"Cowardice asks the question...is it safe? Expediency asks the question...is it politic? Vanity asks the question...is it popular? But conscience asks the question...is it right? And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular but one must take it because it is right." ~Dr. Martin Luther King

Tuesday, 19 August 2014

None So Blind. As Those Who Will Not See

Yesterday the comment was made about the flower planters on Yonge  Street. I drove down in the early evening.

Noticed posts for hoardings in place around the old IGA site. That's a large space. Condos are proposed. Lots of potential for pedestrian traffic. Acess and egress on Yonge  Street. Close to the
Yonge Wellington intersection. Something will have to give.

Gigantic  crane over the Yonge / Centre construction site. Still happening.

New facade obviously being prepared on the true value hardware site.I hear the shed behind has
New framing inside and my accommodate a couple of boutiques.

Condos are planned on the site next to the old town hall.

The hood will be transformed.

None of it at public expense.  No tapping into the Community Improvement Plan  adopted recently by Council. All of it contributing new revenues to town coffers.

Like the nice dress shop  down in the hollow. Reminds me of North  Bay.

Once ,between  SARB hearings, I had time to window shop on the Main Street. I noticed particularly four or five privately operated shoe stores just on one side of the street. The display windows were a delight with quality  Canadian brands of shoes I hadn't seen for years.

Men's and Ladies and  Children's  wear shops  abounded.

Council has referred hundreds of  thousands of dollars of spending to the next budget for the purpose of " revitalizing" the downtown. Replace sidewalks with patterned concrete. Build it and they will come is the obvious logic.

Talk of  "revitalizing" downtown has become a mantra that hasn't change in fifty years.

It's as if if they never really see the downtown. We know they don't live here. The town hall is off the beaten track. Maybe they  avoid it because of  congestion at the Yonge /Wellington intersection.

But Councillors live here? What's their excuse?


11 comments:

Anonymous said...

The only good news about the re-vitalizing project is that someone, maybe Cllr Thompson, stopped that stupid replacing of perfectly good paving with new products to " provide a seamless " mesh with others. I might be wrong there as Cllr Humfryes really, really needs those sidewalks. Maybe she got them - it was late & I stopped watching.

Anonymous said...

Reminds you of North Bay from thirty-odd years ago?

Anonymous said...

For years we have needed a decent place for visitors to stay. Every term there is more talk and the current two candidates for Mayor are the same. Just talk. We need a hotel .

Anonymous said...

I was driving south on Yonge today and they're putting up some sort of post around the old LW store as well.

Anonymous said...

I hope some councillors can resist hassling people trying to develop properties. Those investing their money want to do a good job. No one sets out to offend a town and there is no reason for cases to become adversarial. Imagine trying to stall a permit because you feel an additional awning would be appropriate.

Anonymous said...

14:35, Cllr Buck mentioned that in her post: "Noticed posts for hoardings in place around the old IGA site."

The Liquidation World building was originally an IGA supermarket. (There is an even older "IGA site" near that intersection - the building fronted by the recently-closed Mac's convenience store)

Anonymous said...

17:43- Yes your right. I was thinking of the last IGA over on Orchard Heights.

Anonymous said...

13:45

That's part of the problem... no one ever thinks of the present

Anonymous said...

8:44
You would think that people would look and plan towards the future. That being said. There's a world of information in looking into the past. Some we don’t want to repeat and some we do.

Anonymous said...

...and some we don't want always repeated.

Anonymous said...

"I hear the shed behind has (n)ew framing inside and m(a)y accommodate a couple of boutiques."

I think I know which little birdy you, ahem, heard this from.