A ambitious 20-year plan for downtown was presented to council on March 29th.

The Downtown Secondary Plan touches many corners of city planning in Guelph’s historic centre. From heritage and culture to transit, tourism, and development, the DSP will transform downtown into a destination from people from inside and outside of the city. However, there still is a lot of questions that need to be answered so that this 20-year project can be done right.

The Downtown plan has specific plans on various things, such as, preserving the sight lines to Church of Our Lady from four specific vantage points.  Also included in the plan is the establishment of a continuous riverfront trail from Royal City Park to Goldie’s Mill Park, the expansion and/or relocation of the Guelph Farmers’ Market, and the redesigning of Macdonell Street, Upper Wyndham Street and St. George’s Square.

While I see much of the plan as average to good, there are still lingering concerns and questions that need to be answered and addressed. The Church of Our Lady is our flagship tourist and historical site. The limited sight lines proposed are not enough in my opinion. We should be working towards maintaining the maximum number of sight lines to this centrepiece while placing these new developments into the downtown area. Also missing out of the plan is having this site light up at night. It is probably the only centre piece of any city I have been to to be completely dark at night.

Bringing together a seamless park (Royal City Park to Goldie Mill) along our rivers is a wonderful idea, but may become a very expensive propulsion as existing retail currently sits on the lands the city wants for this idea. The city will need to figure out where to get the revenue to pay for such an exercise. These retail establishments and owners of the lands and buildings will want top dollar for a high profile location.

The expansion of the Farmers Market has been long on the wish list for citizens, however, it seems like it gets brought up and thrown on the back burner over and over again. There was a question from a councilor regarding unitizing the Armory site, it it becomes available, for such an endeavor. Hopefully, within the the next few years, this can be done. In the meantime, we can do like other cities, such as having mid week farmers markets at other locations such as West End Rec Centre, and even the Market Square at city hall when it is complete.

The redesigning of Macdonell Street, Upper Wyndham Street and St. George’s Square will be great and bring people downtown. The redesigns planned for Macdonell and Wyndham would allow room for larger restaurant patios, trees and crowds, something lacking today.

Ward 3 councillor Maggie Laidlaw asked the consultant who presented this report whether the planning team had considered making Carden Street and other downtown thoroughfares car-free.

The answer: “Pedestrian-only streets are frankly very hard to sustain vitality on in winter cities”

I agree and disagree. While I can understand that winter weather tends to make people seek indoor sites, there are many sites within Canada and in the world that seem to be able to have successful Pedestrian-only areas all year round. See my post on Making Douglas Street a Pedestrian-only area. Additionally, I have posted a video from youtube on how St. Georges Square could look like.