What does DTK need?

[nms]

The Old Ontario Facebook Group has shared a colour film (Facebook link) of the Downtown Kitchener pedestrian mall along King St.  It travels south starting at Water Street.  It's amazing what an ample amount of street trees and plantings on a sunny day can do to brighten a street.

[ac3r]

I think the University of Waterloo has a very high quality (4K?) version of that too.

It would be nice to see a pedestrian mall again but you will break people's brains if you propose it. There was a thread on Reddit last month or something about pedestrianizing King Street and nearly everybody said it would be a horrible idea and cause countless businesses to fail due to lack of parking...even though there are only a small handful of free 2 hour street parking spaces on King.

[Rainrider22]

Those same people who say it is a horrible idea, do they even go downtown. I think it is an awesome idea and I bet the businesses would do better...

[neonjoe]

King St should have been a transit mall, but that ship has sailed.

[panamaniac]

King St should have been a transit mall, but that ship has sailed.

Ottawa would suggest it's not a great idea.

[danbrotherston]

King St should have been a transit mall, but that ship has sailed.

Ottawa would suggest it's not a great idea.

How so? Ottawa does not have one. Calgary does, and AFAIK Calgary's is....fine?

FWIW...it should have been a transit mall, but it doesn't matter now, it being a pedestrian plaza is even better for King St. but worse for the city.

[panamaniac]

Ottawa would suggest it's not a great idea.

How so? Ottawa does not have one. Calgary does, and AFAIK Calgary's is....fine?

FWIW...it should have been a transit mall, but it doesn't matter now, it being a pedestrian plaza is even better for King St. but worse for the city.

Ottawa got rid of theirs (Rideau St).  It was a mess.

[ijmorlan]

How so? Ottawa does not have one. Calgary does, and AFAIK Calgary's is....fine?

FWIW...it should have been a transit mall, but it doesn't matter now, it being a pedestrian plaza is even better for King St. but worse for the city.

Ottawa got rid of theirs (Rideau St).  It was a mess.

It was a bus transit mall. Very different from having a mostly pedestrian space with a few LRTs gliding through every few minutes. It felt like a busy 4-lane road even though it was all buses.

Also the sidewalk was mostly enclosed, which I cannot believe is by itself responsible for the problems (although I’m not even completely clear on what the problems were, even having lived there), but it is a characteristic that needs to be noted and certainly was an important feature of the way the street was.

King St. already has very little parking and not much motor-vehicle-moving capacity. Shifting those few parking spaces into the always-available parking garages and the motor vehicles onto parallel streets (one block in each direction — Charles and Duke) would remove very few people from the street, but allow many more on it as pedestrians and cyclists.

[dtkvictim]

King St. already has very little parking and not much motor-vehicle-moving capacity. Shifting those few parking spaces into the always-available parking garages and the motor vehicles onto parallel streets (one block in each direction — Charles and Duke) would remove very few people from the street, but allow many more on it as pedestrians and cyclists.

I'm curious how the rise of food delivery services could impact the future of King St. There a very few non-restaurant businesses on King St (which is an issue itself; would you go to Fairview mall if it was 90% restaurants?), and the restaurants seem to have become highly dependent on food delivery services. I don't really know what closing King St to the couriers would do to them. Would they start declining orders from King St? Would fees for these restaurants go up? I don't think any added pedestrians from removing cars would come anywhere close to making up lost business if food delivery is significantly impacted, especially because I don't think cars are particularly big reason that people avoid downtown.

And don't get me wrong, I hate this current situation, especially with the amount of "perpendicular parking" (parking straight across the sidewalk) and double parking that I see. And I don't think it's healthy long term for the businesses or the area.

[ac3r]

Those same people who say it is a horrible idea, do they even go downtown.  I think it is an awesome idea and I bet the businesses would do better...

Most of them said they didn't due to lack of parking. When I pointed out that there are thousands of parking spots downtown they argued that the parking lots are too far, that parking should be free and that apparently downtown is a dangerous no-go-zone which is news to me. It's hard to argue with carbrained idiots so I usually just remind them that that they have brain damage due to sitting in traffic all day.

[ijmorlan]

Those same people who say it is a horrible idea, do they even go downtown.  I think it is an awesome idea and I bet the businesses would do better...

