Archive for downtowns

New styles of work and older urban designs

December 12, 2007 / Wendy Waters / 5 comments

Penelope Trunk recently provided seven predictions on the future of work. Many will require changes to how people live in cities.  Old style sprawl will not allow for new styles of working.   Here I’ll address her first two predictions:

The end of gender disparity
Pay is equal for men and women until there are kids. This inequality will change when Generation Y starts having kids because the men are committed to being equal partners in child rearing. We see already that among Generation X men and women are willing to give up pay and prestige in order to get time with their families. Generation Y’s demographic power will provide critical mass for big change.

The end of the stay-at-home parent
Women have already widely rejected the idea of sacrificing their time with children to a relentless, high-powered, long-houred job, and men are following suit. Women have also found that staying at home with kids all day is boring. Institutions are responding – finally — to these trends. Parents will choose some form of shared care. Each parent will work part-time and take care of kids part time.

These predictions and observations will require many families to abandon suburban life for a more urban existence. The suburbs evolved when one parent working outside the home was the norm. The other parent could then dedicate herself (or occasionally “himself) to getting the kids to schools and other activities, as well as looking after them at home. If the working parent had to commute 60 minutes each way, that was considered acceptable to have a large back yard and a white picket fence.

In order for both parents to share care and have careers, they’ll need to live in proximity to their employer or clients (for the self employed). Although the internet and mobile technology allows for some types of work to be done anywhere, face to face communication is usually essential some of the time. It builds trust, is part of networking, and is required at least occasionally for effective collaboration.

Having a home in a distant suburb makes it harder for two parents to blend work and family life. If you live 10 minutes from downtown (or a major employment area) — or live downtown — it’s easier to get away for a one hour meeting, which will only cost you 1 hour 20 minutes of time. If you live 60 minutes from downtown, a one hour meeting will cost you 3 hours, two of which will be fairly unproductive if you’re driving in traffic.

For those who need to make regular appearances at an “office” (or the equivalent there of), living close to work and the kids schools means that you can zip home in a few minutes if there is a problem or dash to the school to attend a concert for an hour. It also means less time wasted commuting and therefore more time with your kids. Plus, when it comes to negotiating flexibility — such as an option to work from home occasionally, or to work in the evening in return for having a shorter day at the office — it’s more workable (and an easier sell to employers) if you can get back quickly in an emergency.

So, the future of work and the future of cities are interconnected. Of course, living in higher density areas will usually mean living in a smaller place — maybe a condo or townhouse and playing at the park rather than in a big backyard.

Category: "back to the center", downtowns, planning policy, public spaces, resident attitudes, residential development, sprawl, urban families, urban lifestyles /

Do schools and condos mix?

November 15, 2007 / Wendy Waters / One comment

As more families move to dense urban areas in places like New York, Toronto or Vancouver, the question of fitting schools into an already dense urban landscape emerges.   The traditional and suburban model of a large one-story building surrounded by proprietary sports fields won’t work.

As reported in the NY Times this week (pointer Planetizen), a school in New York city launched an innovative plan to pay for a new school through building 18 storeys of luxury condominiums on top of the eight-storey school.  Many are opposed to the project for various reasons.

While there might be legitimate reasons to deny this specific project (and I don’t know the neighborhood issues involved), the overall concept is one I expect we’ll see with increasing frequency for several reasons:

1. It allows private organizations to afford to build or expand a school (as in the NY case above).

2. The only way to make downtown living family friendly is to offer more space in schools — whether private or public.  And the only affordable way for a city school board (or private school operator) to acquire land (or space for a school) is to partner with a developer who would be asked to give up the school space in return for other concessions such as a taller tower or another form of higher density.

In Vancouver there is a pending university-and-condo development.  Why not an elementary or high school?

