Winnipeg | James Avenue Pumping Station | ?M | 6F - 4F | Phase 1 | U/C

[rrskylar]

Originally Posted by ywgwalk

Sky Condos is definitely starting to fill up with toddlers, we always walk to The Forks for the playground but having something around Alexander Docks would be perfect.

Would be nice to have something like a tennis court or something like that too.

Civic politicians seem more concerned about dog parks than parks for children (humans)!

The all about me generation puts pets before kids anyway!

[Labroco]

Originally Posted by esquire

^ Slumlords won't take over condos like the Excelsior and the Strand, but they could take over more marginal rental apartment buildings out on the periphery. And then the situation really starts to deteriorate.

I don't know why A90 isn't encouraging RNDSQR with their development... that project will help close the gap between the more established East Exchange and his property further up the street. It will be great news for H20 because suddenly it won't feel like it's out on the edge so much. Which makes me wonder, how are YouCube and the spaceship doing? They are even more out of the way than H20.

I think Labroco needs to take his neighbour A90 for a drink and provide some reassuring words

Funny, I just told my brother to take him out for coffee!

Since Friday we have had two brand new steel doors destroyed by crow bars trying to gain access ($3,000). A grade/dock lift vandalized ($1,200) broken window ($600) more gang tagging ($300). This is happening every day of every week for us. The “homeless” have Uber Eats and bottle service delivered to the waterfront park every day! Sally Anne & Silomn have lunch / dinner delivery service as well!

When your councillor won’t return calls to deal with community issues and the President of Centre Ventures makes more than the Mayor and possibly Premier, there is a problem in governance.

When people like A90 say they have had enough one should really sit up and listen. The problem is no one is left to listen let alone creat the necessary changes. He is rabid with frustration and anger. I don’t blame him. Spaceship and H20 are in exactly the same spot. They cannot retain their tenants due to the crime and fear partially due to inaction on lighting, safety patrols and no movement on the Docks. The young people who have stepped up, taken a chance and worked for change have been IGNORED. It’s shameful.

[trueviking]

^^^ ha ha. Classic. Couldn’t help yourself. Your hatred for CentreVenture is hilariously illogical.

Fun fact. The mayor is the 18th highest paid city employee. 7 of the top 10 are cops. 32 of the top 50.

[1ajs]

the silent majority who are fed up dont help either needs to be a major uproar of some sort on these issues

[1ajs]

Originally Posted by trueviking

^^^ ha ha. Classic. Couldn’t help yourself. Your hatred for CentreVenture is hilariously illogical.

Fun fact. The mayor is the 18th highest paid city employee. 7 of the top 10 are cops. 32 of the top 50.

your on the inside of some of the circles tv and your ignoring him for his bias of cv. put that aside and listen.
i have my own dislikes for cv many of us do.. but still

also the eaxchange should bein a compltely different civic ward then its in

[Wigglez]

Originally Posted by 1ajs

the silent majority who are fed up dont help either needs to be a major uproar of some sort on these issues

Care to elaborate on this at all? Some specifics on what people should be complaining about? Anything specific one could all rally behind? Or just gonna drop some Fox News rhetoric and roll with it?

Actually could anyone from the "The exchange is worse than the Warsaw ghettos" crowd give me some solid solutions? I'm seeing a lot of complaints and telling developers they're stupid, lots of randomly throwing blame at whoever/whatever, but beyond talking about a rotting dock not a whole lot of logical ideas.

Just wanna state that other than mocking 1ajs quoting his fav news outlet, I don't disagree that the exchange could be a lot better. But whining gets a grand total of nothing done.

Anyone wanna talk about their ideas for making the exchange better? Do people actually think bike lanes are some communist conspiracy to provide homeless with easy access to UBER eats and punish the wealthy? or something? Sorry, it's hard to dig thru the insanity of this thread and what some people are considering "discussion"

[Labroco]

Originally Posted by trueviking

^^^ ha ha. Classic. Couldn’t help yourself. Your hatred for CentreVenture is hilariously illogical.

Fun fact. The mayor is the 18th highest paid city employee. 7 of the top 10 are cops. 32 of the top 50.

Let’s be clear.. My comment was about compensation of the President of Centre Ventures. If I’m incorrect please let me know. There is nothing illogical about this or funny. Consistently commenting on an agency that has challenges in a forum in a thoughtful and I would say professional way is in no way off side.

As the Chairman of Centre Ventures to take a comment about compensation of the President (which I believe to be true) as an excuse to attack and accuse me of hate is unprofessional and undignified of the Chair. You are attempting to deny and deflect the comment. It’s unbecoming of you. I would also suggest your projecting.

As I said, if my comment is incorrect please let me know. As the financials of CV for 2018, 2019 and 2020 have still not been posted on the website one cannot be sure.

I would have hoped you would have zeroed in on the challenges expressed in the post by the stakeholders who have made multimillion dollar commitments to the City and area instead of once again not listening to the constituency you claim to represent.

In all sincerity, I think it is you who has stopped listening...

8 years is WAY too long to sit on a board...

Your in the CV bubble...

(As for your public urban commentary and articles, your spot on. Keep up the good work).

[1ajs]

did i come across as fox news not my intention. i dont watch that station. nore do i want anything to do with it

theres tension

[Hecate]

Let’s face it... centre venture is a joke. They’re propping up a man with multiple bankruptcies to develop a forty storey tower downtown. Just gross.

[davequanbury]

I read a lot of frustration in this thread, as well as people asking what can be done...

We are obviously seeing increased homelessness these days. The swell in numbers was already happening pre-pandemic (thinking of MMF tent city), but the pandemic has compounded a lot of suffering and loss of routines/access to services. There is a ton of poverty happening in Manitoba, just a ton. People are coming out of the woodwork, becoming unhoused, and unsheltered at an alarming rate right now.

