Monthly Archives: March 2011

Somerset dog-and-pony show — new priorities

The City held an open house last evening to explain to the public what is being done on Somerset Street this year. It was a mix of old news — the section west of Preston remains  unchanged from last year except for some details — and new news for the section east of Preston up to Booth.

The new stuff comes in several formats. The consultants and city staff had all the public consultation team members on hand, with name badges, to explain what is proposed and to tell their neighbours about some of the tradeoffs that were made to get to these results. This results in a less “top-down” message and reflects the reality of the community input. Of course, this messaging won’t work unless there was genuine community involvement; the simple we-are-talking-to-you-because-we-have-to approach still used by many city teams cannot plaster a veneer over the top.

The Somerset consulting team from Delcan is working on Rideau Street (east of Dalhousie St to Cummings Bridge) next. They are continuing with their new approach. Instead of having separate technical advisory committees (the engineers, traffic boffins, sewer geeks) and a public advisory committee (those neighborhood keeners who want an intelligent city streetscape, and a BIA committee, they are rolling all of them into one advisory group. This will force a wider variety of players to understand other competing demands for the scarce city space. Should be fun.

Also new at the Somerset meeting were information boards that offered real information with some meat in it. For example, for cyclists the sharrows and bike lanes were shown with detailed measurements:

The Somerset project is the first one in the City to try planting trees on a bridge. The road rises up to cross over the O-Train cut. The lengthy approach from the east side results in a barren walking experience, cut off from buildings and exposed to winds and sun. To moderate this, the outside traffic lanes are being given over to a painted bike lane, and a series of concrete planters about 30′ long and 24″ high which will be irrigated to supply water to hardy locust trees. If this scheme works, it will make it much more attractive to walk to school or to the Plant Rec Centre:

Rather than selecting an “off-the-shelf” bench for the Chinatown portion, the team chose a plain steel back bench that will laser-cut with a decorative pattern. The designs on the bench backs — created by a local graphic designer — will be Asian-themed to reinforce the Chinatown Royal Arch designs and colours:

There will be laser-cut garbage receptacles and some granite inserts in the sidewalk with figures from the Asian zodiac.

Construction begins April 18th. The section west of Preston should be completed and landscaped by November; the area east of Preston in Chinatown will see major construction done this year and finishing landscape touches in spring 2012.

OC Transpo planner grills audience

I went to City Hall last night to learn some more about the proposed bus route changes. There was a huge, vocal, and annoyed turnout. The questioning for Mercier and Deans and Transpo staff was tough. But half way through something totally dramatic happened. Unfortunately the Main Stream Media reporters had all got enough “angry mob” clips and gone home; leaving only bloggers to cover what really transpired. Read closely now, this has been a closely guarded story until now, when I share it with you alone.

Pull your chair up closer to the screen, you’re still too far away. This is hot stuff. Shhh.

Just after the MSM had left the meeting to pop a few beers down on Elgin Street strip (taking their fleet of vans instead of the No 5), one lone OC Transpo planner-type guy stood up, raised his arms, and called for silence.

“My name is Walter Mitty, and the rest of this meeting is going to be different.” Gesturing to colleagues near the exits, he said “Lock the doors. Nobody leaves. Now I am going to question the audience.”

And in the same aggrieved tone of voice as the audience had earlier lambasted city officials, with the same wicked spins and curves in non-questions obviously gleaned from hundreds of hours — no ten-thousand hours! — of watching Question Period, he began to question the audience:

“You there, who thinks there is a requirement for single-vehicle no-transfer bus service between ANY two points anywhere in the city … give me your bank account number so we can buy the buses we need for that level or service.

You there, who complains residents can’t be expected to walk even a block to a bus route because your street doesn’t have a sidewalk … OK, new city policy as of now is for every street to have sidewalks … on both sides! How will you ensure no one complains about the cost of the sidewalks, the snowplowing, the “change” that this will bring to your bucolic suburban idyl?

You there, who chose to live on a tiny crescent out at Merivale and Hwy 16, so you can be far from the city and have only flatulent cows for neighbours,  why do you think is the public responsibility to provide direct no-transfer bus service from your isolated blot to every other urban job site, hospital, church, community centre, or shopping centre, seven days a week and late at night too?

You there who says one transfer is too much, how about having half transfers?

