The Pickering Bridge is not what it seems.
As happy as many seem about the Pickering Bridge, it's not nearly the project it could have been and to be happy about getting the bridge is like being overjoyed about receiving a set of roller skates for your birthday when you could have had a Lear Jet and all the trimmings.
The Pickering Bridge is a band-aid to be installed near what should have been a new transportation and community hub for Pickering. In that area you have a rail line for GO, the 401 reduced to west-bound access only, Bayley St. a major east-west artery south of them, Hwy 2/Kingston Rd immediately north and all of them crossed over by north/south Liverpool Rd. To make matters a little more complicated, the area is environmentally sensitive as well with a creek flowing into Lake Ontario immediately west of Liverpool.
On the Northeast corner you have Pickering Town Centre. On the Southeast corner; you have the GO Station. On the Southwest Corner you have poorly designed and isolated housing area known as Bay Ridges complete with hodge podge apartment towers, a new assortment of towers and low rises named after a Jimmy Buffet song and on the Northwest corner a Loblaws Supercentre.
Four corners completely isolated from one another as far as local use is concerned regardless of the new Pedestrian bridge.
When I ran for mayor of Pickering, part of my platform was to unite those four corners and the transportation lines so that the entire area became functional not just for commuters but for local residents as well.
To do that the corners needed to be infrastructurally connected. The way to accomplish this would have been with tunnels that run under the highway the streets and the rail line.
Above, all of the buildings in the area could have been united into one major structure that would have seen the transport routes running through the mammoth building.
Right now the demographics of this area show that a high percentage are near, at or into retirement years. Commuting from home to services is a big deal to many and surprisingly awkward - especially if you have to commute on foot - in winter.
Another part of my plan included a major bridge system out in the lake that would run from Kingston (or maybe even Montreal) to Niagara Falls with looping stops along the way. Pickering would have been one of those stops.
The bridge system would carry high-speed trains such as are used in Japan, China and Europe. In one go it would take a tremendous amount of traffic pressure away from most of the GTAs east/west corridors. Most of the traffic could be virtually emissions free thanks to the train and technology that is on the way.
The bridge itself would require supporting pylons in the lake. Each of those pylons could be built with future population expansion in mind and become “Habitat" sites that in effect are nearly self supporting. They could include for instance hotels on top, bird habitat externally and fish habitat in the water. Add American fishermen and you have the nucleus of a new way of growing Ontario's future without sacrificing farmland.
Such a plan would require massive federal funding and political will. The Confederation Bridge to P.E.I. was built with much less of a financial return at the other end. This scheme would unite the majority of the province's urban centres in a way that cannot exist anywhere else in the world. The payback would be immense.
The unimpeded view of Lake Ontario initially could be considered a downside. But if the bridge was built with elan, the view could be vastly improved even from an ecological perspective. Functionality could also be included to minimize or nearly completely eliminate impact in the water. We have most of the technology. We can develop the rest.
But instead of that future, we are getting a foot bridge to service GO Transit riders to get from the south side to the north side of the transportation corridor. Big hairy deal. Despite the transportation corridor, Pickering remains mostly not plugged in.
The new foot bridge is not going to encourage new and imaginative development of Pickering Town Centre or the Supercentre or any other existing local amenities. Most of Pickering's businesses are warehouses that offer little in the way of employment. The biggest employers are all related to power generation. That is a service industry that does not bring new money into the area and doesn't encourage new economic growth. In fact the Nuclear Station inhibits growth despite what politicians might tell you.
Pickering and thus Durham Region needs new and innovative thinking if it is going to ever be more than an area that warehouses boxes and people.
Have I simplified the logistics involved? Yes I have. But the fact remains that Pickering could become a major player in local economic growth without excessive environmental destruction if only some imagination, money and leadership were applied to get it all up and running.
