 2019

Scorched earth : 2 : council's authority
given away cheaply

This city council was elected on Oct. 24, 2018. Almost 30,000 votes were cast, 40% of eligible voters. This is council’s legitimacy, its authority and its responsibility to govern and guide Nanaimo in the interest of all citizens, in the interest of the greater public good.
Great responsibility comes with winning election to city council. This responsibility is not council’s to assign to another party, unelected and motivated by narrow special interest.
One of Nanaimo's most important and consequential land use decisions was made last week. But it was not made by our democratically elected local government, it was assigned to an organized vocal not-in-my-backyard group. This is a failure of leadership that will have negative consequences for years.
Under the stewardship of this young and inexperienced council this process was not guided to a better outcome that salvaged something for the greater public good. I’m concerned that our new council see themselves more as a passive advisory panel than the seat of local government authorized by tens of thousands of voters across every part of the city by citizens of every demographic.
The comments of councillors as published in the Nanaimo Bulletin require comment, as they seem naive and ill-informed. I’m concerned councillors are not getting good advice.
Councillor Ben Geselbracht worried that "Moving ahead with this project as is would be a break in the public trust in the city’s planning processes.” A fundamental principle in official community plans is the recognition that circumstances from, in this case, 15 years ago, will be reviewed and altered by future elected councils who will have the responsibility to adjust the plan to current circumstances. Failure to do that erodes the public trust in planning processes certainly. From the OCP:
To become an “official” community plan, the Plan must be adopted by City Council as a bylaw, and all future land use decisions must be consistent with the Plan. However, the Plan is a living document, and the City may amend the Plan to adapt to new trends in the community, or respond to changing conditions.
Councillors Ian Thorpe and Don Bonner were quoted that they were concerned about “spot zoning.” The red herring of the corridor designation aside, as Mayor Leonard Krog said, "I think everyone surely must have assumed at some point [this site] was going to be a significant multi-residential development.” The nature of the site, its size and location was always going to require special consideration.
“I simply do not see this as a corridor designation…” councillor Erin Hemens said. “This has three dead ends on it; it’s in the middle of the neighbourhood.” Point taken but why did councillor Hemens not have that concern addressed sooner in the process? As development director Lindsay told me, there was an alternative.
Councillor Tyler Brown said the development was a great proposal that met the goals of the transportation master plan, for example, but said the OCP is about the community’s wishes, not council’s. This and similar comments by other councillors is at best disingenuous. Councillor Brown and his colleagues accepted a responsibility to apply today’s 21st Century realities to (often cynically manipulated) planning documents from 15 and 25 years ago. The “community" by casting almost 30,00 votes assigned that responsibility exclusively to our local  government : city council. That responsibility is not council’s to relinquish to an unelected group that resists change. A failure of leadership.

Scorched earth : 1 : a failure of leadership

Saturday, September 28, 2019



Friday, September 20, 2019

Anyone who’s tried it will tell you it’s a lot harder to get people out in support of something than it is to pack a meeting with people opposed to something...


Thursday, September 19, 2019


Tuesday, August 20, 2019

The elimination of Nanaimo's
Urban Containment Boundary : 3 :
The Downtown BIA : A cautionary tale

This is the third in a series of posts on how we lost the fight to protect the Urban Containment Boundary which protected from development the rural “green-fields” in the southernmost area of the city. Plans for a golf course resort and a big box retail “master planned community” didn’t proceed. A new proposal has come forward however, ahead of our upcoming Official Community Plan review.
In the first post I mention that a Downtown Business Improvement Area (BIA) had been organized. It had a board of directors that included two city councillors and met at the council table of the day at City Hall on Wallace Street.
Funding for the Downtown Nanaimo Business Improvement Association, from both a commercial property levy and matching funds from general revenue (the only BIA in the province double-funded like this), was withdrawn by the last Council and we're left with the cautionary tale of how not to structure a BIA. Its greatest failing was its inability to stand up to the perhaps greatest threat to downtown's future, the elimination of the UCB.
Over its history it had suffered membership revolts and the removal of its President by City Council. It was increasingly unaccountable and opaque.
It ran on hubris and too much money. It thought of itself as an unelected arm of government, directors sat around the Council table for their meetings giving them an inflated view of their own importance. Two City Councillors were also on the board of directors, if memory serves, Diane Brennan and Bill Holdom.
Individually board members would express opposition to the removal of UCB, but were compromised and co-opted by City Hall. The BIA had one job, protect downtown from the force that had done it harm: low population density car-dependent sprawl and the subsequent corporate-owned shopping centres. At the public hearing at which the UCB was eliminated the BIA didn't speak up, board members sat on their hands afraid to displease the Councillor board members or risk the loss of City funds.
Our downtown is again threatened by sprawling growth on remote green-field lands and there will be no doubt calls for the creation of a new downtown BIA. I hope we’ve learned how not to do it.
It’s time, in my view, for a comprehensive downtown plan, best organized around a modification of Vancouver’s Grandview-Woodlands Citizens’ Assembly. The success of small and large business downtown is important but it’s only one element of a vibrant urban core. Time too, for a review and updating of the National Urban Design Award winning 2008 Downtown Urban Design Plan and Guidelines.

