Winnipeg Retail

[trueviking]

Originally Posted by Biff

I think we have to disagree here. I think the one way streets make traffic move faster and more difficult for consumers as you need to go around a block if you miss an address. In my opinion on the streets I mentioned earlier - Kennedy, Edmonton, Carlton, Hargrave, Garry and Smith - all which are not thru streets would be perfect candidates for 2 way traffic.

You are correct.

one way streets are car funnels. Two way traffic is better for many reasons, primarily because it calms traffic.

Slowing traffic can improve the quality of urban life in many ways, but primarily it achieves this by making streets safer for everyone; pedestrians, cyclists and drivers alike. Reduced speeds result in shorter stopping distances, fewer accidents, less severe injuries when accidents do occur, reduced noise and a more comfortable overall physical environment.

With fewer visual distractions from oncoming traffic, it is felt motorists on one-way streets are not only encouraged to drive faster, but their concentration can be reduced, becoming less aware of their surroundings. This can impact pedestrian and cyclist safety, particularly at intersections.

In Hamilton, Ont., a city that has been attempting to convert its streets for several years, a public-health study published in 2000 found children are 2.5 times more likely to be injured on a one-way street than on a two-way. Further to this, a study from the University of Louisville, Kentucky, from 2011 revealed a two-way conversion of central Louisville streets reduced automobile collisions by 36 per cent in the first two years.

One-way streets were first implemented at a time when funnelling vehicles through the downtown was the only design priority for traffic engineers. Two-way streets however, have been found to more effectively connect points within the downtown.

This can make urban living more attractive by allowing residents to more easily access amenities and services throughout the downtown. Anyone in Winnipeg who has ever tried to drive or cycle between two central destinations, the Exchange District and the convention centre as an example, understands finding a circuitous route through the labyrinth of one-way streets can require a significant amount of foresight and planning.

A private urban-design firm in Orlando, Fla., found because of less direct travel routes, drivers on one-way street systems turn more than twice as often and travel up to 50 per cent greater distances to reach their destination. This results in a higher number of vehicle-pedestrian interactions (typically 40 per cent more), again reducing pedestrian safety. In fact, despite one-way streets typically having 10 to 20 per cent higher vehicle capacity, many current studies indicate this longer trip length may mean the slower traffic of two-way streets does not actually reduce travel times and increase congestion as conventional wisdom suggests.

Perhaps the most politically attractive advantage of two-way streets is they are good for business. Their slower pace creates a more comfortable physical environment that attracts pedestrians. Pedestrians are shoppers. Shoppers support retail business. In most cities, it is rare to find a one-way street that has successfully created a comfortable enough pedestrian experience to support a successful shopping strip or collection of sidewalk cafés.

The advantages of an attractive physical environment are supplemented by more convenient access for drivers because of the neighbourhood connectivity and easier navigation two-way streets offer.

Fewer barriers to access encourage the stop-and-go shopping that is so essential to support ground-floor retail. Accessibility also grows the market footprint, by making people who live across a greater geographic area consider a shop or restaurant to be part of their local neighbourhood network.

Increased storefront visibility is a third reason two-way streets have been found to promote retail growth. Slower speeds make signage and storefronts more visible to motorists, increasing the likelihood of impulse purchases. The direction of travel becomes important as motorists on one-way streets see only half of the ground-floor retail spaces when stopped at intersections, the time when drivers are most likely to notice a retailer. Visual access in general is reduced when everyone is experiencing the street from the same perspective. Many planners believe the introduction of one-way streets in the 1950s signalled the beginning of the slow decline of downtown retail in cities across North America.

[Ozabald]

Originally Posted by borkborkbork

Yes, I live nearby. It's dodgy. This is I think one of the big takeaways from cities' experience with pedestrian streets, though:

If you build it, they may not come.

In other words, pedestrian-only streets are successful when they take already successful streets and close them to traffic. Making a street that isn't already vibrant pedestrian-only tends to deaden it further.

Agreed. There are many failed attempts of pedestrian-only streets (with transit only in some instances) in Canadian cities such as Sparks St. and Rideau St. in Ottawa; Granville St. in Vancouver; and Graham Ave. locally. Stephen Ave (8th Ave. SW) in Calgary seems to have had some success.

[zalf]

If this is failure, success must be truly overwhelming.

This is also how I remember it being when I was in Ottawa last, which was like 12 years ago.

