What do you think of this project?

  • Total voters
    61
Gronk! said:
A big problem with a Rec Room in the ICE District is that it will compete with The Banquet that's already there.
On the other hand, I think The Banquet may be on its last legs.
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I definitely feel like the Banquet is on it's lest legs. Rec Room is also better and has a more recognizable name, which I feel like would help A LOT, I believe.


David A said:
While I agree people who live in the suburbs are not going to come downtown to go to the Winners in City Centre, what is downtown also needs to serve people who live in the core or nearby, who often seem to be forgotten or overlooked in this discussion. Then we wonder why we have a hard time attracting people to live in an area with such limited retail and we also expect people who do live downtown will continue to happily trudge to WEM to go to decent stores like Simmons.

It was unfortunate that the theatre visioned for Ice District did not go ahead, it could have attracted more people to downtown as well as been an enhancement for those living there. I suppose fancy new downtown theatre complexes are just for other cities only and we will just have to continue to make do with the theatres in City Centre. A Rec Room downtown would be nice and there are several spaces available that could accommodate it.
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That was exactly my point. People in the core neighbourhoods (anything within a 10-15 min drive of downtown) would probably go there happily if the offerings were good enough to convince them that it's more convenient than going to WEM, or even Kingsway. It obviously also doesn't help that the social disorder discourages people from going there even if there were people willing to do so, but mostly, the absolute lack of options for basic things, like decent retail, a hardware store, etc., seems to be the biggest issue for me.
I lived in Winketowin for years, and I honestly would've preferred going DT for stuff than driving to WEM, or even Westmount or Kingsway, especially if I could turn the whole trip downtown into a full experience for shopping, entertainment and eating. I can't even count how many times I've though about how nice it would've been to go watch a movie Downtown, then stop somewhere to eat and hang out for a while, but the very thought of having to go through ECC to do that made me reconsider and go to WEM, for example.
 
Gronk! said:
A big problem with a Rec Room in the ICE District is that it will compete with The Banquet that's already there.
On the other hand, I think The Banquet may be on its last legs.
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Yes, I had thought of that. Heaven forbid there could be more than one of a certain thing downtown that might compete. Do most malls just limit themselves to one shoe or clothing store?

I feel having more choice and competition might actually attract more people to the area and perhaps force some existing places to up their game, although also not confident about Banquet in the long run.

Perhaps that is even more reason to try get something better in the area now.
 
This is the answer.

Downtown doesn't really have the stores or really even public services ie: K-9 school to make it a community. People want to live downtown really because they want convenience, things being close so they don't have to drive everywhere. Well in our downtown they get the downsides of living downtown and the downsides of living in the burbs all in one, that's not very appealing.

These prime commerical spaces being taken up by the same ol stuff is starting to become a issue city wide. Downtown it's all banks or just empty storefronts, the northeast it's shawarma, pizza, weed stores, liquor stores and daycares...
 
The banks are really, really not the problem here. There were actually around three times as many banks downtown several decades ago and it actually was more vibrant then with a lot of other retail.

Yes, I agree Ice District is not the best place for them. IMO, it seems a strange choice but if no one else was renting the space was the landlord going to say no to them?

However, I agree the mix of downtown commercial space use is very poor right now, we seem to have more than enough of some things and not enough of many other things.
 
NicolBolas said:
This is the answer.

Downtown doesn't really have the stores or really even public services ie: K-9 school to make it a community. People want to live downtown really because they want convenience, things being close so they don't have to drive everywhere. Well in our downtown they get the downsides of living downtown and the downsides of living in the burbs all in one, that's not very appealing.

These prime commerical spaces being taken up by the same ol stuff is starting to become a issue city wide. Downtown it's all banks or just empty storefronts, the northeast it's shawarma, pizza, weed stores, liquor stores and daycares...
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You forgot pharmacies, medical clinics and dental offices!
 
Does banquet offer free parking?