Wednesday, August 14, 2019

Getting better, more broadly
representative public input

During a City Council’s term, aside from a referendum or sophisticated, costly polling, only its election is an expression of the collective, tens of thousands of votes across all areas and demographics.
I risk splitting hairs, it may be just semantics but when Councillors hear folks at public hearing they're probably not hearing an expression of “the public.” It’s good in my view Council is mandated to hear citizens at public hearing and good that citizens make the effort to appear but without a way to analyze a usually small sampling, speakers at public hearing probably don’t represent the views of the broader public. Important to add to that, again outside of a binding referendum, it falls to Council to make decisions for the longer term even if those decisions are at odds with current public opinion. Otherwise we could have government by algorithm.
Getting better, more broadly representative public input should be an ongoing goal nevertheless. Initiatives in Vancouver and in Portland may offer ideas we could modify here in Nanaimo.
Vancouver, frustrated with a fractious and polarized east side neighbourhood enacted the Grandview-Woodland Citizens’ Assembly tasked with putting forward recommendations for the neighbourhood’s Community Plan. From the website :
Invitation letters were mailed to 19,000 area residents, property owners, and business owners in late June 2014. In addition, hundreds of invitations were handed out at street corners, community centers, service centers and other key locations in Grandview-Woodland.
The 48 members of the Assembly were selected through a blind draw from the pool of over 500 volunteers. The blind selection process ensured an equal number of men and women; representative numbers of members from six neighbourhood zones; representative numbers of members from each age cohort; and, representative numbers of members who rent their home, own their home or reside in a co-op. Volunteers were asked to identify if they are Aboriginal to make certain we have representation from this community. In addition, two seats were reserved for business owners in Grandview-Woodland and one seat was reserved for a property owner who does not reside in the neighbourhood study area.
It's time for a new Downtown Plan here in Nanaimo IMO and this is the approach I’d hope we’d take.
The other initiative is Portland’s innovative way of working with neighbourhood associations. The City will officially recognize a neighbourhood association and allow it to access the resources of Office of Neighborhood Involvement if it complies with its requirements.
The rules aim to ensure a more representative body, clarifies membership is open to anyone living in or operating a business in the neighbourhood, ensures transparency, inclusion, non-discrimination and makes clear an association would not be allowed to charge a fee for membership.
Without this sort of guide we have to assume that currently Nanaimo neighbourhood associations—some more than others—though they’re composed of engaged well-meaning citizens, represent the views of a relatively few individuals not the broad view of the neighbourhood.

Thursday, August 8, 2019


Why Big Cities Matter in the Developing World - CityLab
Architecture students know less about cities, urbanism, urban design, and place-making than you might think. urbanismproject.org

Wednesday, August 7, 2019




Tuesday, August 6, 2019

The elimination of Nanaimo's Urban Containment Boundary : 2 : Revisionist view

In my last post I look back at the review process that led up to 2008 Official Community Plan. This post offers, in part, a revisionist view of the role played by two central figures in the City of Nanaimo administration during this time, City Manager Ted Swabey and Director of Planning Andrew Tucker. From my current vantage point my impressions are clearer and I come to some conclusions.
Andrew Tucker had only been with the City since 2004. During his early years here I now realize he was a proactive chief planner. He conducted this OCP review process and was the public face on discussions about the since-demolished Maffeo Sutton Park arena and foundry buildings and on his watch the award winning Downtown Urban Design Plan and Guidelines was completed.
As part of the 10 Year OCP Review, Swabey and Tucker agreed to attend a Friends of Plan Nanaimo sponsored Q+A meeting which was likely to be contentious. When I had an opportunity to ask a question I said, “Good for you guys for doing this... My question is this: If Council agrees to eliminate the Urban Containment Boundary, to allow these developments across the city’s southern green-fields, will that not be a disincentive to develop lands currently within the Urban Containment Boundary?
Planner Tucker’s response, “That’s the most compelling argument against eliminating the Urban Containment Boundary."
At public hearing, the last chance for the public to address Council on the OCP, I repeated Planner Tucker’s answer, adding it to the list of arguments against the elimination of the UCB on the record from Smart Growth BC and others. As expected Council approved the OCP eliminating the Urban Containment Boundary. The result of the process was a forgone conclusion, a highly manipulative process that is clear to me now was ideological in nature.
In 1993 my family arrived here from North Vancouver. Only days later a long time family friend introduced us to then-Mayor Joy Leach at the Civic Arena Canada Day festivities.
A quick sketch of Nanaimo civic history: after decades of Mayor Frank Ney’s real estate development frenzy his grip was finally broken in 1990 by Leach and her group and she was elected on the promise to bring community planning into what was essentially unregulated sprawl. Her Council created Nanaimo’s first Official Community Plan, Imagine Nanaimo, among its guiding principles "Manage Urban Growth."
It becomes clear that the competing forces in community building, here in Nanaimo at any rate, are forces of economic opportunity as perceived by the private sector and the creation of shared public good, amenities, land use, mobility etc. And the ongoing tension: which leads and which follows?
This cynical process, the OCP Review, added to the widespread feeling of Nanaimo-ites of a distrust of what goes on in our City Hall behind closed doors. A few years ago Nanaimo was startled to learn that there was a proposal to lease a portion of a downtown waterfront park to a commercial developer. On my morning walk thru this park, when I saw people studying the sign, I'd ask them what they thought. Comments consistently included "I don't trust them." For good reason.
After this process Andrew Tucker wasn’t the public figure leading important conversations he had been and it was and continues to be my impression he was under, in effect, a gag order. What I’m convinced was a calculated ideological shift was complete in 2013 when City Manager Swabey “phased out” the position of Director of Planning. We have now, tellingly in my view, a Director of Development.
The ideological shift that was the dismantling of the previous planNanaimo and elimination of the Urban Containment Boundary was successful and is entrenched in our City Hall to this day. It successfully shifted Nanaimo from a city that plans, back to a city that develops. My revisionist view is much kinder to Andrew Tucker than I was then.

