I have always loved shutting down the streets in Toronto’s Kensington Market to cars for the final Sunday of every month from May through October. The streets flood with people and performers. It is obvious this is something desperately wanted by many, and some local businesses boom when it happens.
For years I, and many others, have been frustrated that we cannot shut these streets and others around the city to cars on a more regular, if not, permanent basis. I have written about this frustration in the past. It had never occurred to me that there could be a serious downside to creating a permanent no-car zone in a place like Kensington.
I checked in with local Kensington Business Improvement Area Coordinator, Yvonne Bambrick. As a main organizer of ‘Pedestrian Sundays in Kensington Market,’ she is a strong ‘streets are for people’ advocate. She says that if you look at what has happened with increasing rents in pedestrian zones in New York (past, related OpenCity coverage) and Copenhagen, we should expect that same result here. According to Bambrick, “permanent pedestrianization equals rapid increase in value and rent,” and this is not something “wanted by the community.” Running Pedestrian Sundays on a temporary basis “works for everybody.”
There is already tremendous development pressure in Kensington to push out the small, independent businesses that play a major role in creating the unique character of the ‘Market.’ If these streets were made into permanent pedestrian zones this pressure to gentrify the area would only increase.
Instead, Bambrick suggests that we look at implementing temporary or permanent pedestrian areas which could lend themselves to this type of activity, including:
-Bloor St. from Spadina to Christie
-Queen St. from Spadina to Trinity Bellwoods Park
-Yonge St. from Queen to Dundas or College
I had no idea that there is actually a history of having pedestrian zones along Yonge, the city’s largest thoroughfare, in the Summer. How fantastic would that be? Furthermore, a recent article highlighted a city study that found more than 50,000 pedestrians crowding Yonge’s relatively narrow sidewalks versus the 22,000 cars on the road over an eight hour period. It seems like the demand for pedestrians zones is already there.
While they are small to start, our pilot (test case) pedestrian zones on Ryerson campus and University of Toronto’s campus are an important beginning. Perhaps we can look at expanding these, having more frequent pedestrian hours/days in Kensington and adding new, more significant streets to the pedestrian-only mix going forward.
Jordy Gold is the OpenCity Projects Editor and is a sustainability consultant. He has worked and studied in Geneva, Lund, Chiang Mai and Phuket. Jordy learned from the Swedes how to cycle in all conditions and can be seen on his bike 365 days a year throughout the core of Toronto.
Photo used with permission by Camille Labchuk
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I have always been curious about the relationship between pedestrian traffic, the width of the sidewalk and the energetic feeling you get as a pedestrian. Getting the right mix is so important to a vibrant street. If you remove cars you are effectively widening the sidewalk. So to ensure that the area doesn’t feel dead you need many pedestrians to fill in the space. Cars (and bicycles) by virtue of their mass and movement add energy to streets. What matters to me is that pedestrians feel safe – which is why street parking can be so powerful. Parked cars add a nice barrier between pedestrians and cars as well as force cars to slow down.
Jordy,
Ive read recently about Kristin Tam-Wong’s proposal for Yonge St — is this the Ryerson campus pilot you speak of? It’s not entirely a ped zone but it’ll significantly widen the sidewalks around Dundas on Yonge.
Josh
This seems counterintuitive: “permanent pedestrianization equals rapid increase in value and rent,” and this is not something “wanted by the community”. I suppose if the community in question serves as an oasis within the automobile dominated city then, yes, escalation in the cost of living for its residents would be a corollary to it pedestrianization.
But what if the primacy of the pedestrian were stressed across the greater urban area and multiple neighbourhoods reordered their public realm to a more pedestrian friendly environment? I wonder if that would do much to mitigate the unintended consequences, i.e., higher rents and gentrification, attending a policy when applied to a single, confined zone.
Its also a matter of recognizing the political power of auto associations in Toronto, Ontario and Canada. Imagine how much clout they have: in getting politicians to keep car manufacturers subsidized, and therefore in town (think Oshawa, and many others). This is entangled in legitimate labour struggles, however, so things hit the grey zone. Increased income inequality mixed with manufacturing jobs exported abroad give the auto associations much grounds—and frustrations—to stand on too.
Torontonians have to stand for all sorts of economies. Big economies from the past, and future small, medium and large economies that could emerge, from pedestrian zones for example. Is it a matter of conflicting economic policies? Political ideologies? Or just plain neighbourhood dynamics, especially from those afraid a pedestrian Kensington would turn posh. Does it risk vanishing, no matter how you put it?
All kinds of great comments:
Jamil: Exactly, if you close an area to cars you do need to make sure you fill the space. That is why I would only permanently close an exceptionally high foot traffic area and am more inclined to close certain streets to car traffic during key hours on a regular basis. As for the parked cars providing a ‘safety’ barrier, you pretty much only need this barrier when there is car traffic on the roads providing a real source of danger.
Josh: The Ryerson campus pilot project is the section of Gould St. I believe that is closed off to traffic. There is a link in the post above for a Toronto Star article referring to the project you are talking about where Kristin Tam-Wong wants to temporarily increase the space for pedestrian traffic at Yonge-Dundas which would be wonderful.
Luke: Rapid increases in rent are good for the building owners collecting the rent and those collecting on property taxes. Gentrification can have some benefits, but in the case of a unique community like Kensington what makes it special are all of the small businesses that provide a certain character to the area. If rents went up dramatically only major chains would be able to afford to move in and the neighbourhood would no longer be special.
Yes, if we saw pedestrians prioritized right across the city, then closing a certain neighbourhood off to car traffic would have a far smaller impact in terms of localized gentrification. Realistically, this re-ordering of priorities is not about to happen meaning that we need to be more selective and strategic in seeing where we are able to increase pedestrianization and not harmfully impact any particular neighbourhood.
Cedric: Yes, there are a number of powerful interests exerting influence throughout our lives. That said, I am not so sure any automobile lobby has pushed for car-dependent infrastructure in our city recently. We established our car addicted culture a long time ago and now we do not seem to know how to move on to a new model that is more functional. Building more roads brings even greater traffic and our current mayor seems to cater to individual citizens who simply want to maximize road space at all costs.
Yes, Kensington could gentrify with our without permanent pedestrianization. The neighbourhood has already coordinated efforts to do what they can to ensure the current character is maintained. If only maintaining this character came more easily.