Comment 27404

By seancb (registered) - website | Posted November 23, 2008 at 16:52:42

I am not advocating keeping things exactly as they are at city centre. It will no longer be a mall that they rent space in. My vision starts with the city buying the centre and doing a complete conversion inside and out. It would no longer be a mall.

There will never, I repeat, never be a downtown mall in city centre again. Mark my words, that era of retail is over. As soon as the city moves out, what will become of it?

City Hall was at that site for a long time before moving to its current location, and it worked perfectly well as a civic space. Gore park is the public gathering place for hamilton and always will be. The courtyard at City hall does little more than insulate all city councillors and staff from the city itself. City hall is a drive-in drive-out building with too much parking.

City workers and councillors are now (at city centre) forced to interact with Hamilton directly - they no longer park right next to their office. They meet people on the street, they walk past downtown businesses and they experience the city and are forced to be a part of it.

We are seeing some positive changes these days, and I do not think it is a coincidence that many staff are loated IN the downtown now -- where for the past 50 years they essentially were not.

Current city hall is geographically downtown but in reality, it offers a quick drive-in from the 403, no need to get out of your car, go to work then back home to the suburbs. There is no incentive, and in fact a strong disinentive to get out of the building and interact with the downtown. It is no wonder we have been stuck in a slump of suburban mentality for 50 years.

I'm sorry but I understand pride in civic buildings, I think it's important to restore city hall architecturally but I think it is much much more important that councillors and staff work IN the city and be a part of the city every singe day. Current city hall site just does not allow that to happen.

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