And here comes Sandstone…

Tuesday, July 30, 2019

The elimination of Nanaimo's Urban Containment Boundary : 1 : Full circle

Recent news that the Sandstone property had been purchased by Seacliff Group and that they were submitting Official Community Plan Update and rezoning applications, brings things for me full circle. In 2004 my wife and I and our daughter who was soon to graduate from VIU and go off on her own moved from a North Nanaimo suburb to the downtown "Old City."
At that time the City of Nanaimo was preparing for its 10 Year Official Community Plan Review. Downtown revitalization initiatives were a major reason we moved house and business to the inner city. A Business Improvement Area (BIA) was organized with funding from both a levy on commercial properties and matching funds from the City of Nanaimo taxpayer. It had a board of directors that included two city councillors and met at the council table of the day at City Hall on Wallace Street. More on this later...
There was well an organized and effective group, The Friends of Plan Nanaimo, that participated in the review process and were increasingly opposed to elements of the new plan that differed greatly from the previous OCP (Plan Nanaimo). I wasn't a member of the this group but increasingly we shared many concerns.
An important feature of Plan Nanaimo was the Urban Containment Boundary (UCB), meant to halt sprawling growth across the undeveloped southern area of the city. It was clear to most observers that the UCB was of critical importance to the revitalization of our downtown.
The new plan called for the elimination of the Urban Containment Boundary, even tho by the City's own Land Capacity Analysis there was sufficient residentially-zoned land to meet projected population growth to 2031 and beyond. Then Director of Planning Andrew Tucker was quoted as saying Nanaimo had growth capacity for another 30 - 50,000 people without extending development past the UCB. Why then, eliminate it?
The "review" turned out to be the formalizing by the City of its intent to eliminate the Plan's Urban Containment Boundary and greenlight low density subdivisions and big box retail and a fantasy destination golf course resort across the previously protected greenfields at the southern extremity of the city. I decided then I should perhaps pay a little more attention to civic affairs.

The OCP Review process began with a community consultation conference held on November 18, 2006 at then-Malaspina University-College. Approximately 200 people participated in the all day event that included keynote speakers and small group discussions.
Keynote speakers from Smart Growth BC and Urban Futures, as well as Vancouver Urban Planner Lance Berelowitz spoke on land use and sustainability issues with the overriding message that the Urban Containment Boundary should be maintained and strengthened.
From my letter to the editor, April 2007 : "Massive, sprawling projects outside the Urban Containment Boundary will set back downtown revitalization and therefore the economic and cultural health of the entire city for five, 10 even 15 years... Our regional shopping centre must be the revitalized core of the city. The 'gateway' to the region described in the South Nanaimo Lands [Sandstone] proposal is more accurately a wall."



