IanO
Superstar
EDW 2025: Increasing the Downtown Residential Population: Role of Design
Boosting downtown Edmonton: Panel explores how housing, design & policy can drive growth beyond office workers.
www.eventbrite.ca
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- Thread starter Daveography
- Start date
www.eventbrite.ca
IanO
Superstar
Edmonton’s downtown is struggling — and remote work is not the only culprit
The fate of Jasper Avenue reflects a larger challenge: if Canadians want thriving city centres, they must choose to support them. They say a picture is worth a thousand words.
www.linkedin.com
David A
Senior Member
I keep on saying that here in Edmonton there also was an economic slowdown or downturn from about 2015 to 2021 that hit our downtown hard, so yes it wasn't just work from home or COVID.Edmonton’s downtown is struggling — and remote work is not the only culprit
The fate of Jasper Avenue reflects a larger challenge: if Canadians want thriving city centres, they must choose to support them. They say a picture is worth a thousand words.
The article also refers to Ottawa, which I think didn't have that downturn, but there is talk now of reducing the Federal public service so they may be affected by that in the future similar to how we were in the past.
Of course, there were also public safety and disorder issues that happened not just here but in other cities around the time of COVID which have also hurt our and other downtowns a lot.
Gronk!
Senior Member
A brief history of Audreys Books
edmonton.taproot.news
A moment in history: Oct. 24, 1977
On this day in 1977, Audreys Books was hosting book signings by authors Pierre Burton and Helen Richardson.
edmonton.taproot.news
inclusion
Active Member
One of the commenters on that article said the following:
All so true. I've supported more places in my neighbourhood during and after the pandemic than I ever did downtown, many of which are better than the options downtown.
I'd also rather go to Rge Rd than many of the options downtown. We just don't have a great culinary scene in general, let alone downtown.
ECC has been a slow march downward that started well before the pandemic. The pandemic was just the final nail so to speak. Whatever the other side looks like for ECC, I hope the new owners consider how to enable more people living downtown, which will either mean conversion and/or demolition or both. Just as it took decades for ECC to die, its going to be a while before it recovers, too. Anyone hoping for a fix tomorrow or even next year is a hopeless optimist. While I hope we have optimists in our downtown community, I also hope we have realists that see the long term big picture of where downtown needs to go and how to get there. Ending hybrid in the public sector isn't going to do it and if we think that is the solution, then yikes, our downtown is in for a rough ride for years to come.
The_Cat
Senior Member
I think downtown needs a better argument for getting people downtown other than "because we're downtown". One former small business had troubles with open drug use nearby, despite their best efforts to serve customers.
IanO
Superstar
For me it's about the heart of your city argument, what WE want to communicate to investors, how we welcome tourists and what we desire to become as a city.
thommyjo
Senior Member
The WFH argument shouldn’t be about downtown vibrancy. It should be about productivity for companies and organizations. Some can effectively manage that remotely, others benefit from in person.
For every story of returb to office just being zoom calls in cubicles, I can also speak to WFH friends that are on socials, Netflix, etc all day.
And this doesn’t speak to all government employees, but it’s my friends in GOA, WCB, COE jobs that most proudly share this while friends at EY, Jobber, and Law firms certainly aren’t getting away with that stuff.
I think it’s the nature of the work. If outcomes and success are easily tracked, or individual contributions are easily seen on company success, then it’s easier to be remote. But larger orgs and more bureaucracy help bad employees hide. Being in office at least forces them to hate their job if they’re going to be lazy.
You only have to sit in university lectures to watch kids on laptops to understand what low accountability, digital distraction, and non motivated people leads to.
For every story of returb to office just being zoom calls in cubicles, I can also speak to WFH friends that are on socials, Netflix, etc all day.
And this doesn’t speak to all government employees, but it’s my friends in GOA, WCB, COE jobs that most proudly share this while friends at EY, Jobber, and Law firms certainly aren’t getting away with that stuff.
I think it’s the nature of the work. If outcomes and success are easily tracked, or individual contributions are easily seen on company success, then it’s easier to be remote. But larger orgs and more bureaucracy help bad employees hide. Being in office at least forces them to hate their job if they’re going to be lazy.
You only have to sit in university lectures to watch kids on laptops to understand what low accountability, digital distraction, and non motivated people leads to.
CplKlinger
Senior Member
Imagine how transformational it could be if AB put the tens of millions of dollars this will cost (at minimum) toward the student housing accelerator and other residential incentives, and/or incentives to get more private businesses moving to downtown. It's big bucks we're talking here, so I think it's a shame to spend all of it just to get back to where we were, instead of where we could be.
inclusion
Active Member
I mean, lazy people were lazy before WFH was ever a thing. They sat on their cell phone or took longer breaks, or whatever. Hell, there used to be a temp we had that would watch Netflix all day. I know plenty of lazy people in tech who do the bare minimum. Perhaps they are efficient with their time when they are working, but they only do what is required, then do whatever they want that isn't work-related. It is a common misconception and generalization that only the public sector employs lazy workers. I assume you work in the private sector for a company that doesn't allow you to be lazy? That is good that they do that, but it's a problem across the board.
Gus Haynes
Active Member
100% this. There are certain types of jobs that translate well to WFH, and others that don't. I know in my particular field, I actually get better productivity out of my WFH employees because they are more likely to put in extra time on the job (time that they would have spent commuting!).
Coprolite
Active Member
Ehhh. A lot of workers just really benefit in terms of productivity from being left alone, and being in an environment that is actually tailored to work rather than one which is tailored to excessive levels of supervision.
Gus Haynes
Active Member
Well, that too. There are really a lot of reasons why home environments are better than office ones: better nutrition, better bathroom access, fewer distractions (arguable, I acknowledge!), in addition to the massive time savings, of course.
YEG imagineer
Active Member
Ian, we do a mediocre job at best of welcoming tourists or even newcomers to our city. We don’t even have a tourist information office downtown anymore because money saved was going to be spent on more online campaigns to attract more tourists. But that at a starting point is a failure of inviting people over and having your front door locked when they arrive.
Coprolite
Active Member
Yeah, and when it comes to those time savings, you're going to be benefitting from that whether they use that time for more work or not (I would definitely always discourage anyone under me from getting into the habit of using that commute time to do more work). If your people have more time to take care of their lives, sleep, eat right, get some exercise, and they're not as stressed, they're going to give more in the hours when they are producing.
(Edit: Though in my case for one of the projects I've been working on, my client would've admittedly burned at least a work day in limited productivity travel time on their dime to have me come to their admittedly very cool office/lab/nerd farm, in addition to a bunch of other logistics.)
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