You there, who says a ten minute walk is too far to go to the bus, how about we supply everyone with an electric wheelchair or scooter? No? then what should the new standard be — 200m? 100m? a bus stop in front of every house?

You there, who thinks that it is OC Transpo policy that only children of those who drive are to be allowed to go to the aviation or other museums (because we don’t provide bus service to single isolated destinations sought out by tens of people per Sunday), would you prefer that we go the Smithsonian route, whereby we mandate the Museum is Free but parking is $14? (and NO CHEATING, sidewalks will not be provided nor will wide shoulders on the road).

You who claims you never listen to the radio, watch TV, read the paper (even the ones that are frickin’ free) or even read any of the marvellous high quality bloggers in Duckburg, because you claim that you never heard of the proposed changes until yesterday … thank you for volunteering to go out and tell every one of the 790,000 (very)odd people in Ottawa face-to-face that some bus routes are changing. Come back with proof you met every resident and that everyone understood your message.

You there, who thinks it should be mandatory for every councillor and bureaucrat to take OC Transpo for every trip every day so they know what its like, please come up with an effective communication strategy for the hundreds of thousands of drivers who will feel aggrieved that councillors never understand the road problems because they never drive …

You there, who insists Jim Watson does not care about Ottawa’s poorest and most vulnerable, you will ride the bus every day with said people and yet never stand beside the employed, the self-supporting, the confident, any students, or anyone else except said minority.

You there, who insists our quiet residential streets will be littered with the corpses of the elderly who were fasting before their blood work and expired before they could hike 200m to the closest bus stop … you are assigned a wooden cart and bell, and sentenced to cry out “bring out your dead” for all eternity.

You there, who thinks it is dumb to run buses in both directions down your downtown street because it might disturb you, please meet that lady over there is who thinks it is dumb to run buses in opposite directions on parallel one-way streets, and we will grant an extended transfer slip to the survivor.

You there, for claiming a “large proportion” of 600 church attendees at Bethel Pentecostal Church get there by No3, you will stand at the bus stop by the church and put in two (2) tickets for every empty seat on that bus all day Sunday, and no you may not claim bankruptcy.

You there, who wants a bus route in every low density spread-out crescent-infested suburban neighborhood, agree to permit a 35 storey high rise to be built on every block on a 60′ lot to increase the density enough to justify a bus service, before we put the bus service back?

You there, who insists that it is a public responsibility to provide no-transfer bus service from some obscure suburban entertainment arcade your daughter has a part-time job at, directly to your house, kindly agree to pay 500% more taxes so that every teen can have the same level of service (surely that is only equitable?) just in case they might wish to avail themselves of the opportunity to earn some pocket money?

You there, who complains that your neighborhood has a school on one street, a community centre on another, a mall elsewhere, a church somewhere, and none of them on a main street, kindly agree that we bulldoze over this suburban spaghetti of streets and put all destinations on main streets instead of where the space is cheapest or easiest for the motorist-elite to get to? Hurry up, we got years of bad suburban planning to undo.

And finally, for the guy over there who claims service changes are designed to get drinkers from entertainment districts into cars, please go out and tell that to the MSM drinking on Elgin Street before they file their stories! Stories which are full of lies and don’t reflect the real world wherein the entire transportation system is designed around me, my family, and my convenience, at modest cost, no noise or obtrusiveness, or else my name isn’t Walter Mitty.

The effacing Bridge

 

This story originally appeared as my WalkSpace column at Spacing Ottawa: http://spacingottawa.ca/2011/03/28/walkspace-we-can-do-better-than-a-self-effacing-bridge/

The City is conducting studies for the placement of a ped-cyclist bridge over the Rideau River connecting Somerset E to Donald Street. I think this will be a very useful link. I am also delighted that we are constructing a link based on its own merits and appeal to cyclists and peds and not just as an appendage catering to motorist origin-destination desires.

From the newsletter of the study team, I espy the following comment, which is pretty typical for Ottawa:   “the design should look to enhance the natural environment and reduce visual obstructions of the river vista”.

Hmm. Am I over-reacting when I read this as a wish for a bland, innocuous bridge that is self-effacing and minimizing? And probably cheap, too?

