21 Weber St W + 149-151 Ontario St N | 20 fl | Proposed

[dtkvictim]

That solves the problem of the heritage building...  (hopefully it actually is okay, but sometimes these things look a bit fishy)

Given that the building is "abandoned" (that phrasing feels weird to me, but whatever) and yet two individuals were injured, it was probably just homeless individuals and not suspicious in the sense you are thinking.

People might be shocked at the sheer number of homeless fires happening downtown, as just about none of them ever make the news. I've lost count of the number set on the property I live on, or one of the immediately neighbouring properties. Thankfully all of these have been caught very early, but they are frequent enough that I sometimes have nightmares about them as I fall asleep.

[ijmorlan]

People might be shocked at the sheer number of homeless fires happening downtown, as just about none of them ever make the news. I've lost count of the number set on the property I live on, or one of the immediately neighbouring properties. Thankfully all of these have been caught very early, but they are frequent enough that I sometimes have nightmares about them as I fall asleep.

This makes me wonder, for some homeless, what is actually needed to keep them in safer accommodations.

Somebody who doesn’t understand that you can’t have a campfire inside a building is not somebody who is capable of living independently.

[plam]

People might be shocked at the sheer number of homeless fires happening downtown, as just about none of them ever make the news. I've lost count of the number set on the property I live on, or one of the immediately neighbouring properties. Thankfully all of these have been caught very early, but they are frequent enough that I sometimes have nightmares about them as I fall asleep.

This makes me wonder, for some homeless, what is actually needed to keep them in safer accommodations.

Somebody who doesn’t understand that you can’t have a campfire inside a building is not somebody who is capable of living independently.

There are no easy solutions, but some of these people likely wouldn't start a fire if they weren't cold. It is really tiring to be cold all the time, and I don't even like fires.

PS speaking of fires it's also extremely common to have people lighting fires outside where they really shouldn't be lighting fires (because of conservation, or fire hazard, or...)

[dtkvictim]

This makes me wonder, for some homeless, what is actually needed to keep them in safer accommodations.

Somebody who doesn’t understand that you can’t have a campfire inside a building is not somebody who is capable of living independently.

There are no easy solutions, but some of these people likely wouldn't start a fire if they weren't cold. It is really tiring to be cold all the time, and I don't even like fires.

PS speaking of fires it's also extremely common to have people lighting fires outside where they really shouldn't be lighting fires (because of conservation, or fire hazard, or...)

That may well be the case here, since it's still cold out. I'm empathetic in those cases, but it's still often done in a reckless manner.

But at least in the cases I'm familiar with, nearly all have been in warm or even hot summer weather. One I watched out my window mid-summer: A fellow walked up with some books, crouched over and lit them on fire. Under a wooden structure, in dry weeds, and next to a grease disposal bin... He just stood back to watch them burn, and then took off once he started getting covered in fire extinguisher chemicals.

[ijmorlan]

This makes me wonder, for some homeless, what is actually needed to keep them in safer accommodations.

Somebody who doesn’t understand that you can’t have a campfire inside a building is not somebody who is capable of living independently.

There are no easy solutions, but some of these people likely wouldn't start a fire if they weren't cold. It is really tiring to be cold all the time, and I don't even like fires.

PS speaking of fires it's also extremely common to have people lighting fires outside where they really shouldn't be lighting fires (because of conservation, or fire hazard, or...)

A fire outside where they shouldn’t, I understand, and a desperate but capable person might do that. I know I would, if I really needed to. I have enough imagination to know that there isn’t really much making me different from somebody who is more likely to be homeless.

A fire inside — doesn’t matter how cold they are, there is something wrong with their mental equipment. And I don’t mean to denigrate them by saying that; I’m just saying they probably can’t cook for themselves in a proper kitchen either and keep it clean (by which I don’t mean clean as such, just not filthy to the point of becoming a hazard).

And so my real point is that hearing about these fires makes me wonder if we need something different. I’m sure some homeless can be helped by making lower-cost accommodation available. But others need more of a care setting. I don’t mean go back to the old lock-them-up days of mental hospitals, but I don’t think low-cost housing will be enough for all the homeless.

