
1. A walkable city – New York is the ultimate walkable city. Cars are a decidedly second-tier way of getting around unless you have a really good reason to use one. Pedestrians rule at crosswalks, and the city has done a fantastic job of supporting this through the creation of many public seating areas (to rest your tired feet), supporting distinctive neighbourhoods that can only truly be enjoyed on foot, and maintaining a fast and efficient subway system that makes it easy to zip across town when you need to go somewhere fast. In New West, we already enjoy a culture of walking but we could do more to make it more pleasant. I would like to see more cafe tables (public and private), more treed boulevards (especially in lower apartment blocks where green space and shade is lacking), and a pedestrians-first traffic policy.
A walkable city is a terrible idea. Downtown Vancouver used to be pleasant to stroll, but since they started getting people out of their cars and onto the sidewalks, it’s just unbearable. Uptown New West is already pretty clogged with the walking undead….go past the library on any given day to see what I’m talking about.
I feel like I’m beating the drum to death, but we have a perfect opportunity to have a Highline Park in New Westminster on the parkade. As most people know city council refuses to reconsider the demolition of the a large piece of usable space.
New Westminster has a golden opportunity to have its own Highline Park – with small retail and food offering connected by small raised walkways on the parkade. Unfortunately, after much consultation, all of it before the development of the Highline Park, city council is ignoring the possibilities and going ahead with the demolition of the parkade.
Re he Parkade / Highline park commentary, I see where you are coming from but…
The Pier Park IS the New West equivalent of the HighLine park. That was essentially the intent and what all of the accolades and awards for this development refer to.
Sure, we could have a bunch more “highline park” built but it would be a bit redundant as it is immediately adjacent to the just-completed riverside Pier Park. Crucially, it would still leave a (potentially) very vibrant street-level retail and entertainment area buried, dirty and ill used.
Just my opinion of course. I think the parkade should go.