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A Better Plan than the Canal – and the city created it!

Thu May 14, 2009 @ 1:37am

Riverfront

There has been much talk of a Downtown Canal lately, but the Canal project was preceded by an amazing, quadruple award winning design for our own Riverfront.  A number of years back, the City of Windsor created the Central Riverfront Implementation Plan, an enhancement to the existing trails and attractions along the riverfront.  If you are familiar with the Peace Beacon or the Mayor Bert Weeks Memorial fountain, these were part of this concept.

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The CRIP plan is broken down into five beacons, within nine small segments, with attractions that include:

- a marina with restaurant
- riverfront wind generators
- a viewing balcony on top of Hiram Walker’s grain silos
- an outdoor amphitheater/assembly plaza
- a fishing pier with fishing stations
- an artisans workshop
- a firefighter memorial
- public basketball & tennis courts
- bicycle racks every 30m along the course
- a mist wall
- volleyball courts
- a childrens garden
- skate park
- a wildflower and native species garden
- and a Walkerville Recreationway, a trail through Walkerville connecting to the river

More images and information below…

 

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The Celestial Beacon.


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The Legacy Beacon.


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The City Beacon.


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The Dawn Beacon.


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Proposed plan for Walkerville, in the area of Hiram Walker’s, and the Walker Power Building.

The Central Riverfront Implementation Plan won four awards in the early 2000s, including:

- Canadian Society of Landscape Architects 2003 National Merit Award
- Ontario Professional Planners Excellence in Planning Award
- Canadian Institute of Planners Honour Award
- Waterfront Centre 2001 Top Honours Award

There is still EXTENSIVE information on this plan, including high detail visual renderings, planning and placement of attraction maps, cost estimates (approximately the same we’d spend on a synthetic canal) and more, all on the City’s CRIP plan website:
http://www.citywindsor.ca/001819.asp

Here’s the catch though.  This plan for the Riverfront was designed by the Mayor Hurst administration, and before it could come to fruition, Eddie Francis was elected mayor.  Take that whichever way you wish.  But do compare and contrast both plans, and decide for yourselves which plan is more beneficial to Windsor.  Do we need an artificial canal, when a plan exists to enhance our beautiful, natural waterfront?

I urge you to discuss, debate, and repopularize this plan.  Perhaps we citizens may be able to remind the City of Windsor of its own award winning ideas!

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  • fleeting_image

    This is an awesome plan. Not only that but it doesn’t need to be implimented all at once. They could work on one section at a time as the budget would allow.

    Oh gorgeous. I do hope they do this!

  • anonymous

    It makes so much more sense to make what we already have beautiful than to tear up a neighbourhood on a gamble. What I like about this plan is that it extends the riverfront plaza past the casino into the Aylmer to Marentette neighbourhood, which badly needs a boost. The Francis canal plan, by leading development away from downtown in the other direction, essentially abandons the casino area and its residents. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if the link between Walkerville and downtown was a lovely, thriving neigbourhood built around this riverfront development, instead of the mess of boarded up and burned out houses it is now?

    Jodi (jodigreen.ca)

  • hey_joe42

    Now that is a good plan.

  • _linabeanz

    my thoughts on the canal idea aside, this seems like a lovely alternative!

    i will stand back as the debacle of idiotic debate persists. it’s too stressful.

  • mushrooms_4_u

    Wow, this looks like an awesome plan!

  • onyerbike

    You should maybe contact someone at the paper to do a write-up about this. I’ve never heard of this Beacon plan. And just by reading what you’ve provided here, I like it better than the Marina idea, for reasons that Jodi already stated. If the people of Windsor knew more about this, I’m sure they’d jump behind it.

  • westerntragedy

    That would be wonderful! The Alymer/Glengarry area has been neglected too long, and it’s only getting worse with the recent fires. Thriving is what I’d love to see.. an area for a real test of new urbanism.

  • yupislyr

    It’s not like the plan was hidden or something, perhaps forgotten.

    The media did report on the plan back when it first came out.

  • yupislyr

    Also of note, the guy who developed that plan also created the canal plan.

  • james123emb1

    I like the canal plans far more than the posted alternative. The are many more recreational and economic positives with the canal that don't exists with the light Beacon on the Water front idea. One of the objective of the municipality is to encourage people the move into the core of the city. The canal provides that. Also with an amphitheater free entertainment will be a constant attraction to pedestrians etc.
    Windsor Canal, 2 thumbs up