06-12-2015, 10:17 AM
(06-12-2015, 09:47 AM)BuildingScout Wrote:(06-09-2015, 01:55 PM)tomh009 Wrote: David's Gourmet was too early: only the Kaufman Lofts was occupied then, as I recall, and that's not enough to make a difference. Once City Centre and One Victoria are occupied (and Arrow Lofts already is), there will be a lot more people living in downtown Kitchener. (But there is already competition for David's in the core, too much so, I think for them to succeed.)
I'm afraid that even then it won't be enough, judging from other urban examples. We are going from 0 buildings to 1 (Kaufman) to 3 (Kaufman+One Victoria+City Centre) so while the increase sounds like a lot, density is still extremely low in that area as far as downtown urban districts are concerned. We will need the other City Centre tower as well as the two towers in One Hundred Victoria before we start seeing critical mass. The transit hub will help a lot as the fact that a trip to downtown will be a breeze away when the LRT is in place. Then we'll see a clear pickup.
This brings up my biggest issue with the LRT - "a trip downtown is a breeze away when the LRT is in place" ... for who?? Maybe a few folks who happen to live around the line, but not for most residents of the city (and by most I mean everyone in Wards 1, 2, 6, 7, and 8). I understand the planning rationale for creating a corridor that induces development (and a long-term shift in population from the suburbs to condos along that corridor), but I really wish the LRT as more useful for more existing residents - meaning it had lines that extended out into the existing suburbs to the east and west and made it easy for people to come downtown as a destination. I get it - that was way out of the budget - but presently I have a hard time seeing how the LRT would help me get anywhere I want to go (have you ever found yourself on King street saying "gee, I really wish I could hope on a train and get to uptown waterloo?") ... most of the city's residents (again, everyone in Ward 1, 2, 6, 7, and 8) live outside walking distance from the LRT, which means they will have to keep driving everywhere they want to go.
Since the province is now providing 100% funding for this sort of thing we should be lobbying for a Phase II LRT that adds loops from the outer areas into the core to augment the main line!