Should Toronto's Kensington Market be mostly pedestrianized?

I was in Toronto's Kensington Market over the weekend and so naturally I decided to tweet out a glib remark about how the neighborhood should be mostly pedestrianized. This, as many of you know, has been an ongoing debate in this city for as long as I can remember. But there are, in fact, things happening. Watermain replacements are scheduled for the area in 2024 and 2025 and so the city is rightly using this as an opportunity to rethink the area's streets. Here's the official website for the project. Here's the staff report that was adopted. And here's what design changes are right now being proposed.

One of the things that you'll find in these documents are answers to the following question: "How supportive are you of the proposed design for the Pedestrian-only Zones?" And the results are pretty interesting. When the question was proposed to all respondents (the total number being 1,165), 90% were either very supportive or supportive of the Pedestrian-only Zones. And when narrowed to "visitors" of the area, the number appears to increase to 94% supportive. However, when this same question was asked to "people who live/work/own within the affected streets" the number drops to 55% supportive, with 28% being "very unsupportive" of the idea.

One of the concerns with pedestrianization is that it could make it difficult for businesses to operate in the market. This is an understandable concern. But in my lay opinion, this is a problem that has already been solved in many other cities around the world. Delivery vehicles would still be allowed to load/deliver, and you control their flow through things like mechanical bollards. The other concerns raised by community seem to suggest something different. They seem to suggest that pedestrianization might make the area too desirable. More specifically, it might "accelerate gentrification" and cause "traffic and other issues in the neighborhood." I'm assuming the traffic being referred to here is non-vehicular, because we are, after all, talking about pedestrianization.

This dichotomy is an interesting one. On the one hand you have visitors and customers who overwhelmingly want the area to be pedestrianized or, at the very least, have pedestrian-only zones. But on the other hand, the businesses themselves seem to be concerned about their operations and the area becoming too successful. On some level, I guess, this makes sense, if your concern is displacement and/or the area becoming too corporate or whatever. But it's also counterintuitive. Usually when you run a retail-oriented business you like things that (1) make your customers happy and (2) drive foot traffic.

So how do we go about reconciling this city building divide? Well, like many/most urban initiatives these days, you run a pilot! And that's exactly what the city plans to do. There will be more consultation sometime next year, and then construction is planned for 2024-2025. Once that wraps up, the plan is to test out the various pedestrian-only zones. So I reckon we could be 2026 before we truly know where this is landing. I remain optimistic. But until then, please continue to refer to my glib weekend tweets.

I was in Toronto's Kensington Market over the weekend and so naturally I decided to tweet out a glib remark about how the neighborhood should be mostly pedestrianized. This, as many of you know, has been an ongoing debate in this city for as long as I can remember. But there are, in fact, things happening. Watermain replacements are scheduled for the area in 2024 and 2025 and so the city is rightly using this as an opportunity to rethink the area's streets. Here's the official website for the project. Here's the staff report that was adopted. And here's what design changes are right now being proposed.

One of the things that you'll find in these documents are answers to the following question: "How supportive are you of the proposed design for the Pedestrian-only Zones?" And the results are pretty interesting. When the question was proposed to all respondents (the total number being 1,165), 90% were either very supportive or supportive of the Pedestrian-only Zones. And when narrowed to "visitors" of the area, the number appears to increase to 94% supportive. However, when this same question was asked to "people who live/work/own within the affected streets" the number drops to 55% supportive, with 28% being "very unsupportive" of the idea.

One of the concerns with pedestrianization is that it could make it difficult for businesses to operate in the market. This is an understandable concern. But in my lay opinion, this is a problem that has already been solved in many other cities around the world. Delivery vehicles would still be allowed to load/deliver, and you control their flow through things like mechanical bollards. The other concerns raised by community seem to suggest something different. They seem to suggest that pedestrianization might make the area too desirable. More specifically, it might "accelerate gentrification" and cause "traffic and other issues in the neighborhood." I'm assuming the traffic being referred to here is non-vehicular, because we are, after all, talking about pedestrianization.

This dichotomy is an interesting one. On the one hand you have visitors and customers who overwhelmingly want the area to be pedestrianized or, at the very least, have pedestrian-only zones. But on the other hand, the businesses themselves seem to be concerned about their operations and the area becoming too successful. On some level, I guess, this makes sense, if your concern is displacement and/or the area becoming too corporate or whatever. But it's also counterintuitive. Usually when you run a retail-oriented business you like things that (1) make your customers happy and (2) drive foot traffic.

So how do we go about reconciling this city building divide? Well, like many/most urban initiatives these days, you run a pilot! And that's exactly what the city plans to do. There will be more consultation sometime next year, and then construction is planned for 2024-2025. Once that wraps up, the plan is to test out the various pedestrian-only zones. So I reckon we could be 2026 before we truly know where this is landing. I remain optimistic. But until then, please continue to refer to my glib weekend tweets.

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