We approach the 1st anniversary of #Nanaimo City Council, a Council more broadly representative of our community…

Submitted to @NanaimoBulletin as a guest column — (declined).

We approach the first anniversary of our new City Council, a Council more broadly representative of our community than previous ones. Our aboriginal community, the non-profit sector, a small business entrepreneur, a neighbourhood and anti-poverty activist. There’s been tensions, there’s been missteps. Interesting times, and you know what they say about interesting times.

It’s reminding me of the inner city high school where nothing much ever happened. It had been a stable, even boring place. Students attended, played on sports teams, graduated much as their parents had before them. It took pride in its uniformity and conformity. But then the neighbourhood changed. The high school found itself attended by students from different backgrounds, with different attitudes and styles. It was dynamic, anything but boring. To the school’s Principal and administrators it was also dangerous. It was unruly and rebellion was in the air.

The Principal, who previously had only to somewhat regally walk the well-behaved halls, appear at ceremonies and to cheer on the football team, found it suddenly hard to cope. In a panic a crisis meeting was called in a kind of war room. It was decided that order must be restored. Dress and behaviour codes were quickly put in place with warnings of harsh punishments for non-compliance. All student creativity and any excess of youthful energy were to defer without question to the authority of the classroom teachers..

And as you can imagine things quickly got much worse. The poor Principal and most of the administrative staff went into a kind of bunker mentality, many left for work in less challenging environments.

The story ends happily though. Wise replacements at the highest levels understood that the new dynamic presented great opportunity. Rules that benefited all were established with general buy-in by the students. Old rules that mostly existed to bolster the institution itself were loosened or jettisoned. The school became a place students looked forward to going to and staff were proud to work at.

Wouldn’t it be interesting if Nanaimo’s current upheaval had a similar outcome.

Frank Murphy

#Nanaimo: a crisis is a terrible thing to waste. https://t.co/nCw0VREsm0

— NanaimoCommons (@NanaimoCommons) October 28, 2015

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Pedestrian upgrades underway in the Old City Quarter

Pedestrian upgrades in the Old City Quarter are scheduled to be constructed this Fall. Improvements include curb extensions at Fitzwilliam Street & Selby Street and Fitzwilliam Street & Wesley Street. The improvements are intended to create a safer environment for pedestrians by making them more visible to motorists when they are waiting to cross the street. The project also includes installing a rain garden at the southeast corner of the Fitzwilliam Street and Selby Street intersection. Rain gardens are an engineered landscape feature which is designed to absorb and filter rain water through soil layers and plantings, thereby increasing infiltration of rain water into the ground. More at City of Nanaimo: Pedestrian Upgrades underway in the Old City Quarter

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From Winnipeg Free Press —From parking lot to urban paradise

It is rare for a city to be given an opportunity to build a brand new neighbourhood in the heart of its downtown. When it happens, it is usually the result of an industry that was once the economic engine relocating out of the modern core.

In Toronto, the railway lands along Lake Ontario have seen a multibillion-dollar transformation into a forest of highrises, altering the city's postcard skyline image into something resembling lower Manhattan. False Creek was once the industrial heart of Vancouver, but today it is home to 60,000 people living in a signature West Coast condo tower neighbourhood.

When the rail yards at the intersection of the Red and Assiniboine rivers were closed 30 years ago, Winnipeg was given that same opportunity -- but went in a different direction... Read more: From parking lot to urban paradise - Winnipeg Free Press

From Project for Public Spaces — Reimagining Our Streets as Places: From Transit Routes to Community Roots

In a city the street must be supreme. It is the first institution of the city. The street is a room by agreement, a community room, the walls of which belong to the donors, dedicated to the city for common use. Its ceiling is the sky. Today, streets are disinterested movements not at all belonging to the houses that front them. So you have no streets. You have roads, but you have no streets.– Louis Kahn, The Street. Read more: Project for Public Spaces | Reimagining Our Streets as Places: From Transit Routes to Community Roots

From @Park_People — Making Connections: Planning parks & open space networks in urban neighbourhoods

Our report | Making Connections: Planning parks & open space networks in urban neighbourhoods http://t.co/Qzg42ay1Tn pic.twitter.com/wkKOTkwkHC

— Park People (@Park_People) April 22, 2015

8 Guiding Principles for parks and public realm planning from @Park_People, an excellent, timely input into #TOcore pic.twitter.com/1jFEKJ2DMk

— jennifer keesmaat (@jen_keesmaat) May 1, 2015

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From The Star — Toronto transit expansion spawns community-cultural hub

Toronto council endorses artistic community-cultural hub for Weston @TorontoStar http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2015/03/31/toronto-considers-artistic-community-cultural-hub-for-weston.html

Posted by Nanaimo Commons on Tuesday, March 31, 2015

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60% of families would choose a smaller home in #walkable, transit-friendly neighbourhood

60% of families would choose a smaller home if it was in #walkable, transit-friendly neighbourhood pic.twitter.com/M4eW3HvFlv v/@BrentToderian
— Canadian Urbanism (@CanUrbanism) January 18, 2015

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"Great cities know that streets are places to linger and live..." @BrentToderian

"Great cities know that streets are places to linger and live; not just move through." @BrentToderian #northvan pic.twitter.com/g4RWYO8bHZ

— NorthShoreSRA (@NorthShoreSRA) January 15, 2015

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—@VIUniversity launches Master of Community Planning Degree Program

Post by Nanaimo Commons.

