CD 21 Zone

[grammafreddy]

*sigh*

The CD21 was not a workable plan - and neither is the new downtown plan.

The major interest in the now-history CD21 plan seems to me to be focused on the Lawrence and Leon problem, but what people do not realize is that the issues there and the ability to improve anything there is totally out of council's hands. It was that way for Gray before when he was mayor, it was that way all the time Shepherd was mayor and it will be for whoever wins this election.

Some people are of the opinion that the CD21 would have solved all the ills downtown. That is just not the truth. It never will be the truth.

Consider if you will ...

1. Under the zoning, up until this year, the zoning downtown allowed for up to 20 storeys anywhere downtown.
2. During our building boom years recently, how many new buildings of any height did you see get built on Lawrence or Leon?
3. How many high rise towers got built right downtown?
4. Did Lawrence and Leon improve at all when they were allowed 20 storey buildings?
5. Why not? The zoning was in place for them. The developers could have built them, but they did not.
6. There are at least 6 new condo development project currently sitting in limbo in the city, one of which is "24" - a 27-storey highrise planned on Bernard Avenue which the developer asked the city to hold off on giving it final approval because they could not pre-sell enough units to make the project financially viable. None of these projects are going ahead at this time because they were unable to pre-sell enough units and ALL of them asked the city not to give them the final approval because, had the city council done that, they would have been legally forced to start construction.


Here is the answer to why Lawrence and Leon look like they do and why no council will be able to "fix" the problems ... and why we will not be seeing any high rise buildings in the downtown core for many years to come.

The tall buildings require a large footprint. The land in the downtown core is in small parcels. In order to build a tall building, developers needed to buy AT A MINIMUM as much as half a city block of small parcels - all joined together.

Some key smaller individual land owners did not and do not want to sell their land to the developers. Some of them were never even consulted in the planning for this CD21 exercise - not by Milroy's group, nor by the city.

*******
Below is the vision as it was in the CD21 plan ... check out the footprints of the buildings ...

I decided to take the developer's vision and plop it down on top of the sorta current existing lay-out downtown - to put it more into context so it would be something that people (including me ) could relate to.

What I see is that Bernard Avenue will end at the extended Mill Street (which will end at Lawrence Ave) and all traffic on Bernard will funnel down Mill instead of along Abbott. Once Bernard traffic gets to Lawrence it will have to funnel onto Lawrence which currently is a one way street and which is why MOT says Lawrence would have to become a two-way street. From Lawrence, Bernard traffic would then go to Abbott (west bound) for the bridge traffic or away from the lake (east bound)for other than bridge traffic.

The end of Bernard would be closed off and the end of Abbott would be closed off. In my picture, that is the "green zone" where it would be pedestrian only.

Kerry Park would have Highrise #1 built on it, so Kerry Park (and the Ogopogo statue would be history) would change to have a high rise building beside Kelly O'Brian's on Bernard across Mill St. So, too, would the docking for the tourist boats there.

All the blue squares on my picture are high rise buildings that do not exist today.

Hopefully this helps people see better the changes that this CD21 zone had in mind for us.

Click on the picture to see it larger (I hope)

According to their CD21 plan, we would have lost at least three heritage buildings at the lake end of Bernard, as well. They would have been demolished when Mill Street was punched through to Lawrence.

IMO, the biggest reason those two streets look as bad as they do, and were allowed to become so run down, is because the developers and the city council of that day (Mr Gray's council), wanted to choke out the small land owners and drive the prices down at the same time. They either let their lands turn into weed-infested parking lots or else they put unsavory tenants into the buildings they owned there. There was, IMO, a definite backroom handshake between Gray's council and the big developers who had an interest in amassing more land on which to build their towers. And some people now want to re-elect Gray?? The difference between Gray and Shepherd as mayor is that Shepherd did things down there the honest, open way and Gray hid it all while he (and his council) manipulated behind the scenes.

The failed CD21 was not a quick fix and the new downtown plan is not going to be, either. Until the small landowners are willing to sell to the big developers or the city, nothing will be able to be done down there. The small landowners hold all the trump cards and Gray and Shepherd and the old boys club (and maybe even FourChange) know it. So my big concern now is how do Gray, Blanleil, Gran, Givens, Zimmerman and the rest of the FourChange slate think they will be able to force these landowners now - and what underhanded tactics do they plan to use?

[Giddyup]

I keep hearing and laughing when I hear that fourchange is a grass roots organization. Hilarious! They have an agenda and the developers are standing in their shadows hoping to get push-overs put on council. Congrats to the councillors that had guts to say "hold on a minute", and ask the hard questions that some councillors seemed only too happy to ignore. Last I checked, the councillors who fourchange want removed, all stated they want downtown development, just not in this version plagued with issues.

[Mtn Biker]

I keep hearing and laughing when I hear that fourchange is a grass roots organization. Hilarious! They have an agenda and the developers are standing in their shadows hoping to get push-overs put on council. Congrats to the councillors that had guts to say "hold on a minute", and ask the hard questions that some councillors seemed only too happy to ignore. Last I checked, the councillors who fourchange want removed, all stated they want downtown development, just not in this version plagued with issues.

Yup . . . here's their ten top reasons:

There are many examples of this lack of leadership to be found in every corner of Kelowna. Here are just 10 of them...
1.Much work, great support, then this Council reverses the Downtown Redevelopment Plan
Council did so because of the large outcry of citizens who said this plans sucks.

2.Rapid Transit to Rutland sees 5 years of talk, but the watered-down plan is still not done
Victoria continually dropped the ball on this. Victoria presently controls our bus system, and Shepherd is lobbying to change that.
3.New Kelowna logo not so original or popular; but city spends $80,000 on "extensive" research
$80 was the total cost of implementation which included research, but also the change over to all city owned vehicles and stationary.
4.City seeks proposals for KSS site, but rejects them all, site now sits empty, as city invents...
That was squashed by Ron Mattiussi
5....the Central Green plan, loaded with costly demands, no takers, could cost us $10 million
Again point the finger at Mattiussi
6.City buys waterfront lots at Cedar Avenue; then rejects project; now back for more study
They rejected the project because it deviated from the original intent and why the properties were purchased in the first place. The project went totally commercial with buildings as high as 5 stores on the lakeshore.
7.Salary task force says freeze salaries, but this Council delays 4 months, grudgingly agrees
Ya like you all would happily take a pay cut. Don't forget you're supporting 4 current councilors, so what was their part in this.
8.City wants rebuild of Bernard Avenue, but gives no promise of faster winter construction
The city opened it up to the business owners to determine the best course of action for all. Can’t please everyone. And the plans are going ahead.
9.Council bounces around about Enterprise Bunnies, then debates Backyard Chickens
Really. You’re all supposed to be business people and you’re making this an election issue. Seems kind of petty.
10.City changes its mind on HOV lanes
City doesn’t control the HOV and has recommended many changes, particularily to the hours of operation.

To anyone reading the Fourchange.org website, please read between the lines. These are business people who had the keys to the city taken from them. They have to do things like everyone else now and they're *bleep* about that.