The exchange district has the unfortunate geography of being adjacent to a part of downtown that has been ground zero for homelessness services for the majority of Winnipeg history. The area south of the current CPR station was a total clapboard shack slum as early as the 1880s. Main Street between City hall and CPR tracks has proved to be an area which is highly highly resistant to investment going back at least to the days when Fraser demolished the top 4 floors of the Bon Accord block to protest his city tax bill. Missions have been pooping up in this area since at least the 1920s. I've also read newspaper articles about how the "tramps" and "hobos" that lived along the riverbank got flooded out in 1950. This area just has what you might call certain gravity of poverty and homelessness, even back before the majority of urban homeless in Winnipeg were of Indigenous background. Now we can add racism to stigma.

With that being said, with to the construction of Waterfront drive and the accompanying condos, that census tract is the only CT in downtown that saw increases in income in the past 20 years. Now that we are into the later phases of Waterfront drive, the developments are occurring further and further north along the strip, bringing them closer and closer the area of entrenched poverty.

It's a recipe for conflict. You have ever increasing numbers of desperate individuals in the same several square block radius as individuals investing in residential development that is for middle and upper middle class folks.

What can be done? Depends on whether we are talking about 'upstream' or 'downstream services' for the homeless. Downstream services are already congregated on Main st between Logan and Higgins as well as further West to Princess. Unfortunately, there needs to be a ton of investment in upstream or preventative services such as affordable housing, mental health services, settlement services, supported housing. These investments cannot continue to be congregated on North Main, they need to be located in functional neighbourhoods which can absorb them, and offer the 'clients' a shot at making a new start, away from the strip.


There also needs to be some acceptance that this area has a character that cannot simply be built over. As long as there continues to be poverty here and in Manitoba's remote communities, this area will continue to act as a magnet for the desperate masses.

[esquire]

^ Great post... thank you for that historical perspective.

[buzzg]

While I guess it's good that there are people here willing to take a risk, people seem to be forgetting that 62M and YouCube decided to build in an area that was already experiencing all the issues being discussed, for decades. So to think a developer can just go into a "shitty" area and build something "nice" and the city or some agency is just supposed to wave a magic wand and make all the existing people/problems go away is just... lunacy. Some call it gentrification.

The land purchased was cheap for a reason – low desirability. On said cheap land, cheap, low-quality buildings were built (wasn't H20 supposed to be condos but no one would buy them?). To expect that this not very desirable corner of downtown was going to attract hordes of rich 5-star tenants to live in poorly designed buildings is wild to me.

Maybe one day this area will be a lot more attractive, but we need to fill in the area between James and ~Higgins first, and all up Waterfront. This is like the urban version of leapfrog development.

[esquire]

I don't think anyone was expecting Linden Woods type living along the northern stretches of Waterfront Drive near Higgins, but the picture that A90 is painting (his twitter feed contains occasional pictures of the damage and mischief) suggests that the situation has become more dire lately.

It's like the difference between the neighbour's teenage kid selling a few dime-bags vs. living next to a full on crack house and the chaos that ensues.

[buzzg]

^Yes, but said crackhouses were already there before the Jones' moved in.

Now hey I'm not saying we shouldn't do anything about it – but the "solution" is much deeper than somehow just removing all the people from the area who were mostly there already.

[esquire]

I don't know that the solution is necessarily moving people out of the area but doing things like doing a better job of providing housing/addiction treatment, and enforcing laws to deal with those who are breaking into buildings and cars, stealing, etc.

[buzzg]

It's become abundantly clear to me that "enforcing laws" has zero effects long term. You can't lock someone up for 25 years for breaking into a shed. I totally agree with better proactive treatments and housing. Unfortunately there's only so much the city can do for what is a healthcare problem.

The city can however redirect a significant amount of resources away from police (which are reactive and prevent nothing) and toward proactive solutions. The small pilot of teaming a single police with a mental health professional here for 211 calls has apparently been going well and even the police are happy and want to see it significantly expanded. The key here for the city will be directing current police funding toward this stuff, not just adding more and more expenses on to expand these programs.

[esquire]

Originally Posted by buzzg

It's become abundantly clear to me that "enforcing laws" has zero effects long term. You can't lock someone up for 25 years for breaking into a shed. I totally agree with better proactive treatments and housing. Unfortunately there's only so much the city can do for what is a healthcare problem.

I get that law enforcement is a short term fix, but you still need it. If the overriding feeling on Waterfront is that people can steal and cause costly property damage with impunity, then why would anyone live there?

[Spocket]

Originally Posted by buzzg

The city can however redirect a significant amount of resources away from police (which are reactive and prevent nothing) and toward proactive solutions. The small pilot of teaming a single police with a mental health professional here for 211 calls has apparently been going well and even the police are happy and want to see it significantly expanded. The key here for the city will be directing current police funding toward this stuff, not just adding more and more expenses on to expand these programs.

Totally disagree with the base premise of defunding police. We're not living in a police state where cops are shooting everybody who looks at them twice. We've got what I feel is just the right amount of policing. If we want to add more social workers that's fine with me and I think we probably should. Defunding the police may work in what amount to warzones in the States but we're far from that level in any area just yet. When crime drops significantly and stays that way for long enough to become the norm then we can start talking about taking cops off the streets.

[buzzg]

I want to be clear I don’t think we should abolish - I just think the fact we have the highest cost of police in Canada is something to be alarmed about. The police budget has taken up more and more of the whole city budget, with no correlation to crime rate. So I think we should freeze the police budget and direct more to trying new things. The current system clearly isn’t working… so isn’t this the definition of insanity?

[bomberjet]

The cost of policing is out of whack. The union has won that battle for them. We've talked about this many times.