The downtown campus debate has become quite the divisive issue in our community. Though I want to say that I get the other side of the debate -- I really don't. I, for the life of me, can't understand why there is such rabid opposition to building the new engineering campus in our downtown core. Call me hopelessly optimistic, but I believe that we can achieve great things in our community, of which the University of Windsor is a integral component, if we stop saying we can't and starting asking, how do we succeed.
I know that we all need a little inspiration so, to get everyone started, check out The Project for Public Spaces - Campuses page and see what makes a truly innovate and successful campus. Spend some time reading and dreaming with the folks at PPS (don't feel ashamed if you catch yourself exploring the other program areas). After spending a couple of hours (and that's being conservative!) digging through the pages of inspiration at PPS I think you'll find that it's not a matter of if we support a downtown campus, but a when will we suport a downtown campus.
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Admittedly, as a former engineering student myself, I would have to side with the naysayers. Not so much about the benefit to the City - I think there would be. But I had a tough time in University. Success was a direct result of time management. You move an Engineering building downtown and keep the chemistry, math, library facilities on campus, you've now added at least an hour out of your day for travel, time that you could have used for getting work done, or doing one of life's essentials (eating, getting exercise) that you may keep putting off while you work your darndest to figure out how to weight those beams or do that intergration. Inevitably it means you cut off the very things that keep you from going insane because you'll have to make up that new travel time studying and applying your studies. Those much-needed distractions from the books can be easily dismissed, but they are essential. And they include shopping, dining, etc. The engineering students would be downtown, but they would only be there in person, not in spirit, and they won't be there going to your cafes every day or shopping. They're just too busy trying to juggle everything.
Compounding that is the inevitable complaining that would occur in the many, many renovations that would occur downtown as labs are added or late night classes terminate. Your facility, which will house the latest and greatest technology, will be landlocked from expansion in the current site, short of appropriating Bubi's. And is massive land acquisition something students' tuition should really be paid for when they already have the land they need? A downtown campus would be a win-win - for law, for arts, for anything that does requires specialized research, or none at all. But this discipline is the wrong one for the small site proposed.
If the City and Province were to chip in to provide those ancillary classes and services on-site, and go ahead and buy the land, then the circumstances change dramatically.
It’s James again…
What is our fascination with the whole Uof W issue anyway? There always seems to be a huge outpouring of emotion anytime someone proposes a mega-project for downtown. But, is one single development going to make a difference? While we can agree that many successful downtowns count among their land uses a university campus, the university campus is but one layer of many. Over time, so many of our downtown’s layers have been stripped away so that it no longer functions as a complete community.
A significant amount of damage has been done to our downtown in the chase for the one mega-project that would turn everything around. The City of Windsor acquired and razed a huge chunk to make way for a new arena. That land is still vacant, and rather than come up with a comprehensive plan to redevelop the lands they are still seeking the elusive mega-project. Look what was done to the Norwich Block. An entire block of multi-use buildings, businesses, restaurants, apartments a real pleasure to look at and explore – gone - replaced with a mega-project that went horribly wrong. How much has the chase for the mega-project cost us in terms of taxes and lost opportunities?
I'm not stuck on Engineering -- and I think that other schools would actually be a better fit -- as you've both pointed out. The Engineering school discussion, IMO, is the catalyst to start reviewing other options.
I think that, in keeping with the DWBIA designation for the area as an arts district, that bringing another, more complimentary, program downtown may be a better fit.
It's not about another mega-project, but rather the push for something innovative. I've always liked the tagline "And now for something completely different!" -- I think that needs to applied to city development.
There still seems to be some confusion surrounding this proposed campus. I am under the impression the options for the new campus were simply A)downtown, and, B) somewhere in the boonies, like, maybe the airport annexed lands, or some other fringe area. So if there are any students or former students that have concerns over a commute how does a bike ride to the airport sound?
Characterizing the university campus as just another megaproject in a long list of megaprojects is just simply wrong
James has not acknowledged any of the arguments explaining the differnence. WHy?
Lets go through logic 101
1. The only way to revitalize downtown is through
a.increased residential population.
b. increasing desirability by business of the demographic of that population Ie. creative class etc..
2. You will never get suburbians to change their minds and move back downtown
3. Your best way to repopulate downtown is to recruit new people to the city
4. There are only two options to recruit
a. Recruiting post secondary educated graduates
b. newcomers to Windsor
There is no better way to recruit new adults than have college/university students that have enjoyed 3-4 years downtown to stay downtown.