Saturday, July 27, 2019

Nanaimo City Council to decide on
downtown tactical "quick wins"

Monday's Governance and Priorities Committee meeting will be making recommendations on downtown “quick win” tactical interventions. I shared some thoughts…
>Subject: Quick Wins
Date: July 27, 2019 at 3:06:32 PM PDT
To: Mayor&Council@nanaimo.ca

I support the idea of taking high visibility actions now downtown, pop-up, tactical quick wins. It’s said it’s important for an organization to both do good work and to be seen to do good work.
Too, other cities are reporting that this approach results in better public opinion feedback and allows for corrections before being made permanent.
Some of the proposed quick wins I suspect will be easy for you to green light: refreshing crosswalk paint lines, and increasing sweeping and power washing frequency, etc.
Here’s the ones I’d prioritize:
Tactical trials of road diet configurations for Front Street with explanatory signage announcing its upcoming redesign. There will be push-back to be weathered! Let’s make a start.
Eliminate the slip lane to create an enlarged Dallas Square. I’d hope this would include signage announcing an upcoming redesign of this important ceremonial plaza. Include a temporary activation element, a piano perhaps, a basketball hoop, moveable tables and chairs...
Repair the Square! http://www.thesidewalkballet.com/2012/11/repair-square.html
Good to see attention to Robson St footpath to Fitzwilliam. Spend a bit of money here. Quality design, include lighting. An important neighbourhood street for infill uses (as are currently underway).
Green light Tideline park, include some tactical element and signage announcing its coming role in that area’s revitalization.
Unsure what re-configuring pedestrian crossings at Commercial, Wallace Albert and Victoria entails but I’d hope it would include elimination of “beg-buttons” (green light automatically includes “walk” signal) and no right turns on red light.
Access to the waterfront walkway concerns me. The drawings of the current plan show the walkway stops abruptly at the edge of the property. This is of course unavoidable but the important connectivity and continuity of the walkway would not be disrupted to the same degree if it carried on from the waterfront on a pathway at the north edge of the property. The access as configured in the drawings is a mistake. A footpath at the north edge would coherently mirror the footpath around the Cameron Island tower and create a superior walking experience.
I’m not sure a scramble intersection configuration at Bastion and Commercial should be a high priority. Crossings are plentiful now here, and my inclination would be to “take our victory” on Commercial and look to surrounding streets to expand on the kinds of things that have made Commercial a far better street than it was a few years ago. Consider though a test scramble at Front and Bastion and/or Front and Chapel.
Happy deliberations!

— Frank

Many of you may have seen this. Urban Studies Prof Michael von Hausen webinar “Making the Next Great Small to Mid-Size Downtowns." Link to his webinar here : https://youtu.be/pnj7OUc5bBo. There are some good ideas for Nanaimo here...


Friday, July 19, 2019


Wednesday, July 17, 2019




Tuesday, July 16, 2019



Saturday, July 13, 2019

The City and You : Find Your Best Place. Richard Florida, Coursera #MOOC



Friday, July 12, 2019

City builder term of the day : Urban Design


Thursday, July 11, 2019

Twitter thread : The Death and Life of
Great American Cities, Jane Jacobs.
Ch 5 The uses of neighbourhood parks


Sunday, July 7, 2019

When you narrow the roadway from
3 lanes to 2, and expand the sidewalk,
you get to have more patios
(St. Paul Street, St Catharines)


Friday, July 5, 2019

On the problems with mid-rise and
tower housing densification in the
midst of car-dependent sprawl

There’s nothing urban about sprawl, it’s more correctly suburban sprawl. It’s not caused by the housing form itself, it's caused by single-use residential car-dependent zoning. Single family, mid-rise blocks, or towers, all contribute to suburban sprawl.
The most compelling argument against this kind of development is that they immediately introduce 100s of automobiles which will be required for even the most basic task. And this at a time when it’s clear reducing the number of car trips is an urgent priority.
Some buildings are for people 55+. As the population ages more and more people will be unable to drive. So if developments like these are supported by an “age in place” argument, in fact increasingly people will be aging in place with an eventual devastating loss of independence.
Compare these projects with the benefits this level of densification would bring to an already at least basically walkable neighbourhood. More and better shops, possibility of improved transit, lively and safe street activity, cycling a practical alternative for many tasks.
I want to see the City be proactive in identifying “20 minute neighbourhoods” where at least a certain number of amenities, shops, services etc are present within a 20 minute walk and proactively promote this kind of density into those neighbourhoods. Win-win.
"If we wish to reduce our carbon footprint, the single most powerful tool at our disposal is middle-density intensification in established, walkable neighbourhoods.” @alexbozikovic The Globe and Mail https://t.co/Bsrvj8JOnP


Wednesday, July 3, 2019

Walking the Downtown Mobility Hub with the City of Nanaimo transportation engineers

Last week I met with City of Nanaimo Manager of Transportation, Jamie Rose and the City's lead on the Downtown Mobility Hub Project, Transportation Planner Amir Freund. We walked and chatted in the 800m downtown zone currently under study.
We talked about, among other things, how the culture of the built mobility environment changes and reinforces user behaviour, good and bad; the importance of the unbroken connectivity within the pedestrian network; the urgency to address Front Street now with a tactical intervention (apparently plans are in place for Front St road diet in 2021).
It was good to hear recognition that street design elements directly determine vehicle speeds and therefore the comfort and safety of vulnerable street users, on foot, in wheelchairs, on bikes, with walkers, pushing baby strollers, etc. And that narrow travel lanes, much more than any amount of signage or education or enforcement, slow vehicle travel speeds.
We looked at sidewalk bulges with zebra crossings on Fitzwilliam (observably safer as drivers read the difference in the design of the space they’re entering and respect it). I asked why at, for instance, Selby and Franklyn only 3 of the 4 sidewalks are marked across the intersection. The unbroken pedestrian network would line all sidewalks across all intersections in the downtown core.
The traditional short block street grid has been proven to support walkability and neighbourhood commerce. Nanaimo’s north-south streets are too long creating the need for mid-block crossings ideally with sidewalk bulges and zebra crossings. These are being done in some cities very economically with paint, fixed pylons and planters. In Nanaimo I’d say 300 ft is the longest someone should have to walk without a safe and inviting way to cross the street.