[thebasketballgeek]

Originally Posted by Ozabald

Agreed. There are many failed attempts of pedestrian-only streets (with transit only in some instances) in Canadian cities such as Sparks St. and Rideau St. in Ottawa; Granville St. in Vancouver; and Graham Ave. locally. Stephen Ave (8th Ave. SW) in Calgary seems to have had some success.

Granville and Sparks don’t really seem to be failed streets unless I’m missing something.

[thebasketballgeek]

Originally Posted by borkborkbork

Yes, I live nearby. It's dodgy. This is I think one of the big takeaways from cities' experience with pedestrian streets, though:

If you build it, they may not come.

In other words, pedestrian-only streets are successful when they take already successful streets and close them to traffic. Making a street that isn't already vibrant pedestrian-only tends to deaden it further.

That depends on how the street itself is redesigned though. Add some trees for shade, allow room for patios with added space, change in hardscape materials, and features such as market stalls or food trucks can all be implemented in these car-free streets. Additions like that would make a street more pleasant and do a better job in generating activity.

If the street that turned car-free just put a bollard and a sign saying no cars then car-free or not the street will not be activated to its full potential.

[cslusarc]

Zellers opens on Tuesday, April 4th @ Hudson's Bay St Vital.

[SquarePegYWG]

What if we had $2 million for a study to hire Jeff Speck to come up with a comprehensive plan for the downtown. I suggest we take it from the money allocated for the "trade route" study. https://www.jeffspeck.com/

Originally Posted by Biff

I think we have to disagree here. I think the one way streets make traffic move faster and more difficult for consumers as you need to go around a block if you miss an address. In my opinion on the streets I mentioned earlier - Kennedy, Edmonton, Carlton, Hargrave, Garry and Smith - all which are not thru streets would be perfect candidates for 2 way traffic.

[SquarePegYWG]

Originally Posted by CoryB

That is pretty close to the worst thing you could do to make downtown more inviting. People here often talk about shifting the focus away from personal use vehicles and changing downtown roads to be two way streets does the exact opposite of that as it puts all the emphasis on convivence of personal use vehicles. With traffic in most of downtown coming from a single direction it actually makes the whole area much more pedestrian friendly as the complexity in predicting traffic scenarios is significantly reduced.

Everything I've read from experts suggests otherwise. 1-way streets prioritize speed of through traffic over everything else.

[Hecate]

Originally Posted by SquarePegYWG

Everything I've read from experts suggests otherwise. 1-way streets prioritize speed of through traffic over everything else.

They prioritize movement of traffic. The one way routes were developed to improve traffic flow in a city with no freeways. To do away with that now would be an absolute nightmare for all downtown neighbourhoods. Trying to turn streets like princess and King into two ways would most likely cause serious traffic issues throughout the rest of downtown. People love to say “look it worked here” but fail to see the other puzzle pieces those cities have that make it work. Pieces like Freeways and actual rapid transit.

[GreyGarden]

^Is traffic really that bad though? I’m being genuine, I feel like congestion in Winnipeg is not bad and that we can “afford” to make commute times slightly longer. They’re pretty reasonable already.

[Highwayman]

So I read Lowe's is now becoming Rona....... First they buy out Rona and then fail in Canada then want to turn their 80 stores across Canada back into Rona. They went on to praise how their 26000 employees will not lose their jobs and all the other Bs that goes with it.

But what happens to the Rona stores that still exist that are basically next door to a Lowe's. They will obviously close the smaller Rona stores and make the larger Lowe's stores into Ronas. But what happens to the smaller Rona stores employees. They didn't mention that.

I always liked the little Ronas as you'd actually find the stuff no on else would stock. And you were not bombarded with ( can I help you ever isle you went down ) .

[WinCitySparky]

Rona’s prices and customer service are vastly inferior to Home Depot’s, and Lowe’s wasn’t much better.

[AccordTR]

Originally Posted by WinCitySparky

Rona’s prices and customer service are vastly inferior to Home Depot’s, and Lowe’s wasn’t much better.

Agreed. Shopping at Rona is literally the worst experience possible. Most employees have zero idea about the departments they work in. Least at Home Depot they hire ex trade people.

[cllew]

Originally Posted by AccordTR

Agreed. Shopping at Rona is literally the worst experience possible. Most employees have zero idea about the departments they work in. Least at Home Depot they hire ex trade people.

The last few staffers I dealt with at Crossroads HD have a tag on their apron saying I work in all departments. And they appear to be too young to be retired.

When the Crossroads station HD opened you were correct that in the plumbing and electrical departments the staff were mostly former trades people. Now I think most of the former trades people just work at the Pro Desk to service the contractors.