Its a bit tricky but I defy james to ignore the logic.
James, at least acknowledge this
3. Your best way to repopulate downtown is to recruit new people to the city
True enough - but you won't recruit new people to the city, if all we have to offer them are call centre jobs.
In my opinion, we need to stop expanding the city with low density housing. We need to encourage infill with mid to high density residential.
We need to attract GOOD paying jobs to attract this so-called "creative class".
Building an engineering school downtown will not accomplish this.
The solution for downtown does not rest on the engineering building, but in concert with other economic and policy changes in the city.
Wouldnt the engineering school offer good paying jobs to its profs and educators etc.? These are the folks you want downtown as you say yourself! right? These educators might even live in/near the core now and may, in future, have to commute to the fringe.
Much like any of the mega-projects that have been bandied about most people have focused on the size of the facility and the bodies that it will bring downtown. The rhetoric surrounding the university’s decision not to locate downtown is, to me, the reason I classify it as another “lost” mega-project. People are angry with the university and feel that downtown is doomed without them. This is completely unreasonable IMO. The fact that the university just dropped the idea is an indicator that they were never very interested in locating downtown in the first place. I will use your talking points to try to demonstrate that downtown does not need the university or the college present to be revived.
1a. I am not convinced that the downtown requires an increased population to thrive again. I’ve noticed from examining the aerial photos of the city that I have at my office that there is a large residential area within 500m on either side of Ouellette Avenue from Riverside Drive all the way out to Tecumseh Road. There are a number of high-rise condominium buildings downtown as well as some older walk-ups and redevelopment of old office buildings. As well there are single family homes and duplexes in the downtown core.
1b. I’m not quite sure what your trying to say here, but I will say that for a community to be successful all demographics should be represented. I would argue that the “creative class” should want an affluent or professional class in close proximity to finance and patronize their work.
2. I disagree. People will move to desirable neighbourhoods if they can realize an improved quality of life. If downtown is a vibrant and complete community it will become desirable for people to move closer and become part of that community. The people that work downtown could be convinced to live downtown if it was demonstrated that they could live comfortably and securely with their family downtown. So perhaps we should concentrate on selling downtown as a place to live and work and play and be entertained and to shop and to raise a family; just like the marketing people do to sell crappy houses on the periphery of any city.
3. Here I totally disagree. Windsor is not a city that needs to increase its population. Presently, if anything we need to depopulate. We are very quickly losing our biggest employers. The population we have here is underemployed. Again I refer to 1a there are plenty of people living within a short distance of downtown. I think the biggest problem is that they have a suburban mindset. Instead of walking a couple of blocks to buy groceries they get in their cars and drive out to the “boxes” to shop.
4. Again we do not need to recruit people to move here, see above.
In terms of sprawl much of the damage is done. We have managed to spread ourselves about as far as we can. The upside for Windsor is that the real sprawl began about 25 years ago. The buildings that went up were designed to pay for themselves after about 5 years. These places are in need of replacement. (These are not the kind of structures that anyone wants to pay to maintain, there’s not a lot of sentimentality attached to a glass box.) Now is the chance to bring the insurance brokers and engineers and doctors and dentists in from the office parks and back to the downtown. The recent story in the Star shows that developers are interested in building more office space downtown and a real effort should be made not just to welcome these people back in from the boonies but to convince more to come back. There is plenty of space downtown and if downtown can be packaged and redeveloped as a complete community these people whose jobs are moving downtown can be persuaded to move downtown as well.
I want everyone to see that downtown is viable without moving bits of the university and college. The university campus is not far from downtown. The students already come to the downtown for coffee and night life. If the students saw a complete community where they could work (since that’s what you do when you graduate) and live and shop and have access to recreation and entertainment; Then they would want to stay in Windsor.
University and college campuses are communities. Students from all faculties need the chance to interact socially and academically with each other. While I think the St. Clair students downtown enjoy being there they are missing out on many on campus events. I think it is a bit ironic that we are discussing taking part of the university away from the main campus. By doing this we will encourage short car trips and require more parking facilities as the students and some of the staff will have to make trips back and forth between the two sites. We can create a community for the graduates downtown but if their experience at school in Windsor is not fulfilling or inconvenient or they do not see a city worth staying in when they are done, they will leave.
I was a little distracted putting this together so if it’s a little rambley I apologize.