My concerns remain as I detailed in this earlier post Nanaimo Downtown Mobility Hub Project : I fear what might be hiding in the weeds. In particular concerns about staff understanding...
“the nature of the task itself. We’re looking at some of the biggest and most important public space in city. Fixes and modernization of this public space are not at core technical problems, not problems of engineering or problems of landscape architecture, tho both of those are essential once the vision and design have been established. It’s at core a problem of urban design and the technical process has to be preceded by a process of visioning and design lead by a professional urban designer with first hand experience in establishing walkable urban centres inclusive of the most vulnerable street user.”
Each of the city’s systems is co-dependent on the other systems. Focusing solely on transportation without careful study of impacts on public space; the local independent shopkeeper economy; social equity and inclusion; arts and culture, etc requires a more holistic approach, systems thinking, an understanding of the organized complexity at work in a downtown core.

Monday, July 1, 2019


Monday, June 17, 2019


Friday, June 14, 2019

@StrongTowns Curbside Chat Video
Why Traditional Development Wins


Wednesday, June 12, 2019


Follow-up email to Nanaimo
public works chief Bill Sims re #DowntownMobility hub project...



Friday, May 31, 2019


Saturday, May 25, 2019


Friday, May 24, 2019



Tuesday, May 21, 2019

Nanaimo Downtown Mobility Hub Project :
I fear what might be hiding in the weeds

https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5LtbVtHvh6fecAmbIDUxY2VuKnvXbPO9qbi1_EZSdZ7TPJYd0ETJgqKe_d3WACIQEpgSRgUOG73xDmgOH-qKJnrs63-0nETNzS5RuB7WQHqSkS1ez7yFsRkpntfzwvf8fLMjcuhvTQoLX/s1600/800m.png
Click image for enlargement
You know what the best thing about this plan is? Identifying this 800m zone at the heart of the city. Ground zero for our urbanization. Get this right and the payoff, evidenced by the experience of other cities, is huge : social, economic, and environmental.
I look at the aerial photo of this zone and find it crazily exciting. If our plan truly reflected the inverted pyramid of mobility priorities from the Transportation Master Plan it would inspire and capture the imagination of the local public, and catch the attention of other cities across the country.
As the plan is now, it and the inverted pyramid of priorities set side by side makes it clear something’s seriously out of whack.
"You can’t add other modes to an already overbuilt private car network. Car infrastructure has to be reduced to accommodate safe equitable walking, accessible mobility for disabled, bicycling, and transit for every age and shape and size of human."
The plan is weakest where it has to be strongest : the pedestrian network. The actions called for are too few, too small and will have little impact.
If the inverted pyramid, codified in City policy, had meaning in the real world, here’s some things that would be evident in the pedestrian network part of the plan :  

travel lane width reductions (proven to reduce vehicle travel speeds)
lane eliminations (road diets, resulting in more equitable share of the street);
elimination of “beg buttons” at every City-controlled intersection in the urban core (pedestrians should never have to seek permission to cross on green);
elimination of right turns on red lights (research shows high incidence of pedestrian and cyclist  injury and death);
sidewalk extension lines including zebras across every intersection in the 800m urban zone.

Pedestrian crossing locations : only 4 in the 200m zone, 2 in the 400 m zone, 9 in 800m zone.
Mid-block pedestrian crossings : There are 2 on city controlled streets (one on Terminal MoTI jurisdiction) Skinner St ?? Mid-block zebras should be mandatory with few exceptions on every block of a certain length.
Pedestrian walkway connections between blocks. Sounds great but I have no idea what’s meant by this.
Accessible connection upgrade. There’s one. Have disabled activists confirmed that that’s all that’s needed?
Enhanced pedestrian realm. Details please. This should be one of the primary focuses of the plan. Times up for empty homilies.
Intersection Pedestrian Operation Improvement I assume this means “beg buttons.” In a walkable urban zone the pedestrian should never seek permission to walk on green.

