ON IT'S AXIS

I thought about the days when Aurora residents had to pick up mail at the old post office on Yonge Street. 

There was always a line-up. People chatted while they waited. 

Same thing happened  at Elwood Davis garage where we lined up every year to re-new car licenses. 

Former Councillor Walt Davis told me once, the sidewalk on Yonge Street was impassable on Friday nights. Folks came in from the country to shop and gather in groups on the sidewalk to catch up on the week's news.  

A person on the move had to step into the road to make headway. Every store  downtown was a retail outlet. Retail is no longer in the same place. 

People need to drive here and there. No Chat. No gossip. No interaction among residents. 

The Aurora Banner was sold. 

The change was phenomenal. 

Modern planning is responsible.

Homes must be separated from commercial amenities. Homeowners are passionate about that.

Retail must have parking and planting and screening.

More space is required so it sprawls into the
countryside. 

Tenants pay rent for space and parking and lighting and cleaning and to be where retail is.

Downtown became an old-fashioned concept. 

Malls were the place to be. 

Then along came consultants with goofy advice about replacing sidewalks with decorative concrete and placing heritage street furniture.

where  crowds once entirely occupied said sidewalks standing about chatting and catching up on the news. 

Councillors, with little knowledge and less interest in how things were, before they became what they are and why...swallow the goofy advice holus-bolus to the delight of administrators, who take it as validation and proceed with time and effort to make it happen. 

Then .... common sense prevails ... it doesn't happen... it's back to the drawing board with  a new work load generated. 

And so the world turns.