Small Cities That Offer a Good Urban Experience.

[urbandreamer]

Do we have any small Canadian cities that look/feel like Lancaster or other smaller cities in PA?

[hipster duck]

Lindsay is not a nice place. One of its main employers is the prison, which means that it attracts the families of its inmates and all their, um, issues.

[JHikka]

Originally Posted by SpongeG

how about Trenton? I lived in Belleville for two years and never went to Trenton other than a ride through on the bus one time.

There's not much in Trenton, really, especially considering Belleville is a stone's throw away and better for just about anything someone might be looking for. Trenton's got that small town urban area but with large sprawl in all directions.

I actually like Belleville's main street downtown quite a bit but it needs way more residents and local businesses to feel fuller and denser. It suffers the same issue that every other small town and city faces in this country which is the historic downtown has been replaced by power centres near the highway. It would be really nice if they could get density on both sides of the river. They're selling condos in Belleville and the prices are....not cheap.

[MolsonExport]

Originally Posted by flar

Merrickville has some nice stone buildings and many well-kept Victorian homes
https://skyscraperpage.com/forum/sho...d.php?t=169848

Brockville is well worth a visit
https://skyscraperpage.com/forum/sho...d.php?t=175655

delightful photo threads!

[905er]

Brockville for the win!! beautiful!!

[Innsertnamehere]

Originally Posted by niwell

Lindsay's downtown has a solid enough building stock, but suffers from Kent St just being too wiiiidddddeeeee: https://goo.gl/maps/LqFodupuvjiY47NX9


Something about angled parking that just seems so unappealing to me as well. The street trees there seemed completely choked and anemic even in the height of summer when I was there last (as confirmed by going back in time on streetview).

Lindsay is a bit of a crapshoot, yes. Angled parking isn't necessarily a killer though - Uxbridge has a great little historic commercial strip with angled parking for example. In that case I think the extra parking provided by the angled parking actually attracts the better tenants in Uxbridge's downtown compared to the rest of the downtown which only has parallel parking.

Lindsay's problem is lack of strong employment in the area - there is a lot of poverty because of it. I've spent an OK amount of time in the town as my grandmother used to live there and I have a good friend who grew up there.

The residential areas north of downtown Lindsay are quite nice though.

Ontario probably has 30+ small towns with half-way successful retail cores. It's easier to point out the ones that are in poor shape than the ones that are in better shape.

The "best" ones that stand out to me are Stratford, Cobourg, Belleville, Brockville, Huntsville, etc.

The "worst ones" I've seen are Woodstock, Simcoe, Lindsay, St Thomas, etc.

In terms of mid size cities, the worst offenders to me in Ontario are Brantford and Peterborough. The best are Kingston and Guelph to me.

[Laceoflight]

In Québec, the case of Shawinigan is interesting: a tri-city area that has grown tremendously in the first half of the 20th century, becoming one of the provinces's main urban areas, and then plateauing / slightly declining until today. It resulted in a city with 3 downtown cores, lots of "dense" urban neighbourhoods made of brick walk-ups or apartment buildings... Nice bones, as we know, small Quebec towns tend to look like overgrown villages, in comparison to their ontarian counterparts that were developed later on. It has been documented here by Rico Rommheim and Masoliantekw.
See the post from Rico Rommheim
See the post from Masoliantekw

Another interesting city to look at is Saint-Hyacinthe, in Montérégie. During the second half of the 19th century and the first half of the 20th, it was in the top 5 / top 7 main urban agglomerations of the province. The city had impressive institutions for its size, acting as a regional capital: 2 important colleges and smaller ones, 7 or more religious congregations and convents, hospitals, provincial agricultural schools, a catholic bishopric and cathedral, important industries, etc. Its consistent downtown is built around a market hall and place. Cascades street is lively. Uptown, you will find the city hall, central square, the courthouse, the main hospital (Hotel-Dieu), the cathedral, etc. There are also a good number of working-class brick/wood apartment buildings areas.
Street View / rue des Cascades

Of course, I will always praise my hometown, Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, another monteregian city, whose downtown is impressive, located on both sides of Richelieu river, but less well-preserved than Saint-Hyacinthe's, though there is an important renovation ongoing.
See my past photo threads about Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu

[hipster duck]

Originally Posted by Innsertnamehere

The "best" ones that stand out to me are Stratford, Cobourg, Belleville, Brockville, Huntsville, etc.