Genuine walkability is achievable in this zone and the interventions to do it are low cost and quick. Mystified why staff resist. I’ve a strong sense that the public support for this urbanization has grown far beyond that of staff’s.
We pause for this editorial : I suspect the process got off on the wrong foot, didn’t understand the nature of the task itself. We’re looking at some of the biggest and most important public space in city. Fixes and modernization of this public space are not at core technical problems, not problems of engineering or problems of landscape architecture, tho both of those are essential once the vision and design have been established. It’s at core a problem of urban design and the technical process has to be preceded by a process of visioning and design lead by a professional urban designer with first hand experience in establishing walkable urban centres inclusive of the most vulnerable street user.
So… The pedestrian network part of the plan is disappointing. But it’s benign, will do little good but at least will not make things worse.
As for the other parts of the project plan, bike network good idea and trendy just now. Pains have to be taken to ensure it doesn’t damage the fragile pedestrian realm. These bike lanes have to be carved out of the over-built car infrastructure. I’m concerned that’s not explicit here.
The parking study’s an ok idea, I’m sure staff are versed in the research and writing of UCLA urban planning prof Donald Shoup. Properly managed it’s possible to reduce its supply freeing important downtown real estate for more productive uses.
There are two areas where I have reason to fear what might be hiding in the weeds : the transit plan should be a separate study not rushed as here and absolutely not to include a traffic roundabout between downtown and our waterfront. Roundabouts are dangerous and uncomfortable for pedestrians and cyclists and there’s no place for one in a walkable urban core.
And lastly the key intersection redesigns. The big ticket item, 100s of thousands of dollars I imagine, and if they end-of-the-day are car-centric infrastructure, I worry with good reason, having watched these processes over the years, they could harm the human scale walkable downtown. We need help especially on this section of the project plan.
One more passing thought : there is mention here of property acquisition for road widening. Those days are over, time now to repurpose the downtown street network to be more productive for more citizens. And the term “jaywalker” should never show up in a city planning document.

Friday, May 17, 2019

Who's not in the room?

The transportation consultant Jarett Walker reminds himself to start every meeting with “Who’s not in the room?”
There was someone not in the room where this downtown mobility project was in development. This person also was not in the rooms when the Terminal-Nicol project or the Transportation Master Plan or the Downtown Waterfront Lands master plan work was done.
This person, a professional with associated credentials and experience, self-identifies and is identified by others based on her work as an urbanist. The urbanist, as with the other disciplines around the table, notably the traffic engineers, adds to the outcome of the project not just with technical skill but also with a unique sensibility.
In other cities it’s evident that the urban planning department is staffed by urbanists and that they are able to hold their own against the dominant silos who as Brent Toderian says, tend to think they have a veto over other departments. There's no evidence that even if an urbanist is confidently represented in our planning department that she is able to bake urbanism into this project. Nanaimo should be directing resources to its urbanization big time. It’s urgent.
Better City-Making Means Breaking Down Silos—Here's How
Without an urbanist influence from early in process, the urbanist perspective and critique that I bring is unwelcome. It’s too late and it’s just the opinion of one citizen. I get that. But in the absence of that urbanist influence it becomes all the more important to seek the perspective and critique of the professional who is an urbanist.
Consider: two plans of the highest quality over the last 10 or so years were lead by former VIU VP Dave Witty, the Downtown Waterfront Lands, and Victoria architect Franc D’Ambrosio, Downtown Urban Plan and Guidelines. Peer review doesn’t come with much higher praise than the D’Ambrosio-lead Downtown Urban Plan and Guidelines which won a Royal Architectural Institute of Canada National Urban Design Award in 2014.
There isn’t as far as I can see a self-corrective mechanism within our City Hall to test plans to ensure they achieve the highest possible level of excellence.
Plans have to be vetted by people like Franc D’Ambrosio, Brent Toderian, Jeff Speck (he’s in Vancouver over the next few days as you may know), the Jan Gehl organization Cities for People, Gil Penalosa’s 8 800 Cities… Franc D'Ambrosio continues to take an interest in and is protective of our wonderful downtown. We need to bring him back to help us.

Wednesday, May 15, 2019

Downtown mobility for humans of every shape and size, age and ability

Strikes me the Downtown Mobility Hub Project display boards might have been done for a city convinced that the big problems in its downtown renewal and revival have already been solved, and now we just need to tweak a little.
Someone (who they’ll listen to, that’s not you and me) has to tell the City—staff and Councillors—you can’t add other modes to an already overbuilt private car network. Car infrastructure has to be reduced to accommodate safe equitable walking, accessible mobilty for disabled, bicycling, and transit for every age and shape and size of human (and their pets!).