James
1a. Every downtown that has revitalized has done it by increasing the density of the population as well as increasing the demographic of that population
High rises don't help as I was told at Downtown Association conferences that residents in bldgs above 5 floors don't walk out. A majority remain shut ins that don't contribute to the downtown community. Coincidentally the neighborhoods developed in Canton Michigan by Beztak don't rise above 5 stories either. THey have main floor appartments that are designed to convert to retail as soon as the demand increases
2. I don't mean to disrespect but. Whether you disagree is irrelevant, this is what the statistics show in revitalized downtown. It was in presented to me at a seminar by the mayor of philadelphia. We have to start depending on the importance of My opinion or your opinion and start looking at what has worked. This is an experiment that has been repeated enough times. The data is in, we just need to look at it vs listening to anecdotal evidence and our opinions
Yes I agree that workers should be targeted but you will do a better job targeting new workers to downtown.
3. I don't think windsor needs an increase in population, it needs to be redistributed so that it becomes denser. We also need vacant commercial and office space to be converted to residential. Our downtown is the largest in North America that does not offer incentives to do this.
What do the hundreds of other cities that do know that we don't?
Thats great that you want to see downtown viable without the university. I think it is as well, but a campus would make it better. It would serve as recruiting grounds for a new demographic of residents
If the university campus does not come downtown then thats fine, we still need to attract their graduates to live downtown taking every action that you suggest.
But everything I hear suggests the engineering manufacturing center is not only going off campus but to the suburbs.
P.S.
Why would university students drive when we have a wonderful new transit terminal located in the middle of a new campus??
I have to agree with James. Historically this city 's downtown was it's absolute best in the 50's and 60's when it was both a day and night DESTINATION. We came downtown to work, shop, go to the doctor's office, socialize and dine. It was pure hustle and bustle. Buses were always full of people commuting to and from the downtown. People would also take transfers to hit Erie and Ottawa streets. None of them had to, or desired to live there. The key is having the right elements to bring people to the area. Uniques shops, proper anchors, and the right mix of entertainment venues. If the city did one thing; to offer incentive for doctors to open up practice downtown, we would see a lot of people commuting to this destination. Watch the shops open up after that. If you want to look at town formulas just look at downtown Rochester (north of Troy). Unique shops all the way. You have to get to each one by walking the mainstreet in the snow. And people do! They love it. It all boils down to one thing every time. Give them a reason to come and they will.
Mark
Alright, I like where this is going.
Where I think you and I mostly disagree is what needs to be developed first.
Just increasing the density of downtown won’t help as long as the residents have to drive out to shop and work. Whereas just bringing offices and businesses downtown won’t help if the workers just drive in and leave at the end of the day. There has to be a balance of new development and recycling of existing buildings for both business and people. I think the type of mixed use development you mentioned would be perfect for parts of downtown. We should also invest in the existing residential buildings to improve them and make the area more desireable. Now as for incentives, if you are talking about tax dollars, forget it. My tax dollars are being wasted all over this city. My incentive would be to restructure the property tax system so that speculators are in effect punished for not developing their properties. Good multi use development should get a break not a handout.
Yeah, I suspect that the university will hitch its wagon to the auto industry and move its engineering facility away from the main campus. Too many people still believe in the automobile. At a time when the infrastructure deficits of cities are being announced in the hundreds of millions of dollars we should be training more civil engineers and environmental engineers. It doesn’t help when the Star publishes editorials like Frank McKenna’s today. The guy doesn’t see the future coming. If investment in manufacturing technology is the future for this region why did St. Clair College send representatives to China last year to recruit mechanical and automotive and manufacturing engineering students? I can leave my office, walk over to the Ford Centre for Manufacturing Excellence and look at a big shop full of machines and no students. So its out there I work for the college. That’s why I don’t agree with breaking up campuses. We used to have the Industrial Resource Centre on Rhodes Drive, those students are more active in campus life and get more out of their college experience now than they did off on their own. We’ve also all talked about the possibility of different programs being moved downtown since we got the Cleary. It’s funny but I am the one that put a proposal together for my department. If we had to move I wanted it done in a way that I thought would best serve our students and the downtown community. Personally I would have no problem moving downtown but removing my students from the main campus would cost them in terms of social interactions and school involvement.
James
P.S. Mark I think your point 3. contradicts your point 2. If we just need to densify the current population then why do we need to recruit new workers.
P.P.S. In 1a you want to increase the demographic of that population. What demographic group are you seeking to increase. The fastest growing demo in North America is the 50+ maybe we should think about making downtown into a retirement destination?