The "worst ones" I've seen are Woodstock, Simcoe, Lindsay, St Thomas, etc.

In terms of mid size cities, the worst offenders to me in Ontario are Brantford and Peterborough. The best are Kingston and Guelph to me.

I agree that Kingston and Guelph are the best. But Peterborough on par with Brantford?

I grew up in Peterborough, so maybe I'm sticking up for my hometown a bit, but I think its downtown - while it has its rough edges - still has a fairly lively restaurant and bar scene, a cinema and performing arts spaces and benefits from Trent students who tend to live in the area just to the immediate north. It also has a pretty intact Victorian commercial core.

IMO, the cities of 100k-200k whose downtowns punch below their weight are Brantford, Sudbury, Sarnia and Barrie. Also St. Catharines and Oshawa, but they're a bit bigger, and Oshawa has become a suburb.

[Blitz]

Brantford was in horrific shape about 15 years ago - was easily the worst downtown in Ontario at that time. It has improved in recent years with the help of the satellite campus of Wilfrid Laurier University but it still has a ways to go.

[MonkeyRonin]

Originally Posted by Blitz

Brantford was in horrific shape about 15 years ago - was easily the worst downtown in Ontario at that time. It has improved in recent years with the help of the satellite campus of Wilfrid Laurier University but it still has a ways to go.

If anything I'd say it's worse now, thanks to this absolute stupidity:

2009: https://goo.gl/maps/o7GJCcAcXPWPRX6G9
2018: https://goo.gl/maps/rKL2bkVRQJPJSCP59

[flar]

Originally Posted by MonkeyRonin

If anything I'd say it's worse now, thanks to this absolute stupidity:

2009: https://goo.gl/maps/o7GJCcAcXPWPRX6G9
2018: https://goo.gl/maps/rKL2bkVRQJPJSCP59

Originally Posted by Brantford Mayor Mike Hancock

"The vast majority of our city is strongly in support of this demolition," he said. "It would give our downtown new life."

source: Hamilton Spectator http://www.thespec.com/News/Local/article/714151


That was a lively discussion back in the day, much more lively than downtown Brantford
https://www.skyscraperpage.com/forum...d.php?t=178092

[Pavlov]

Originally Posted by urbandreamer

Cobourg has a great streetwall/building stock but the vibe is lacking - it feels very staid Scots. It probably needs a university to liven it up. I need to explore the Belleville to Cornwall corridor in more detail - Belleville felt like a smaller Kitchener when I last went through it a few years ago. Kingston is disappointing in how its historic main street suddenly peters out into suburbia - I wish it could be extended to just south of the 401.

That seems like an unfair expectation for a city the size of Kingston. For example, Princess Street, from Lake Ontario to the Cataraqui Cemetary (which is still well south of the 401) is nearly 7 km.

Princess Street is very urban and lively (for a small city) from Lake Ontario to Division Street (~1.5 km). From Division Street to Bath Road (another ~1.5 km), it was moderately urban and lively (includes much of the Queen's student ghetto), but is currently undergoing a transformation with the development of numerous midrise condos (targeted at Queen's students).

This is the best recent photo of the area I could find (that shows some of the development):



Here are a couple of examples typical of the type of developments underway:







They aren't beautiful by any means, but they will definitely add to the urbanity and vibrancy of that stretch of Princess Street.

[someone123]

Kingston is really quite nice and has been like that for a long time. It has had a more complex than average downtown commercial scene for years, including larger retailers, and Queen's, one of the nicest university campuses in Canada, within walking distance of downtown.

