King Street (Streetcar Transit Priority)

[micheal_can]

The KingStreetPilot needs to expedite pedestrian improvements or it’s going to lose the PR battle with businesses complaining about the empty streets.

While it’s true that people go into businesses, not cars, traffic on King created the appaearance of it being busy. The empty streets with the occasional streetcar zooming by is not going to help the cause. The empty curb lanes need to be filled very soon before opposition to the pilot calcifies.

Well, winter is upon us they could bury the lane in snow.

 

[steveintoronto]

The KingStreetPilot needs to expedite pedestrian improvements or it’s going to lose the PR battle with businesses complaining about the empty streets.

While it’s true that people go into businesses, not cars, traffic on King created the appaearance of it being busy. The empty streets with the occasional streetcar zooming by is not going to help the cause. The empty curb lanes need to be filled very soon before opposition to the pilot calcifies.

There's many aspects of psychology being bungled on this. And it's completely needless. It's not like transit malls are something that Toronto has invented, save for the City departments making it up as they go along.

The preliminary studies mentioned a number of cities' experiences. What the City has done is fail to learn from them. Some *have not* been successes, and modifications had to be made to make them so. Some have been removed as total failures, Buffalo comes to mind, a very different situation, but lessons to be learned none-the-less. Anyone thinking this project has already won the game is kidding themselves. Even the Bloor Bike Lanes are still not a slam dunk yet.

And btw: For persons thinking the reduced time on the 504/514 through the core is the winning score, think again. There's some serious doubt on how much time, if any, is actually saved.

What's clear is even if a few minutes off of 15 has been saved, there's a lot more potential to tap yet. This project not only needs to barely pass, it's needs to shine, and it can, given the right factors and chances...and it must.

 

[Tuscani01]

The KingStreetPilot needs to expedite pedestrian improvements or it’s going to lose the PR battle with businesses complaining about the empty streets.

While it’s true that people go into businesses, not cars, traffic on King created the appaearance of it being busy. The empty streets with the occasional streetcar zooming by is not going to help the cause. The empty curb lanes need to be filled very soon before opposition to the pilot calcifies.

Yea, this really should have started in the Spring or Summer. Patio season and higher pedestrian traffic would have created a better PR situation.

 

[steveintoronto]

On the pedestrian situation, the potential is massive, implementation pathetic so far. Take heed!

The Trouble with Pedestrian Malls
Once popular, these car-free zones are slowly disappearing from the urban landscape.
December 2011

Buffalo’s 25-year-old pedestrian and transit-only mall has a problem: As in so many similar spaces across the country, there just aren’t enough pedestrians. So the city in upstate New York has applied for a federal grant to turn the mall back into a road. Exit people. Enter cars.

Buffalo isn’t the only city to toss in the towel on car-free streets. Sacramento, Calif., which has a shared pedestrian and transit mall that dates back more than 40 years, has recently let cars back onto K Street. In recent years, many mid-sized cities like Eugene, Ore., and Raleigh, N.C., have turned away from pedestrian malls, as have big cities, such as Chicago and Washington, D.C.

America’s first downtown pedestrian mall appeared in Kalamazoo, Mich., in 1959. At their height, more than 200 cities blocked off traffic in prime downtown business districts in hopes that by removing cars and trucks, people would flock to the city and bring life to retail and business districts facing decline.

But many of the pedestrian malls were ill-planned and had little purpose. Because so few people lived downtown, the malls became lifeless after work, attracting crime and loiterers, rather than large crowds. According to some estimates, of all the pedestrian malls that have dotted American cities in past years, fewer than 15 percent remain today.

Not all malls have failed. Denver has a thriving pedestrian mall, as do the smaller cities of Charlottesville, Va., and Burlington, Vt. New York City’s pedestrian mall in Times Square was initially viewed as temporary, but became permanent after it proved popular with pedestrians and successful at cutting Midtown car congestion. Overseas, European cities like Barcelona have had great success with car-free zones.

“I don’t think the idea of separating people from cars in cities is a failed concept,” says Yonah Freemark, who has written extensively about pedestrian malls for various publications. Cities that have growing residential populations in downtown areas as well as hubs of activities can generate the kind of traffic that makes a mall thrive. Cities that lack downtown populations have also found that creating temporary pedestrian places can bring a buzz and excitement that people expect to find when they visit a city. Malls can work, if done the right way, explains Freemark. Just don’t take the cookie-cutter approach to building malls as so many cities have -- with disappointing results.

“Cities that are taking out malls now will rethink their decision 30 years from now,” predicts Freemark. “We have to learn that having cars on all streets is not the right idea for cities.”

http://www.governing.com/columns/urban-notebook/trouble-with-pedestrian-malls.html

King has *every potential* to work brilliantly. Too bad it's being brought to you by the wrong people, and so many pundits thinking this it's already proven.

This is teetering on failure...and the first push will come when enforcement slackens, instead of tightens. But it needs a lot more than that, not least the design being 'self-enforcing' to a great degree. And that includes adding a transit signal to the traffic signal heads (separate transit signal heads are not needed) and Red Light Cameras.