I think we agree, but semantics and order are the issue. I don't see new retail coming without plans to densify and improve the demographic of the residents. Sort of a cart before the horse
As far as incentives go, I'm talking about Tax Incentive Financing "TIF's" WHich cost the taxpayer nothing.
Property tax rates are maintained. Anyone who invests in a property sees the tax increase on that investment phased in over 10 years.
Basically the taxpayer is giving up revenues it would never have seen without the incentives so that after the 10 year phase in it gets something.
That and other bureaucratic no brainers. Windsor is also the largest city in north america that has the same parking space requirements for downtown developments as it does in the suburbs. Less parking requirements should be needed, as well as a waiving of park levy fees because we have the city's best park already
Why should a developer even have to go to PAC to get things like parking requirements and park levy fees waived. That should be the welcoming "hello" we give just for coming out.
As far as recruiting seniors, I say great, but not with high rises, we need to offer seniors a residential product that is designed to get them to participate in the downtown community more.
Mark,
As Jim A mentioned, downtown was the big shopping centre for Windsor before malls. A retail mix of stores offering quality merchandise will draw people to the downtown to shop. New office development will draw more people downtown to work. As you say, we must plan and attract investors to create more residential opportunities as part of a complete downtown redevelopment plan. If these people coming into downtown see a desireable place to live then they will choose to move to the downtown. Developments like the one you described with retail on the ground floor, office on the second and loft or appartment space on the third to fifth floors is exactly the way to go.
Certainly something we will need to research for our public input prior to a charette would be finding out who lives downtown, shops downtown, works downtown, etc.
I asked in the P.P.S. what demographic are you trying to improve? Please tell us clearly, are you wanting to create a more even spread across all demographic groups or are you wanting to focus on increasing representation of select demographic groups?
James
My opinion… with the still very large influx visitors each weekend ready to spend, there is still a good customer base in which retail downtown should be able to thrive. The city must lure retail and cluster them in extreme close proximity to each other, not spread out all throughout the downtown. Pick one small, specific area and build that up. Put all focus on that one particular area and when it is thriving, others retail business will naturally locate in the vicinity to feed off of it. An example of what I am talking about, on a much, much larger scale however, is the Magnificent Mile in Chicago. Retail shop after retail shop after retail shop, all lined up one after another. People in previous posts, on this blog and others, always argue that there is plenty downtown for people. However, going to one retail shop, having to walk 5 minutes to the next, and then another 5 minutes to the next after that does nothing to lure people there. It is all about convenience. It has to be.
Proper organizing and planning to bring in retail at the same time and all grouped together will get people to shop. Clustering of retail like that would be its own shopping mall and seeing one boutique or retail after another will trigger them to shop. The closest thing we have to that at the moment is the cluster of bars, and what do these visitors do during the day when they visit? They drink, and in all honesty, I can’t slag them for it. Many visitors have asked me on many occasions if downtown has a shopping district they can walk to. While I promote the downtown heavily let them know everything that there is to offer, I have to admit I do get a little embarrassed when the response I get is, “That’s all there is?” It happens often.
In today’s world everything is about convenience. If you don’t organize and plan one specific area for retail, people will continue to rule out shopping downtown, and in turn, rule out exploring the other districts the downtown has to offer. Proper planning and incentives can do this.
What are your opinions on this?
I'd like to see a higher income demographic.
Now I'm not talking about 500,000-1m luxury townhouses or condo's. I doubt there is much demand for that in Windsor. I'm talking about developments something like brush street apts in detroit. Even a few Townhouses and condo's up to $250,000 mixed in with the others.
Right now you won't find much above $160,000 in downtown.
Its like the story I heard about seinfeld. In year 2 the series did not have enough viewers to warrant staying on the air. However the series was renewed because its particular demographic, regardless of how small was the most desirable to advertisers.
If we start to creep up on the demographic, you will have a much better chance of luring those retailers.
As far as the weekend visitors go, its a matter of daytime vs. nightime retailers. When I went to Rome and stayed with relatives in a revitalized district near the university I saw a number of hip clothing retailers open late. My wife lit up when she found she could actually bought a pair of shoes at midnight.
Right other than Bling Bling Capish and a few others, downtown needs more of the type of retailers that would market to that nightlife crowd.
As far as weekends, during the days its really hit and miss. Some sundays I go downtown and its really bustling, other sundays see it empty. Still haven't figured out the pattern
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