Toronto Union Station Revitalization | ?m | ?s | City of Toronto | NORR

Richard White said:
What about the granite benches they have at Exhibition Place?
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You mean these? Absolutely, bring it on. Let's bring a Trillium Park-style treatment to Front Street.

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I’m not sure we need to overthink and overdesign this. Toronto’s approach to its public realm seems to be 99.99% shabby, badly designed - or more likely not designed at all - and shoddily maintained - or more likely not maintained at all. Occasionally, the City and BIE’s will try to design and build something in the public realm that’s innovative, often by Claude Cormier. But not everything has to be a grand statement out of an OCAD PhD thesis. The public realm would be somewhat less hideous if the City could simply standardize on a not-horrible design and organize itself to properly maintain the result. Front doesn’t need a one-off solution that costs a fortune. It does need safety barriers that don’t look like they belong on a New Jersey Turnpike construction site. Front would be a great place for the City to select and install a standard bollard which it could replicate in other areas. Nothing fancy, just something that works with the unusually high quality (for Toronto) sidewalks and the remarkable absence of overhead wires. As an expirement, perhaps the City could even reorganize its maintenance so that when the inevitable dings occur, the bollards would actually be repaired or replaced in non-geological time. Or not, because Toronto.
 
I was in Union this morning and there is work going on in two areas that seem to have been rather quiet of late.

1. The pedestrian passageway at the TTC subway station that goes into the Bay Concourse (before going up the stairs) is closed off as they appear to be roofing this passageway over. Presumably because they are going to do work overhead.

2. The areas to both sides of the ramp going from Great Hall to VIA concourse seem to be being worked on again and they are painting some of the areas on both sides of the VIA concourse.

Perhaps the approaching end of the 4th quarter of 2018 has them trying to finish off things they 'promised'?
 
I just got this from Joe Cressy's office... "Work is underway on plans to replace the temporary concrete barriers with permanent, attractive installations that function to block vehicular attacks while blending seamlessly into the public realm. There is no intention that the concrete barriers will stay in place forever."
 
DSC said:
I just got this from Joe Cressy's office... "Work is underway on plans to replace the temporary concrete barriers with permanent, attractive installations that function to block vehicular attacks while blending seamlessly into the public realm. There is no intention that the concrete barriers will stay in place forever."
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That's great to hear! Hopefully this applies for Maple Leaf Square as well. Throw in Yonge-Dundas Square too while we're at it.
 
DSC said:
I just got this from Joe Cressy's office... "Work is underway on plans to replace the temporary concrete barriers with permanent, attractive installations that function to block vehicular attacks while blending seamlessly into the public realm. There is no intention that the concrete barriers will stay in place forever."
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Should be anywhere people congregate. This includes all entrances to mass transit stations and attractions (Distillery District, Exhibition, mall entrances, ferry docks, your place of residence, ...).
 
W. K. Lis said:
Should be anywhere people congregate. This includes all entrances to mass transit stations and attractions (Distillery District, Exhibition, mall entrances, ferry docks, your place of residence, ...).
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I say we just build a bunch of bollards going across every street, highway, parking garage entrances and exits, restaurant driveways and kiss-and-rides. And I mean straight across them in a "thou shall not pass!" style. In fact, every single resident should be mandated to wear a bunch of bollards around their body at all times for personal protection. Put a bunch of tall skyscraping bollards around every skyscraper and the CN tower to prevent planes from crashing into them, while we're at it.
In case you are confused, I'm with the guy disgusted at the Nanny State we are becoming.
 
Full Metal Junkie said:
I say we just build a bunch of bollards going across every street, highway, parking garage entrances and exits, restaurant driveways and kiss-and-rides. And I mean straight across them in a "thou shall not pass!" style. In fact, every single resident should be mandated to wear a bunch of bollards around their body at all times for personal protection. Put a bunch of tall skyscraping bollards around every skyscraper and the CN tower to prevent planes from crashing into them, while we're at it.
In case you are confused, I'm with the guy disgusted at the Nanny State we are becoming.
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I think your misapplying the term nanny-state here. That's really about micro-managing people's business to me or hyper-regulation. The Jersey barriers do not alter legal regulation in any way.

They are ugly, that's a different issue.

So is the fact they aren't terribly effective at preventing terrorism.

I don't think anyone needs, nor would I feel comfortable elucidating all the ways one could easily cause terror/life loss etc that are either not prevented at all, or only minimally by all the most intrusive measures.

That these barriers are more to serve the purpose of calming the masses and of dissuading the odd impulse idiot (as opposed to organized terrorist) is a given.

Perhaps its misplaced to invest such resources. That's a fair argument to make.

But I still wouldn't call it nanny-state.
 
Northern Light said:
I think your misapplying the term nanny-state here. That's really about micro-managing people's business to me or hyper-regulation.
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According to Wikipedia: Nanny state is a conservative term of British origin that conveys a view that a government or its policies are overprotective or interfering unduly with personal choice. The term "nanny state" likens government to the role that a nanny has in child rearing.

I don't know about you, but these concrete barriers soon to be replaced with bollards sure look like they fit the definition. Absolutely useless waste of money meant to be for show rather than to achieve any useful purpose. It's like wrapping a baby crib in yellow caution tape - very visible but what does it achieve at the end of the day?
 
Full Metal Junkie said:
According to Wikipedia: Nanny state is a conservative term of British origin that conveys a view that a government or its policies are overprotective or interfering unduly with personal choice. The term "nanny state" likens government to the role that a nanny has in child rearing.

I don't know about you, but these concrete barriers soon to be replaced with bollards sure look like they fit the definition. Absolutely useless waste of money meant to be for show rather than to achieve any useful purpose. It's like wrapping a baby crib in yellow caution tape - very visible but what does it achieve at the end of the day?
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I'm not sure that there is an element of "personal choice" to being at risk in a public place. Today's reality is what it is.

What the Jersey Barrier represents is - an admission that the location is a potential target location, and some form of hardening is prudent. I think it's the City's responsibility to follow up that admission with a workable, attractive, more long term solution. JB's are ugly as sin and they block pedestrian and bike movement. Those bollards are reasonably effective at deterring or preventing some level of violent incident.

Nothing is perfect, but it's enough to make a difference. So, get on with the longer term solution, and don't leave JB's sitting around in an area where we do want a positive ambience.

- Paul
 
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