And not, in contrast, something that is dramatic and artistic in its own merit? Consider this ped-cyclist bridge proposed for Calgary, conveniently already in Ottawa colours:

That bridge is the opposite of minimal visual impact, it treats the bridge as a sculpture. Ottawans, of course, prefer something with wooden planks and rusted steel girder sides, as constructed on so many NCC paths or along the Ottawa River below the McD-Cartier bridge. And then, ta da! we will take 1% of the budget and install an “artwork” to beautify it or something. (Actually, we spend 1% but at least 20% of that 1% is consumed with “overhead” expenses to run a competition and pay the bureaucrats administering the project).

The above design is by Santiago Calatrava, here is a view from the ped or cyclist point of view, no 1% artwork budget required:

Lest you think we have to go European to get a great bridge design, here is a design from Toronto-based Ja Studio for the Lent-Tabor Bridge in Maribar, Slovenia:

The undulating bridge is white on top, with red reflective panels on the bottom. There, another design in Ottawa colours. And not just a bridge, it creates its own space, an attraction, a huge functional expansion of the adjacent park space, a place to interact with and enjoy the river.

From Calgary to Slovenia cities are considering pedestrian and cyclist bridges that are sculptural and beautiful as well as functional. Any chance we could ever even consider such a design?

Here’s two more illustrations of how the Maribar bridge would work. Be sure to read the little dialogue balloons in the bottom pic:

What the melting snow reveals

Every spring the melting snow reveals all sorts of “treasures”, aka garbage.

This spring will be worse, with election signs spring-ing up already. While walking on Sunday, I saw this blue one — surely the candidate should have chosen a wider sign shape:

He kept his email simple, using his first name only:

While there is some show through from the other side of the sign, the ones further west showed too much show through, which is concealed a bit by one side of some signs having a solid red and the other side white with red:

I also saw one Paul Dewar sign, but it appeared to have been a “saved” sign from a previous election. I didn’t take its picture because it was in an upper bedroom window and it felt a bit too intrusive to take the snap.

I also came across two signs for a school board candidate, presumably left over from last year. Civic minded that candidate was! I may find my way back to take pic of those signs, just to embarass that loser noble participant in the public service.

But back to my main whingeing. The signs already look junky. What clutter!

Infill in training

Fairmont Avenue, just south of the Queensway; a house is gone, a vacant lot is born. And it shall be named Infill.

This word from a reader: One home is gone but three will take it’s place.  The developer is Tom Gallivan and his company Gallivan construction has built several infill projects and custom homes throughout Wellington village and Westboro.  The lot is 70×85 in size which will accommodate a semi to the north and a single to the south side of the lot.  I believe the single will have a frontage of 30 feet with the remainder 40 feet for the two semi’s.  The developers website showcases  the projects that he has completed.

My lights will be on !

I received a phone call earlier this week from a reporter doing a story on Earth Day, the sit-in-the-dark hour. She cheerfully wanted my contribution to how I was honouring or observing Earth Day. There followed a most awkward conversation, she could not decide if I was joshing her or was serious.

I assure you I am serious.

My Christmas lights in the front tree will be on tonight.

Electricity is a marvellous blessing, a mark of our civilization. It represents enlightenment, learning, opportunity, advancement. I have no desire to sit freezing in the dark.

It bothers me that the save-electricity time is on a Saturday evening. With time of day billing [save up to $5 a month by shifting your electricity consumption as monitored by a $9 a month meter!] why are we saving electricity at the cheapest time, possibly when Ontario Hydro is busy PAYING other utilities to take off our surplus electricity?

If this is to be a meaningful gesture, it should occur in January when it’s cold and would include turning off the furnace for six hours or so; or at 2pm in July when A/C demands challenge the network. But no, this futile gesture is not meaningful, it’s superficial,  it’s an excuse to avoid the hard choices. I note the envirokeeners don’t ask for any real sacrifice, and always avoid simple things like raising the consumer-paid gas tax in favour of indirect, less-traceable actions like increasing the tax on petroleum corporations.

That abdication of responsibility is telling. It tells me their support is shallow. They simply cannot marshal enough support for things that affect people directly.

So instead of hiding in the dark tonight, I’ll be warming by my gas fireplace, reading a book, listening to the kids play video games in another area of my centrally-heated century home. And my lights will be on because we have a civilization and culture that is worth emulating.