08-08-2023, 02:01 PM
(08-08-2023, 12:56 PM)ac3r Wrote: The problem, though, is that if your downtown renaissance only consists of new restaurants opening and closing then that renaissance isn't going to last very long. Diversity is key to bringing life back to a neglected space and you need more than extremely unaffordable condos, restaurants and weed stores. I think we've been doing a great job here but it's 2023 now...I'd love to see some new businesses and more importantly cultural and civic spaces take a chance at opening downtown. It's still a place that turns into a ghost down after working hours. Unfortunately with the state of the economy after the pandemic, that's going to be hard since everyone is broke and the general outlook on things is quite bearish.
But those things will take time. It's easiest to pop up a little restaurant, more than anything else - downtown Kitchener likely doesn't have enough residents quite yet for larger box stores to gamble on opening new locations there, but I expect we'll eventually see a few move in, as more towers go up and there are more people downtown after-hours. I agree that need to take the pandemic into consideration - nearly every company was looking at how to pull back on expenditures between 2020-2022, and very few were actively expanding into new locations. We've only had about 2 full years of non-COVID LRT operation, and we know that there's thousands of housing units downtown on the way. We've seen the Gaukel Block officially turn from a closed street to a pedestrian-only street in the last couple of years, and the city is actively taking input on what amenities residents want to see in the core. That has to mean that some civic space change is coming. It's slower than we want, sure, but the city and its residents are only able to create so much change - the rest is in the hands of businesses who are/are not ready to invest in downtown.
Interestingly, I would anecdotally argue that the downtown restaurants are more likely to be open after working hours than during lunch. A lot of places that used to have lunch service pre-pandemic have cut back on it, and I was a little frustrated to see that the upcoming Don Julio Tacos will be running their hours 4:30pm-midnight/1am.