Roselawn & Downtown People are asking me to elaborate on why there is a direct correlation between the Roselawn Centre and the redevelopment of the downtown core and the larger concept of community development. But first -- full disclosure. I am a Past President and Executive Director of the Roselawn Centre. In my capacity as General Manager of the South Niagara Community Futures Development Corporation, we were intimately involved and instrumental in contributing both capital and operational support to the centre for over a decade. So my perspective and history with facility is substantial. Critics of my position will say that I am not an objective or independent analyst on this topic. I will gladly plead guilty on that one because I am not, for sure, but I will stick to the facts presented by others to validate my perspective. Secondly, I was co-chair of the Downtown BIA Community Improvement Plan Committee which was instrumental in the creation of a plan to redesign and rebuild the downtown core into a viable commercial sector recognizing that the need for revitalization was critical. Thirdly, the SNCFDC, through the Federal Economic Development Agency for Southern Ontario, contributed $100,000 to cover detailed design costs of the CIP on the basis that the City would support the plan going forward. Let’s be clear. The City would never have completed the detailed engineering design for downtown if we hadn’t stepped up with the cash. The SNCFDC also contributed approximately $70,000 to install new and flexible design risers in the theatre at Roselawn in support of activities there. Now, within an hour, the theatre can be transformed into a banquet or reception hall, or dinner theatre, and a wide range of other uses. The theatre could be licensed for wine and spirits to promote weddings, anniversaries and special occasions. It has a turn-key kitchen facility. Has any of this happened? No. Based on the progress in the investment, we want our money back. The best way I can connect the dots here to look at a recent report on the Top 10 downtowns in Ontario and the comparative advantages they have and then overlay them on Port Colborne to see the similarities and deficiencies. Interestingly, when analyzing the Top 10 best downtowns in Ontario, Port Colborne also has virtually all of the major common features, albeit tragically under developed and under-utilized. There were three major shared assets that measured the quality of the downtown: a waterway (lake, river or canal); a theatre or performing arts centre, and festivals. Among the Top 10 with a Lake: Bracebridge, Cobourg, Kingston, Niagara On The Lake, Port Hope. Among the Top 10 with a Canal: Kingston, Perth, Port Perry. Among the Top 10 with a performing arts centre or theatre: Cobourg, Kingston, Niagara On The Lake, Perth, Port Hope, St. Mary’s, Stratford. Every community had a festival of some sort in its downtown, so let’s just chalk that up to a common theme in most communities in Ontario. Ours would be Canal Days. Port Colborne has a lake, canal, and a performing arts centre, and a downtown festival which actually puts it number 1 in shared commonalities. All the rest have 3 or less in the Top 10. So how are we doing? Lake Erie is a great place for sport fishing, beaches, clean water and modest amenities. But we have no strategic plan to maximize the ability to expand waterfront activities and connect it to the downtown. With the exception of Flavours of Niagara, which is now on hold because the city can’t figure out branding, there is very little that links the park, bandshell, open space and shoreline, with the marina complex or the downtown. Lakeview Park is perhaps the most wide open, accessible and manageable public space of any waterfront location in Niagara. There is just no connective tissue there to create any economic synergy. We haven’t been able to connect the bike trail to the park from downtown which would have an immediate impact on mutual and safe access. The bandshell is rarely used and there is no seasonal programming that brings people to the park for spring, summer or fall entertainment. The Canal is another competitive (and comparable) asset. Other than Canal Days, supported mostly by outside vendors who come in for a long weekend, set up their trinket tables, make their money, then promptly leave, is pretty much ignored. Even the transient docks are half the size they used to be. Fundamentally, Canal Days is not at all about the canal at all anymore. The last time Canal Days had much to do with the waterfront was during the Tall Ships Challenge, which, by the way, lost several boat loads of money, pardon the pun. Canal Days is about beer, cover bands and big crowds and it smothers local businesses and residents outside the catchment area along West Street, and is very expensive to run, consistently loses money, yet we continue to do the same thing over and over expecting different results. The economic impact study paid for by the city in 2011 is effectively an online plug and play program by the Ontario government formatted to provide spin-off or trickle-down multipliers for impact analysis. This study suggested, for example, that local spending in restaurants over canal days was just over $1.7 million between resident and non-resident spending. Now, Trip Advisor lists 48 restaurants in Port Colborne in all types from a la carte to fast food. When extracting restaurants outside the Canal Days catchment area, even equally divided among all types, the study would suggest that each restaurant