Market Square

[ijmorlan]

Ok connecting all of downtown kitchener with conditioned space is a fancy and not a good one. Th fact that Toronto and new York's under ground walkway works is irrelevant for downtown kitchener to punch holes in the sides of buildings to build one. They have a signifcant population that warrants it.Also I am pretty sure the retail number you are thinking of is because the Eaton centre is technically part of the PATH system. Winnipeg has the system a little because they have the population to warrant it, but mostly because it is freezing and windy in that city. They are also not made up of 3 "downtowns" and 2 "villages".

Skywalk have a lot of urban planning issues as well:
- accessibility is a big one. 2 flights of stairs or elevators at every exit 
- less pedestrian on the streets make drivers more likely to drive faster
- less people on the streets make the streets more dangerous, over pass themselves are more dangerous as there are less possible routes of escape
-less people/ more dangerous streets will encourage less retail investment in the core. 

Skybridge networks are an Idea dreamed up by GM in the 30's to separate pedestrian from the streets so that cars could rule the urban environment. They are not a good idea for a city the size of kitchener. There is no chance a network you describe will ever happen, so why have 2 useless ugly reminders of the poor urban planning that happened in this city during the 60-80's that basically destroyed downtown.

Um, it’s freezing and windy here too, and sometimes rainy in the summer. These sorts of networks make sense in places like San Diego too, although whether they’re enclosed and climate-controlled is much less relevant. How many downtowns are in the Region is irrelevant; the question is what would make any area (not just downtowns) easier to get around on foot.

Accessibility is actually improved by a properly-designed skybridge network. Instead of having to navigate road crossings, people can just walk around in an enclosed space. Any building with a skybridge will be the sort of building that has elevators, so wheelchair accessibility is there. Of course, nobody would use an elevator at each end of each bridge; instead, just walk from one bridge to the next on one level. As with anything, the design has to be proper. In particular, all bridges connecting to a building should, in general, be on the same floor, and preferably on exactly the same level. Where the exact same level isn’t possible, gentle ramps should be used. Only as a last resort (probably related to significant ground level changes) should a required elevator be used to get from the level of one bridge to another. Of course, in this situation, the regular sidewalk will be problematic for wheelchair users due to grade.

Road design can take care of driving speed.

The sidewalks would still have some people on them. I don’t buy that moving half the pedestrian traffic of King St. up a level would change the safety of King St. As to the bridges themselves, they are interior spaces presumably monitored by security.

As to who supposedly invented the idea, I don’t care who came up with the idea. Skybridges could have been an obsession of Hitler and I would still believe in the benefits of roofs and walls to keep out the weather.

In any case, it’s only in bizarro world that separating pedestrian and motor vehicle traffic could be viewed as anti-pedestrian.

What we need is less ideology and more sensible design, and in a dense area it’s weird to insist that everybody always go outside to get from one building to another.

As to my idea, I agree as suggested it is unlikely to happen, but the reason is that people don’t even look for opportunities to link buildings up. We don’t even have porticos as a standard feature. I actually agree that skybridges and tunnels to have to be designed carefully to fit into the non-interior parts of the city and to avoid some of the potential problems that you bring up (but mistakenly associate with the whole concept of being able to get places indoors, rather than with specific designs), but porticos are an unquestionable benefit.

One more suggestion, which is irrelevant to existing downtowns but absolutely could have been done in a place like what is now downtown Mississauga: if, instead of providing a skybridge network as an alternative to street level, we decide that pedestrian street level is 5m above motor vehicle street level, I think most of your objections vanish entirely. At that point, you have two levels: on one level, cars and other motor vehicles travel, while on another, people walk and bicycle around. Then it doesn’t matter if cars travel too fast for compatibility with pedestrian traffic because there are none. It doesn’t matter if restaurants, for example, can survive on the motor vehicle level, because in effect that’s the basement and we don’t complain that basement restaurants have trouble surviving elsewhere.