 

[Admiral Beez]

On the pedestrian situation, the potential is massive, implementation pathetic so far. Take heed!

http://www.governing.com/columns/urban-notebook/trouble-with-pedestrian-malls.html

King has *every potential* to work brilliantly. Too bad it's being brought to you by the wrong people, and so many pundits thinking this it's already proven.

This is teetering on failure...and the first push will come when enforcement slackens, instead of tightens. But it needs a lot more than that, not least the design being 'self-enforcing' to a great degree. And that includes adding a transit signal to the traffic signal heads (separate transit signal heads are not needed) and Red Light Cameras.

I lived in Ottawa from 1991 to 1995 and well recall the emptiness of Sparks Street in the winter. If you're going to make a pedestrian mall in a northern city, put a roof on it.

 

[MetroMan]

King Street Pilot - Update:

http://www.joecressy.com/king_street_pilot_update

 

[ChesterCopperpot]

Police enforcement will be winding down on King Street this week:

https://twitter.com/to_transport/status/933783523512733696

Free-flowing King transit might have only lasted a week, but we’ll have fond memories of this time forever!

I see they have pulled this Tweet down now

 

[ADRM]

King Street Pilot - Update:

http://www.joecressy.com/king_street_pilot_update

From that update, this is a pretty good line that should be drilled into the brains of sensationalist, auto-centric Toronto media: Cars are still able to reach every block of King Street in both directions.

 

[MetroMan]

I see they have pulled this Tweet down now

And enforcement continues. I saw cops stopping cars going through Peter.

Somebody must’ve gotten in shit for tweeting that enforcement was going to end. That serves no purpose whatsoever. If they’re going to end routine enforcement, don’t tell people. What was the point of that.

 

[MetroMan]

This will help a little with the dead streets: Above Seasonal Temperatures Expected This Week

This has been the biggest complaint. People are incensed that there’s so much traffic (the usual) on parallel streets while King sits empty. Widening the sidewalks would help diffuse that perception. The typical volume of pedestrians on King looks far smaller now that there aren’t any cars on the street to complement them.

 

[DSC]

This will help a little with the dead streets: Above Seasonal Temperatures Expected This Week

This has been the biggest complaint. People are incensed that there’s so much traffic (the usual) on parallel streets while King sits empty. Widening the sidewalks would help diffuse that perception. The typical volume of pedestrians on King looks far smaller now that there aren’t any cars on the street to complement them.

If you were at any of the public or stakeholder meetings on this project that I attended you will know that they intend to improve the 'pedestrian realm' in spring 2018. It really would make no sense to do anything very "significant" until it becomes permanent or even before they make any necessary tweaks in the next few months. I agree it is unfortunate that he trial began just as the snow started to fly but there really was a need to get it started before we get fully into election mode.

 

[MetroMan]

Dan Gunam, owner of Calii Love was interviewed for this article:

https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/20...-taking-toll-say-king-st-business-owners.html

The Mayor is on top of it. He showed up at Calii Love today to ask Dan for suggestions on how to improve the King Street Pilot for businesses.

I'm glad to see that the pilot has the full support of the Mayor, despite Doug Ford's obvious ploy to make it an election issue in 2018. Tory could have easily called it a failure and gotten City Council to end the pilot early. He appears to be all in.

 

[MetroMan]

If you were at any of the public or stakeholder meetings on this project that I attended you will know that they intend to improve the 'pedestrian realm' in spring 2018. It really would make no sense to do anything very "significant" until it becomes permanent or even before they make any necessary tweaks in the next few months. I agree it is unfortunate that he trial began just as the snow started to fly but there really was a need to get it started before we get fully into election mode.

I was and I know. That was my point. They're leaving the street bare and open to criticism.

That said, plans have changed and some of the Spring improvements are actually going to be implemented early. Planters to define pedestrian zones will be arriving next week. The City will be working with local stakeholders, BIAs and business owners to program those spaces during the winter.

 

[crs1026]

Another week or ten days and the pre-Xmas office parties should start happening. I would be very surprised if restauants don't get a boost from that. Few people drive to those.

I wonder if a couple quick winter festival events could be arranged for after the holidays. Argo jersey signings, anyone?

- Paul

 

[ADRM]

Dan Gunam, owner of Calii Love was interviewed for this article:

https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/20...-taking-toll-say-king-st-business-owners.html

The Mayor is on top of it. He showed up at Calii Love today to ask Dan for suggestions on how to improve the King Street Pilot for businesses.

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I'm glad to see that the pilot has the full support of the Mayor, despite Doug Ford's obvious ploy to make it an election issue in 2018. Tory could have easily called it a failure and gotten City Council to end the pilot early. He appears to be all in.

This is so dumb. Has any Calii Love customer ever driven to that business? This feels like the owner of Fresh on Bloor whining about the Bloor bike lanes because he can no longer park directly outside his favourite coffee shop on Bloor anymore.