would benefit by about $60,000 in additional sales. Being in the restaurant business, I can tell you that this is absolutely absurd. In fact, unless one is a restaurateur in the congregated area, the impact of Canal Days is negligible in the food and beverage sector. Several of our regular customers avoid our restaurant specifically over Canal Days because they can’t find a parking spot downtown. The study also suggested that local car rental sales, for example, were in the $40,000 range. This is an easy number to validate with local car rental agencies because there aren’t any! The point of all of this is, of course, that figures lie. Impact studies are misleading and wrought with empirical flaws in small communities like Port Colborne where one can actually count the revenue streams without having to use some form of algorithm in a computer program. But we use these flawed studies to validate continuing with the same format that just has no intrinsic value. The downtown CIP (Community Improvement Plan) and the BIA (Business Improvement Area) recommended seasonal activities to be promoted along West Street including turning a good portion of it into a pedestrian mall over weekends. There is an important recommendation to promote the Market Square with the addition of a small performance stage to attract people downtown. Nothing has happened. Council sees nothing wrong with the status quo. But there is nothing right with it either. Over 13 Thursdays in downtown Fonthill in the summer, the community runs a combined farmer’s market, a fantastic concert schedule, and a local restaurant ‘supperfest’ that attracts well over 2,000 people per week in the Peace Park. The concerts are free, the food vendors aren’t charged exorbitant fees, and the farmer’s market is jammed. People gather, enjoy the ambiance of downtown, and spend their money locally. What a novel idea! The CIP recommended a very similar concept on the landscape portion of King George Park. We don’t have to replicate this concept entirely, but can we imagine for a moment the pedestrian impact of weekly events in the Market Square on the downtown. Some of the stores might actually stay open past 5:30. Could new investment in boutiques and shops, restaurants and cafes, possibly be connected to the actual presence of people downtown? And last, but certainly not the least by any stretch, is the performing arts and theatre, a centre piece of the most successful downtowns in Ontario. The City of Port Colborne owns and operates the Roselawn Centre, currently bogged down in bureaucratic and political wrangling. Roselawn is the most important piece of real estate in the City, historically and culturally. Roselawn has been viable in the past when there was a group of seriously dedicated people in charge. But when taken over by the City, the facility has been strategically starved of support in virtually every aspect of its operations. There is no strategic plan, no marketing dollars allocated for promotion, and it has turned into glorified office space for City staff. Other communities would love to have a property like Roselawn -- a turnkey food and beverage facility, a unique and flexible professional theatre space, a heritage building with one-of-a-kind architecture and already owned by the community itself. And sitting on the edge of the downtown, it is a gift for expansion in commercial, retail, hospitality and tourism which could be the envy of other communities. When Roselawn was busy, the buses would stop on West Street for shopping, then head to Showboat for a matinee. In the evening, people would dine downtown before performances of professional theatre, authors presentations, and musical concerts. The decline of Roselawn has had a measurable impact on downtown. I wonder if the city would pay for an economic impact study testing that? Highly unlikely. People, whether investors or visitors, judge a community by the quality, vitality and beauty in its downtown. It is not rocket science. Where are the sights and sounds in our downtown? Our landscape is comprised of broken curbs, asphalt boulevards, sinking sidewalks and broken infrastructure. We can’t even find a way to install our hanging flowers before the end of June in most years because of some bizarre belief that they could freeze. And tragically, we can’t co-ordinate putting up some Christmas lights downtown. For the first time in my lifetime there wasn’t a single light bulb on a tree in King George Park. When I pointed that out to people, no one even noticed. So sad, so very, very sad. We have all of the necessary components - lake, canal and performing arts and theatre – that could put Port Colborne in the Top 10. Instead of spending $10 million on a city yard, chasing unsubstantiated rainbows, spend it on the downtown and start taking Roselawn seriously as a vital component in a well-rounded local economy. Link the park to the canal and downtown for bikes and pedestrians including a walking trail to Roselawn. Imagine what our community would look like if we invested that in our downtown. New shops, boutiques, restaurants and cafes -- sidewalk activities and new gathering places for entertainment including a vibrant arts centre. I would invest in that community. A $10 million yard for trucks, sand and salt, will not create one single sustainable job, business or activity. No one would invest in a community because it has indoor parking for its trucks. Think about it.
Posted on: Thu, 03 Apr 2014 18:55:31 +0000
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