[Hecate]

Originally Posted by GreyGarden

^Is traffic really that bad though? I’m being genuine, I feel like congestion in Winnipeg is not bad and that we can “afford” to make commute times slightly longer. They’re pretty reasonable already.

Winnipeg is the third worst city in Canada for traffic congestion in Canada behind Toronto and Vancouver. We’re waiting long enough. No need to increase it. Furthermore if you look at the cities the listed above like Orlando and Louisville and Ottawa. The population densities are widely varied. Winnipeg 3700 per mile square vs. 1900 for Louisville and 2700 for Orlando. Vs 334 for Ottawa. Plus all these cities have rapid transit and freeways. There are a lot more people on our streets vs those cities already. It would be a nightmare to put traffic calming measures throughout downtown.

[thebasketballgeek]

Originally Posted by Hecate

Winnipeg is the third worst city in Canada for traffic congestion in Canada behind Toronto and Vancouver. We’re waiting long enough. No need to increase it. Furthermore if you look at the cities the listed above like Orlando and Louisville and Ottawa. The population densities are widely varied. Winnipeg 3700 per mile square vs. 1900 for Louisville and 2700 for Orlando. Vs 334 for Ottawa. Plus all these cities have rapid transit and freeways. There are a lot more people on our streets vs those cities already. It would be a nightmare to put traffic calming measures throughout downtown.

That’s not how density works. While Winnipeg is denser then Louisville or Orlando it most certainly is not denser then Ottawa’s urban area.

Anyways, it wouldn’t be a nightmare to put traffic calming measures through downtown because the streets that would get those measures would have their traffic reduced. This is the concept called “reduced demand” where the reduction of car infrastructure is directly correlated with the traffic on said street.

If for example cars were only permitted on our major DT thoroughfares (Donald, Smith, Portage, Colony, and Main) then traffic would be reduced because the rest of the streets would have 0 traffic. Since those streets would have little to no traffic, that opens up the possibility of other uses for said street that would be more conductive in pedestrian environment.

Hell I’m working on a studio project in DT rn and most street ROW are 20 metres from property line. On Portage, Main, and Broadway it’s 40 metres.

Within 20 metres you can add bike lanes, bus lanes, tram lines, greenways, and hell you can completely get rid of the street and build rowhouses to replace the street itself. Hell some canals in Amsterdam are only 8m wide. You could theoretically create a canal on any of these ROW which would be massive for storm water management considering we have a combined sewer system for most of the inner city.

I know these are very radical ideas especially for a city like Winnipeg. However, streets can be transformed as places people specifically want to visit just because of the way they are designed. There are precedents of street transformations at a similar scale all over the globe and the fact that even turning a 1-way street to a 2-way street is some sort of massive barrier is a shame because it’s frankly not enough.

As a city that’s growing to 1 million and is a regional hub, we need to make Downtown a place people want to be. The width of the streets will never permit the vibrancy we want in the core.

[OTA in Winnipeg]

^Still have to do something about the zombies/meth users. Especially the ones carrying knives. In Kenora the shop owners are keeping their doors locked now and asking people to knock to enter. It's a big problem and until that is addressed, no one wants to be downtown.

[trebor204]

With Rona buying out Lowes

Does anyone know what's happening to the Rona/Lowes stores along Kenaston?

Right now there 2 Lowe's Store in Winnipeg (Regent and Kenaston) and 2 Rona stores (Sargent and Kenaston). In addition there 5 Home Depot's stores in Winnipeg (Kenaston, Polo Park, Regent, Garden City, St Vital)

I don't think Rona would want 2 stores almost next door to each other.

[cllew]

Originally Posted by trebor204

With Rona buying out Lowes

Does anyone know what's happening to the Rona/Lowes stores along Kenaston?

Right now there 2 Lowe's Store in Winnipeg (Regent and Kenaston) and 2 Rona stores (Sargent and Kenaston). In addition there 5 Home Depot's stores in Winnipeg (Kenaston, Polo Park, Regent, Garden City, St Vital)

I don't think Rona would want 2 stores almost next door to each other.

Regent Lowe's converts back to Rona and probably whatever Kenaston store has the best lease break cost goes and the other stays.

Or it could be like Safeway/Sobey's on Kenaston where they are right across the street from each other. I would have thought by now that Empire group would have closed one of them but I guess they are both showing enough of a profit to keep them open.

[horrorbro123]

Sunrise Records Is Now Done In Polo Park For Good Ending Music Stores In Polo Park For Good as Well