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NYC lowered speed limit to 25. Other cities should do it too.

Post by Project for Public Spaces.

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From Price Tags — Arthur Erickson on False Creek development – 1983

Fascinating Jack Webster interview with Arthur Erickson in 1983, discussing the development of B.C. Place (when it was a proposed megaproject to be developed by the Province) for which he was the consulting architect. Renderings start at 9.45. (A very-80s Dave Podmore, head of planning for B.C. Place, shows up – that’s him pictured.) Full post at: Arthur Erickson on False Creek development – 1983 | Price Tags

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Privately owned public space. What could go wrong? RT @CBC_Aboriginal

Privately owned public space. What could go wrong? RT @CBC_Aboriginal: 6-month ban for Gary Moostoos will be lifted http://t.co/fAkoALg2u2

— NanaimoCommons (@NanaimoCommons) October 29, 2014

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Jeff Speck's Albuquerque New Mexico Downtown Walkability Analysis

Albuquerque, New Mexico Downtown Walkability Analysis. This project focuses on walkability and connectivity in downtown, with special attention to the area surrounding the Convention Center and Innovate ABQ site as well as the railroad track at Central Avenue. Jeff Speck's final report submitted Sept 2014 here. More from the City of Albuquerque's website here.

From Voting Helps — How a boarded up building became the heart of a community

Lisa Helps I was talking with a downtown business owner yesterday evening. She, like many, is concerned about the increased number of vacancies downtown over the past few years. We see this every day in the for lease signs that have become all too common in downtown storefronts. “We need to do downtown what you did in Fernwood,” she said to me. And she pointed to the creativity, innovation and bold action that me and others at Fernwood NRG took to address a big vacancy in the heart of our village centre and to revitalize the neighbourhood. It was early 2005... 

Read more: How a boarded up building became the heart of a community: The Cornerstone Story - Voting Helps

From Better! Cities & Towns — A low-cost approach to walkability

Making downtown Albuquerque, New Mexico, more walkable doesn’t have to cost a bundle, according to consultant Jeff Speck. The author of Walkable City delivered a report to the city, which included the following recommendations:.

• Replace 19 low-volume traffic lights with stop signs.

• Narrow standard 12-foot travel lanes lanes to 10 feet. “This extra (lane) width does nothing except to encourage speeding,” he said. “It doesn’t improve the flow.”

• Convert two streets to two-way traffic from one-way.

• Provide more green space.

• Reduce the number of travel lanes on a few streets.

• Provide more on-street parking, which buffers pedestrians, and bicycle lanes. Reduction in lanes and lane widths will provide the space.

• Reduce the size of a major public space, Civic Plaza, which Speck says is too big to feel comfortable for pedestrians.

Read more: A low-cost approach to walkability | Better! Cities & Towns Online

#SD68 First for all the wrong reasons @jeffsd68 #nanelxn14

Post by Jeff Solomon for School Board Trustee.

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From Urban Planner Ryan J. Gilmore — Lessons Learned from Winnipeg’s Waterford Green

Waterford Green is a new subdivision in the City of Winnipeg and is one of the first developments to complete the new collaborative approach. This development stands as an example of the enhanced outcomes that are possible through a collaborative planning process and exemplifies the policies of Complete Communities. Read more: Case-in-Point – Implementing ‘Complete Communities’ Collaboratively: Lessons learned from Winnipeg’s Waterford Green | Ryan J. Gilmore

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From Better! Cities & Towns Online — Shared-Space Waterfront for Washington DC

A 12-block waterfront redevelopment broke ground in Washington DC that extensively uses the concept of "share-space" streets, according to Payton Chung of Streetsblog. At 27-acres, The Wharf is designed to include 560 dwellings plus a couple million square feet of office, retail, hotel space, a concert hall, museum, and maritime education center, and a marina. About 60 percent of the site will be public space — including the streets, which are designed as public spaces, although cars and trucks will have access to most. Read more: New shared-space waterfront for DC | Better! Cities & Towns Online

From Governing.com — Why Would You Have a Highway Run Through a City?

SF Embarcadero Freeway razed in 1991 replaced with palm-lined boulevard, plazas. (D Kidd/Governing)

Robert Doucette, a developer in Syracuse, N.Y., often commutes to work by walking or biking from his house near Syracuse University to his office downtown. The route is little more than a mile long, but it requires crossing one major obstacle: a hulking highway viaduct that cuts a large swath through the center of the city.

This elevated stretch of Interstate 81 carries 56,000 vehicles a day. Though it is propped up on piers, it has a major impact on the landscape below. As many as six lanes of traffic run beneath the expressway, including feeder ramps and access roads. Pedestrians teeter nervously on raised curbs as they wait for a signal, then “make a break for it,” Doucette says, as they try to avoid unseen vehicles making turns. Read mor: Why Would You Have a Highway Run Through a City?

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#Nanaimo Old City Quarter Multicultural Festival Saturday June 14th

Post by Old City Quarter.

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