Here’s how to tell if this plan has merit : look for these kinds of things :
  • mentions of travel lane width reductions;
  • lane eliminations (road diets);
  • elimination of “beg buttons” at every City-controlled intersection in the urban core;
  • repurposing parking lots to urban squares and affordable housing;
  • elimination of right turns on red lights;
  • sidewalk extension lines including zebras across every intersection in the 800m urban zone.
You’ll find none. And if you see mention of a “roundabout” on the downtown waterfront, or use of the discredited term “jaywalker “ be afraid, be very afraid. (Cue Twilight Zone theme music)


Friday, May 10, 2019

Nanaimo's Downtown Mobility Hub Project

Subject: Downtown Mobility Hub Project
To: Bill Sims,
Director of Engineering & Public Works bill.sims@nanaimo.ca
Cc: Mayor&Council@nanaimo.ca, DowntownMobility@nanaimo.ca

Bill, great news that the Downtown Mobility Hub Project is underway. Downtown, more than other neighbourhoods, belongs, to a great degree, to everyone in the city. At the same time it's home and place of work to thousands of Nanaimo-ites.
I want to register a concern about the process being employed. It is one that we have used several times and includes contracting citizen engagement to a consultant. I don’t believe a City Hall can outsource citizen engagement. This process results in my experience in the unintended consequence of the consultant, clearly a skilled and dedicated professional, being a buffer between city staff and Council. The lead on the project, its public face, in my view has to be a city staff person.
We have used different processes and I see different approaches in other cities. It’s increasingly common for city heads of transportation to take a proactive and very public role. Dale Bracewell in Vancouver and Dongho Chang in Seattle spring to mind. In Victoria Mayor Helps seems to be impressively taking the lead!
Locally another approach we’ve used as you know is rather than contract an engagement specialist we outsourced, if you like, the lead role itself. Victoria architect Franc D’Ambrosio’s award winning Downtown Urban Plan and Guidelines and former VIU VP Dave Witty’s South Downtown Waterfront Vision and Guiding Principles. I believe Dr Witty’s approach is one we should adopt.
A couple of weeks ago I was walking through the Vancouver Central Library atrium and there was a City of Vancouver pop-up display about the Granville Bridge Connector. Occurs to me that while we take a broad overview of the downtown hub, it would be beneficial to focus on its smaller components, as Vancouver has done focusing on the bridge. As our earlier exchange, a tactical approach on Front Street over the summer would be an ideal focal point for this project.
Thanks for the chance to run this by you. I look forward to the creation of downtown Nanaimo’s "multimodal transportation network – one that is safe, inclusive, accessible, and interconnected to all the places we love.”
Frank Murphy


Thursday, May 9, 2019


Saturday, May 4, 2019


Friday, May 3, 2019

Walkable City Rules!


Wednesday, May 1, 2019


Monday, April 29, 2019



Friday, April 26, 2019


Thursday, April 25, 2019


Wednesday, April 24, 2019

Four years ago this week #Nanaimo citizen activism saved a downtown waterfront park.

Four years ago this week citizen activism saved a downtown waterfront park from being leased to a commercial developer. This was recommended by staff (!) and passed by the council of the day. The proponent with better sense that either staff or council could muster withdrew the request to take over the park after general public opposition and a well-attended public hearing. Council bullied it through passing at the public hearing but the proponent knew it would never be accepted by the public and withdrew the request.
On Apr 21, 2015 I wrote : #Nanaimo take a minute and congratulate yourself for continuing to stand up for our parks and all shared public spaces. The last Council’s approval of a lease to a local developer of a portion of a waterfront park — a lease plan which should never have been brought forward by Staff in the first place — was rescinded by the new Council last night.
There is now of course a stampede at City Hall to take credit and I say let them have it. Fact is once again Nanaimo citizens showed more common sense than has been coming from our City Hall. An enormously important precedent has been set: entertain the idea of integrating a private project with one of our parks and you better have a plan that clearly benefits the park more than the commercial enterprise. Or Nanaimo won’t allow it. Good on ya Nanaimo.



Tuesday, April 23, 2019


Monday, April 22, 2019



Saturday, April 13, 2019

Breaking the chain
of multi-generational poverty

Subject: Terminal Ave
Date: April 12, 2019
To: Mayor&Council@nanaimo.ca

It’s said “the well-defined problem is half solved.” The origins of the problems that have landed in numbers at the Terminal Ave temporary housing are not of your making but your citizens, I’m sure you’ve noticed, are howling for you to solve them.
To use your municipal resources to solve the problems and to know how to leverage resources of the senior levels of government (where it starts to get closer to the origins of the problems) requires solid reliable data on the nature of the problems you’re asked to solve. I’m assuming you’re not currently in possession of this comprehensive analysis, parts of it perhaps.
Whether sourced from Island Crisis Care, VIHA, Cindy Blackstock, your own social planning dept or other sources, among the perhaps two dozen questions I’d want to see examined by this analysis : How many of the residents of the temporary housing were “aged out” of foster care at 19, after a childhood of upheaval to find their own way in the world without resources? Is the failure to seize that opportunity to break the chain of multi-generational poverty among the core problems you and we face?
Other resources : The Vancouver Foundation’s initiatives Fostering Change and First Call, BC Child and Youth Advocacy Coalition. I recommend Dr Gabor Maté’s book In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts on childhood trauma and addiction.
Best of luck to do what you can. We have to do better than trying to fence these problems out.

