Well, there is what I would like to happen and then there is what I think will happen. Those are two very different scenarios. To me, it would be irresponsible to only have some utopian fantasy about what you would like and not have a plan B to deal with making the city the best it could be under the circumstances that it finds itself. Worse, it would be naive not to acknowledge that certain groups of people have much more of a say in shaping our city than others, and then plan for some kind of miracle world where those people aren't considered. You may be thinking that there is vast potential for urbanization and transformation in the inner suburbs, but the vast majority of people who have the power and wealth to make these kinds of decisions don't seem to share your view. I'm not sure transit is the magic bullet here, otherwise most of the Danforth east of Coxwell wouldn't be part of this decaying grey belt.
There's no need for a plan B if we confront the issue head on, rather than writing off an area. It doesn't matter at all what view the people who have the money and power are thinking right now about my view, that's subject to change. Moreover, a new generation may not tolerate the indifference of elites, and new elites will emerge who will have a different understanding of the issues at hand, especially in a city with so many immigrants. It happens time and time again in modern history. Maybe an uprising will be needed, a new '68, but I think that those with power and money are quite capable of figuring out how to make these places profitable before it comes to that. It's up to ordinary people to hold them accountable any way they can. The last thing we need is American-style inequality between the rich and poor most evident in cities with their written-off "ghettos"; that's not the Canadian legacy. The elites know a beautiful city in Philadelphia, their little part of it. The rest either know suburbs and vast stretches of decay. A city doesn't have to end up like that.
There is no magic bullet. Transit will work in some places well, in others it won't. But stagnation can't be an option. Renewal schemes may be necessary. Neoliberalism will fade as people realize their wages are stagnating and how much money it takes to bailout elites.
I'm not a right wing champion of the free market, but we should be pragmatic: if the rich want to build a megaproject that disproportionately benefits them, we should piggyback onto it and make some concessions that benefit a larger segment of society. That's why I cited the airport rail-link case: it's not going to be used by working class people, but if we ask higher governments to pony up just a little more dough to make it a regional rail line shared with the airport express, we have a good chance of making it a fairly equitable project. Projects for the well-heeled and the downtown elite go through regardless (notice how David Miller's attempt to quash the island airport bridge did nothing to stop the success and expansion of the island airport), so we have a good chance of actually getting this transport project completed over, say, a Finch west LRT or even the parts of Transit City that aren't on the chopping block.
I agree. That's not disturbing like a suggestion that the Union-Pearson link will be the only project built because the suburbs are decaying and those people don't really matter.
Woodbridge_Heights said:
However, is there an appetite in the inner suburbs for the type of urbanization that you speak of? We've experienced the push back from Yonge and Eg residents against the very redevelopment that would bring investement in transit and the like. A similar scenario has played out along Sheppard E where condos have followed the subway line. Will places like your Junction `hood be willing to accept whatever population increases (and the development that goes hand in hand) or will they cry that it will disrupt the very character that brought them there. Will Beach residents accept that a portion of the homes there will be torn down and replaced with 3-20 storey developements so that it can become more than what it is now.
Getting back to the Junction example. With the potential of an electrified regional rail, rail link to the airport, and (hopefully) Eglinton LRT (or whatever) the region should be ripe for massive reinvestment both in residental and maybe even office development. Are the current residents ready for that. Again sorry to pick on you but while I agree that the inner suburbs (which are largely low density) are ripe for reinvestment and redevelopment given improved amenities like transit, generally what is found is that residents resist the type of change that goes along with these new services. Make sense?
The problem with using The Junction as an example is that it has experienced the wave of revival of walkable downtown-style neighbourhoods. Gentrification is happening, for better or for worse. There are plenty of businesses along our main streets again. We already have some high density parts, but we also have the Stock Yards area to transform, and believe me, I salivate at the prospects. And so do the residents who came to the avenue study wanting condos with retail on the ground floor along St. Clair. Currently, more than half the land isn't used for anything but parking lots; the rest is big-box stores. We're talking huge tracts of land where thousands of people could live, and with plenty of opportunities for office and retail. Other urban neighbourhoods without Stock Yards of their own may see houses converted to condos, laneway housing, redevelopment of insignificant buildings for midrise buildings. At this point though, urban neighbourhoods don't seem to be the issue. Most are dense with good prospects for revitalization through subtle changes that probably won't affect their character.
Some inner suburban areas, on the other, may need transformation. As people living there see increased crime, general dreariness and little increase in property values, they're going to start to think that more radical action may be necessary. Hence, they may become more open to redevelopment of strip malls and suburban shopping centres, tower-in-the-park green spaces, and perhaps ambitious projects like the creation of new avenues by pulling down the houses whose backyards front arterials. The potential is absolutely incredible, and if there's anything that Modernist planning has taught us, is that the government things with cities that a lot of people can't even imagine. Back then, it was often negative, but we can learn from those mistakes and preserve the good and recreate what we observe that works in urban areas.