Most of them said they didn't due to lack of parking. When I pointed out that there are thousands of parking spots downtown they argued that the parking lots are too far, that parking should be free and that apparently downtown is a dangerous no-go-zone which is news to me. It's hard to argue with carbrained idiots so I usually just remind them that that they have brain damage due to sitting in traffic all day.

To be fair, the parking pricing policies are bonkers. Some spaces are free even though they’re constantly full, while many parking lots are still charging even at times when everything is empty.

But yeah, according to some people if there aren’t an infinite number of free parking spots in front of each business, there isn’t enough parking.

[nms]

I would be interested to know what the feedback from that first experience was. Based on some of the shots in the film, it looked like a Centennial project (eg 1967) or perhaps it received federal funding which is why the Centennial logo was so prominent.

I would also be interested to know how the population that lived within a 15-20 minute walk of that stretch of King St has changed. Families in general were larger then so a single family home (or 2-3 bedroom apartment above a shop, or in a nearby building) might have 2 to 3 (or 4 or 5) times the number of people living in each residence than does today. Even with the increase in higher-density living, has the overall population increased, or is it just now recovering? Also, 50 years ago, were people more likely to be encouraged to go out in an evening or weekend because there were less options for entertainment (or work) at home? If everything can be delivered to your door, there is little reason to go out. Smaller retail shops (or even larger department stores) can't sustain themselves on limited foot traffic. Even the University area which has much higher foot traffic (and stretching up and down King St from Columbia to William if you want to include areas where the student demographic might go) is very heavily skewed to restaurants and/or bars & pubs (plus barbers and pot shops).

[panamaniac]

I would be interested to know what the feedback from that first experience was.  Based on some of the shots in the film, it looked like a Centennial project (eg 1967) or perhaps it received federal funding which is why the Centennial logo was so prominent.

I would also be interested to know how the population that lived within a 15-20 minute walk of that stretch of King St has changed.  Families in general were larger then so a single family home (or 2-3 bedroom apartment above a shop, or in a nearby building) might have 2 to 3 (or 4 or 5) times the number of people living in each residence than does today. Even with the increase in higher-density living, has the overall population increased, or is it just now recovering? Also, 50 years ago, were people more likely to be encouraged to go out in an evening or weekend because there were less options for entertainment (or work) at home? If everything can be delivered to your door, there is little reason to go out. Smaller retail shops (or even larger department stores) can't sustain themselves on limited foot traffic.  Even the University area which has much higher foot traffic (and stretching up and down King St from Columbia to William if you want to include areas where the student demographic might go) is very heavily skewed to restaurants and/or bars & pubs (plus barbers and pot shops).

I'm old enough to remember when there were four movie houses in DTK, a bowling alley, a number of bars, etc - it was busy at night, especially on weekends.  Add in the teenagers/twenty somethings cruising up and down King St and it could feel very lively indeed in the evening.

[tomh009]

There a very few non-restaurant businesses on King St

From memory, and between Queen and Victoria (excluding restaurants and cafes): there are at least two dollar stores, five bars, three night clubs, a barber shop, a shoe store, condo sales/rentals, a pharmacy, four banks, a museum, a thrift shop, a concert hall, an LCBO, a beer store, a grocery store, a shoe store, a clothing/yoga store, two used book stores, and a bunch of cannabis shops. Not that I wouldn't like to see more, but it's not 90% restaurants.

I'm old enough to remember when there were four movie houses in DTK, a bowling alley, a number of bars, etc - it was busy at night, especially on weekends.  Add in the teenagers/twenty somethings cruising up and down King St and it could feel very lively indeed in the evening.

No movies but I do count five bars between Queen and Victoria: Vineology, AOK, Bobby O'Brien's, the Taco bar and Half Moon (maybe Mehman Nawazi should also count?).

[danbrotherston]

How so? Ottawa does not have one. Calgary does, and AFAIK Calgary's is....fine?

FWIW...it should have been a transit mall, but it doesn't matter now, it being a pedestrian plaza is even better for King St. but worse for the city.

Ottawa got rid of theirs (Rideau St).  It was a mess.

So, I didn't even know about this...but it was built in the 70s and 80s right?

Frankly, I can't even find any pictures of it, but given how bad urban planning was in that era, I don't think there's a lot that we can learn about the concept other than that it is possible to do badly.

Calgary is a much much better analogue. It runs trains, not buses and it's more recent.

But in either case, it's totally irrelevant, the real comparison is more like the open streets in Ottawa (or like, every European city centre).