Frank Murphy

Opportunities in Transition : An Economic Analysis of Investing in Youth Aging out of Foster Care by SFU economist Marvin Shaffer and Family Policy Researcher, Lynell Anderson.

Sunday, March 31, 2019


Saturday, March 23, 2019

City Builder Glossary #CityGlossary @EvergreenCanada

https://www.evergreen.ca/tools-publications/city-builder-glossary/


Tuesday, March 19, 2019

The imperial mayoralty of Leonard Krog

My email sent to Mayor Leonard Krog,
cc'd to Nanaimo City Councillors on March 18.
Fair play and due process

Mayor Krog,
I’m concerned that at the recent public hearing to decide on the rezoning application for the Long Lake Nursery site, you crossed a line. I have an unease about it and here’s why:
It has been widely reported that you spoke after all Councillors had expressed support for or denial of the rezoning; that five Councillors had expressed opposition to the rezoning; that in your remarks you expressed intent to change minds. That’s the line crossed.
You have the right to a vote, the right to contribute persuasively to the discussion hoping to influence the outcome. Importantly you also have unique responsibilities as Mayor. Appealing for Councillors to change their mind, after they had expressed their positions, is an abuse of your role as Mayor. The Mayor is not the party whip. An expression of the will of Council was on the table, fair play to offer an influential counter argument and hope your point of view prevails. Fair play to exercise your vote in favour of the rezoning. But in making the appeal you did harm.
Consider the consequences in reputations damaged (any Councillor swayed by your oratory would risk, undeservedly no doubt, being seen as indecisive); to Council’s collaborative team-building culture; to the public trust that our affairs are being decided in a 100% fair and open environment, free of manipulation.
And consider too the opportunity lost to exercise the important leadership role of the municipal Mayor; to make it clear that whatever the outcome of the vote, although you remain in favour of the rezoning, you would be 100% supportive of the will of Council.
In public perception now there’s the risk that this rezoning and subsequent commercial construction on the property will be known not as the will of Council but as the will of the Mayor.

Frank Murphy

Monday, March 11, 2019

Jane's Walk is coming to 234 cities May 4-5! Get involved in your city by leading your
own walk - here's how!


Tuesday, March 5, 2019

I've been reading Nicholas Pescod's front page story “Council sends dealership to public hearing” from the Feb 28 Nanaimo New Bulletin. I can’t find the url thru the Bulletin website so can’t share. I have a number of problems with the issue and equally the process.
My main concern is I don’t know why Council have found this so difficult and complex. Allowing this so much oxygen right now seems to indicate poor judgement. This is a rezoning application for a use not currently allowed, a car lot on the Long Lake Nursery site. Staff are opposed.
The agenda for the Feb 25 Council meeting here: https://pub-nanaimo.escribemeetings.com/FileStream.ashx?DocumentId=22224. Staff Report starts on page 216.
Background : Staff requested in September that the Mayor McKay Council deny the application. They did not and directed Staff to proceed with the process which Staff have now done and remain opposed.

Seems pretty straightforward. It would take an application that contributed so much to the greater public good that overruling staff and the OCP here would be the right thing to do. Some Councillors apparently see in this proposal such a contribution.
If an economic argument was to have merit, I suggest it would not be in an already over-built sector, automobile sales. That said, this sector has played an important role n the local economy. We’ve become a regional source for buying and servicing new and used cars. But is this the vision for our future seen by our 2019 Council? We can only hope not.
I’ve gotta think Mayor Krog wants this quote back. "Living here long as I have, that would probably be one of the last places I would want to occupy a for-rental accommodation or residential accommodation...” @domabassi @NanaimoNewsNOW https://nanaimonewsnow.com/article/609653/car-dealership-proposal-moves-public-hearing-despite-serious-concerns-over-location
In tone it’s close to Liberal leader Andrew Wilkinson's recent wacky comments about renters. But seriously, neither the length of time the Mayor has lived in Nanaimo or his personal choices of housing options are relevant in the discussion at hand.
While I’m having at the Mayor a little… The proponent’s presentation, by Mark Holland, its lecturing tone, and the hall packed with “supporters” amounted to a kind of old school macho bullying. Disrespectful to both staff and Council. Holland's comment that staff’s position was "unattractive” should have been ruled by Mayor Krog as out of order.

Staff presentation and delegations: video starts at 1:00:46 https://pub-nanaimo.escribemeetings.com/Players/ISIStandAlonePlayer.aspx?ClientId=nanaimo&FileName=Main%20Council%20Encoder_Regular%20Council%20Meeting_2019-02-25-09-58.mp4

End of the day this is another slab commercial construction surrounded by asphalt on the highway. Time for Council to set Nanaimo on a new direction. That’s what we elected them to do. Change is always hard, it takes courage. Deny the application.