I wonder what parking utilization is on non game nights for the ice district parkades? I feel like they really need to draw from a wide region to succeed, meaning drivers.
 
Yes, the big expansion of the paid parking hours is at best inconsistent messaging. Parking in many areas of downtown also had a very low utilization in these times, so it really does not make sense.

Also the terrible new parking app seems to be messed up again and will not even allow the free 15 minute parking without putting in credit card info. There are a number of people who are not comfortable putting this info into a third party app and preferred paying cash or otherwise at the machines. So I am sure there has been some further decline in people coming downtown since the machines were removed.
 
David A said:
Also the terrible new parking app seems to be messed up again and will not even allow the free 15 minute parking without putting in credit card info. There are a number of people who are not comfortable putting this info into a third party app and preferred paying cash or otherwise at the machines. So I am sure there has been some further decline in people coming downtown since the machines were removed.
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Hasn’t this been fixed now? About a month ago I was able to get my free 15 mins without having to input any credit card info.
 
David A said:
Yes, the big expansion of the paid parking hours is at best inconsistent messaging. Parking in many areas of downtown also had a very low utilization in these times, so it really does not make sense.

Also the terrible new parking app seems to be messed up again and will not even allow the free 15 minute parking without putting in credit card info. There are a number of people who are not comfortable putting this info into a third party app and preferred paying cash or otherwise at the machines. So I am sure there has been some further decline in people coming downtown since the machines were removed.
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I agree, we have very counter intuitive policies in this city...
 
IanO said:
It's singlehandedly one of the stupidest decisions that was made.

You spend billions on infra and foundational items to bring people Downtown, upset people with parking outside of peak which pushes them to malls or Unity Square and all for what, a few hundred grand in parking revenue?

Bass Aackwards if you ask me.
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I did the math on my own experience. When we were in college we used to spend a lot of time at Hudson's, OTR, and a few other places. Cheap wing nights on Wednesdays and Friday nights just out and about crawling bars. I'd say we averages 1-2 nights per week and spent about 50-200 dollars per person in a group of 8-10 people.

I remember when that first ticket was had for parking outside my place and spending the night rather than drinking and driving home. It really pissed one person in our group off and the rest agreed it's probably just better to avoid downtown - myself included. So that was pretty much it for spending any night entertaining downtown for us.

If 1% of the downtown population experienced similar behavioral changes and had similar activities, assuming each person spends 100 dollars a night, once a week for half of the weeks in a year, in a group of 8, that's over 2 million dollars in economic activity lost in the local economy.

Anecdotal yes, but a good example that carries over to restaurant goers, shoppers, hikers, or even just people who wanna hang out in a park or Leg grounds.

The admin has shown though it cannot see the forest from the trees on financial matters however. I wouldn't be surprised if it's universally accepted at the city that these policies and rules are required and beneficial.
 
Stevey_G said:
I did the math on my own experience. When we were in college we used to spend a lot of time at Hudson's, OTR, and a few other places. Cheap wing nights on Wednesdays and Friday nights just out and about crawling bars. I'd say we averages 1-2 nights per week and spent about 50-200 dollars per person in a group of 8-10 people.

I remember when that first ticket was had for parking outside my place and spending the night rather than drinking and driving home. It really pissed one person in our group off and the rest agreed it's probably just better to avoid downtown - myself included. So that was pretty much it for spending any night entertaining downtown for us.

If 1% of the downtown population experienced similar behavioral changes and had similar activities, assuming each person spends 100 dollars a night, once a week for half of the weeks in a year, in a group of 8, that's over 2 million dollars in economic activity lost in the local economy.

Anecdotal yes, but a good example that carries over to restaurant goers, shoppers, hikers, or even just people who wanna hang out in a park or Leg grounds.

The admin has shown though it cannot see the forest from the trees on financial matters however. I wouldn't be surprised if it's universally accepted at the city that these policies and rules are required and beneficial.
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I also have a theory that there are no voices at the decision making table that can relate to going out until 3am.
 
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