This is a tangent but people usually seem to judge cities in relative terms ("Nth largest population in geographical area X") yet almost all Canadian cities have been improving their more urban parts and have been developing faster lately. I wonder if or when the popular conception of what it means to be a "small Canadian city" is going to evolve to match this reality. Back in the 90's there were a lot more dire places that did not have much going on. And these days Canadian cities compare more directly with those of the US and Europe. I think the "historical premium", the advantage of having inherited older pre-war stuff compared to new development, is shrinking too. I wonder if so many people will still think of cities made up mostly of older buildings as better from an urbanism perspective in say 2050. The new developments still have overly large footprints with not enough variety in most cities, and IMO there is still too much ornamentation phobia thanks to the modernists, but that could change, and already has somewhat in a few places.

[MolsonExport]

Originally Posted by Laceoflight

In Québec, the case of Shawinigan is interesting: a tri-city area that has grown tremendously in the first half of the 20th century, becoming one of the provinces's main urban areas, and then plateauing / slightly declining until today. It resulted in a city with 3 downtown cores, lots of "dense" urban neighbourhoods made of brick walk-ups or apartment buildings... Nice bones, as we know, small Quebec towns tend to look like overgrown villages, in comparison to their ontarian counterparts that were developed later on. It has been documented here by Rico Rommheim and Masoliantekw.
See the post from Rico Rommheim
See the post from Masoliantekw

Another interesting city to look at is Saint-Hyacinthe, in Montérégie. During the second half of the 19th century and the first half of the 20th, it was in the top 5 / top 7 main urban agglomerations of the province. The city had impressive institutions for its size, acting as a regional capital: 2 important colleges and smaller ones, 7 or more religious congregations and convents, hospitals, provincial agricultural schools, a catholic bishopric and cathedral, important industries, etc. Its consistent downtown is built around a market hall and place. Cascades street is lively. Uptown, you will find the city hall, central square, the courthouse, the main hospital (Hotel-Dieu), the cathedral, etc. There are also a good number of working-class brick/wood apartment buildings areas.
Street View / rue des Cascades

Of course, I will always praise my hometown, Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, another monteregian city, whose downtown is impressive, located on both sides of Richelieu river, but less well-preserved than Saint-Hyacinthe's, though there is an important renovation ongoing.
See my past photo threads about Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu

Great shares! Shows me that I need to get off the highway, rather than judging these places by what I see along the highway (particularly, St.Hyacinthe, which looks quite atrocious from the highway...as does London Ontario, which is defined, on the 401, by extremely banal/ugly discount hotels and industrial park dreck)

[niwell]

Peterborough also has a fair number of stable professional jobs associated with Trent and the Ontario Provincial government. I used to go up often when I worked with MNR and my younger coworkers made good use of downtown amenities and the ability to work walking distance from work at a fraction of Toronto costs. There are sketchy feeling areas close to downtown, but the core itself is quite nice. I'd highly recommend St. Veronus Tap Room which has one of the better Belgian beer selections in Ontario (probably good craft now too).

[Blitz]

Originally Posted by MonkeyRonin

If anything I'd say it's worse now, thanks to this absolute stupidity:

2009: https://goo.gl/maps/o7GJCcAcXPWPRX6G9
2018: https://goo.gl/maps/rKL2bkVRQJPJSCP59

Buildings have been lost in Brantford but in terms of activity it's better now than it was back then. New residential buildings have been built in recent years as well.

[jamincan]

Originally Posted by niwell

I'd highly recommend St. Veronus Tap Room which has one of the better Belgian beer selections in Ontario (probably good craft now too).

And some frites!

[Psychedelic Sailor]

Originally Posted by MonkeyRonin

If anything I'd say it's worse now, thanks to this absolute stupidity:

2009: https://goo.gl/maps/o7GJCcAcXPWPRX6G9
2018: https://goo.gl/maps/rKL2bkVRQJPJSCP59

Wow, unbelievable

[SignalHillHiker]

Originally Posted by MonkeyRonin

If anything I'd say it's worse now, thanks to this absolute stupidity:

2009: https://goo.gl/maps/o7GJCcAcXPWPRX6G9
2018: https://goo.gl/maps/rKL2bkVRQJPJSCP59

Joey Smallwood would weep tears of joy seeing that progress. Boils my blood.

[905er]

It looks a hell of a lot cleaner, I'll give it that much, but holy shit they destroyed so much history. Those could have easily been preserved. Could have been something special