[plam]

And so my real point is that hearing about these fires makes me wonder if we need something different. I’m sure some homeless can be helped by making lower-cost accommodation available. But others need more of a care setting. I don’t mean go back to the old lock-them-up days of mental hospitals, but I don’t think low-cost housing will be enough for all the homeless.

Providing, say, free housing isn't going to fix all the problems. I think that's a bit of a straw man. I think it would help many people, but that approach will definitely not help all people.

I do also think that the evidence shows that an approach that just provides housing first, rather than trying to make people "housing-ready", works better and is overall cheaper, even if one can point at obvious failures sometimes.

[ac3r]

Just providing homes is definitely not the complete answer and we can see that all around the world. I was recently watching a video that featured the documentary filmmaker Mark Laita - better known as the person behind Soft White Underbelly - where they explore Skid Row in Los Angeles. At the start of the video, he prefaces it by saying that the problems that cause homelessness are so multifaceted. He states that while the city has provided people homes, that is often not enough because there are problems that cause and catalyze homelessness. You peel back each layer and you understand that it isn't simply a lack of housing, but it's economic, educational, drug addiction, mental illness, trauma, criminal records and so on.

To fix homelessness you need to solve these kind of issues but the issue is that it is extremely expensive and time consuming to throw homeless people with drug addictions and mental illness etc problems into treatment...and in many cases it's not even successful because they've been broken for so long. Simply providing them homes is often not sufficient. Sure, it keeps them off the streets for a bit, but the problems that got them there in the first place still exist, so they usually don't improve. Homelessness is most often a symptom of a deeper, more complex problem and until we spend the resources on trying to help these people fix themselves, we're fighting a Sisyphean battle.

[tomh009]

The current consensus is that you provide housing to people first -- and then you help solve their problems. Because requiring people to solve their problems in order to get accepted into housing has been shown time and time again not to work.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Housing_First

From the Wikipedia article (references are there if anyone is interested):

"(...) Housing First approach resulted in a 66 percent decline in days hospitalized (from one year prior to intake compared to one year in the program), a 38 percent decline in times in emergency room, a 41 percent decline in EMS events, a 79 percent decline in days in jail and a 30 percent decline in police interactions."

[ijmorlan]

The current consensus is that you provide housing to people first -- and then you help solve their problems. Because requiring people to solve their problems in order to get accepted into housing has been shown time and time again not to work.

That makes a lot of sense. I have enough trouble solving my (relatively minor) problems; but I’m not worrying about where I’m sleeping tonight. I can’t imagine trying to solve a really big problem while simultaneously worrying every single day about what I will use as a bed. Or rather, I can imagine it, and just imagining it is frightening enough.

[danbrotherston]

https://www.therecord.com/news/waterloo-region/2022/08/02/kitcheners-heritage-committee-recommends-refusal-of-permit-for-proposed-civic-centre-highrise.html

22 Weber St. W.

I'm not sure if it's this development or not...but in a move that surprises no one...the heritage committee recommends conserving a parking lot--obviously the heart of our community.

Edit. Woops, wrong thread. I searched for Weber but for some reason the other thread didn’t appear.

[Lebronj23]

I think this is the thread

https://www.waterlooregionconnected.com/...611&page=2

[panamaniac]

Is it normal that the OLT and City approval process seem to be running in parallel?

[Lebronj23]

Found this in a heritage assessment coming to council soon. A 27 storey pile of garbage.

https://pub-kitchener.escribemeetings.co...entId=8356

[attachment=8428]

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[KaiserWilhelmsBust]

Found this in a heritage assessment coming to council soon. A 27 storey pile of garbage.

https://pub-kitchener.escribemeetings.co...entId=8356

Someone make the "the ____ we have at home" for this compared to Q condos

[ac3r]

That's a pretty old rendering. The final design proposal has a lot more glass including some enclosing the heritage building. The tower itself is also now a lot more minimalist looking with better looking glass work.