Category: development conflicts, downtowns, real estate, residential development, urban families /

Risks for cities from investor-owned condos

October 28, 2007 / Wendy Waters / 7 comments

The popularity of downtown condominium living has generated a building and buying frenzy in many North American cities. There are tremendous benefits to metropolitan areas of having more people living in the inner core — less pollution, less congestion, more home ownership options (beyond the single family house). Concentrating more people in an area also supports great street-front retail and restaurant neighborhoods, which draw people to the city.

But, is the condo boom unwittingly leading to a further concentration of wealth — in this case real estate wealth — in the hands of the baby boomers (rather than helping younger people enter the housing market).

It makes sense that financially well-off individuals looking for new investment options have been buying downtown condominiums and renting them out. In Toronto and Vancouver, according to the Financial Post in an article by Gary Marr, an estimated 25% of downtown condominiums are investor owned. In some buildings, the figure is higher. A couple years ago in a casual conversation, a realtor working for Rennie Marketing Systems in Vancouver told me that at one particular tower approximately 60% of buyers were investors with no intention of living there, and that this was becoming the norm for buildings she had been involved with.

According to Gary Marr’s research, most investors are baby boomers between 45 and 55 who have a principal residence. In fact, he found evidence that 25% of people who have a principal residence valued at over $1 million own a second property.  Many are using the equity in their single family homes to buy a downtown condo and rent it out (and they increasingly want something special and less generic, hoping this will help with long term value).

My question: is the trend toward investor-owned condos further concentrating wealth? Or is it helping to diversify home ownership? And how would we measure this?

A couple other factors to consider:

Without the condo option, single family housing would likely be even more expensive than it is already in many major cities. Also, without the condo buildings, it’s possible that average apartment rents would be even higher (as investor condos are rental stock), since in places like Vancouver building rental accommodation does not typically make economic sense for a developer as they cannot break even let alone make a profit on such a project. At least the condos generate additional supply.

I’d love to hear your thoughts on this…

Category: downtowns, real estate, residential development /

Toronto on the rise?

October 23, 2007 / Wendy Waters / 7 comments

Toronto is changing fast. No longer is it just Canada’s financial and business hub, but it’s becoming a world centre as well, with many of the spin off benefits and challenges.

This is the argument or observation of Dr. Sherry Cooper, the Chief Economist at BMO Capital Markets and BMO Nesbitt Burns in an essay she penned last week.

In my view, Toronto is becoming a world-class financial and commercial centre on the order of New York and London. While [new ultra-deluxe] condos are going for $1,300-to-$1,800 a square foot, they are cheap by international standards. Donald Trump—at the Toronto ground breaking of Trump Tower Toronto’s construction at Adelaide and Bay—recently declared that comparable property would sell for $5,000 a square foot in New York and even more in London.
…

No where is the new wave of foreign money more evident than on Bloor Street—Toronto’s version of the Big Apple’s Fifth Avenue with its mixed-use high-end residential, office and retail space. New designer stores are opening and existing ones are expanding. Canada’s-own Holt Renfrew’s flagship store has expanded and remodeled, becoming even more decidedly upscale; as well, designer boutiques such as Chanel, Gucci, and Escada have expanded. High-priced trendy restaurants are popping up city wide and the remodeling and expansion of the ROM, the Gardiner Museum and the Art Gallery of Ontario are enhancing this urban renewal. We are observing the gentrification of Bloor Street west of Avenue Road and east of Yonge Street as downscale commercial properties are replaced by upscale residences and boutiques. For example, the 16-storey ultra-luxury Museum House condominium development will take the place of the Pizza Hut opposite the ROM’s new Crystal and it will be accompanied by other luxury condos on that same strip of Bloor. Even the seamier side of Yonge St. south of Bloor will change with the coming (in 2011) 80-storey hotel/residential/retail tower of 1 Bloor, touted as the tallest residential tower in Canada by its Kazakhstan-based developer. This five-star boutique hotel will join the other five larger five-star hotels opening in Toronto in the next few years, taking us from not a single five-star hotel in all of Canada to six and counting in Toronto alone.

Bottom Line: this is a fascinating and important economic development, bearing with it enormous portent. On the positive side, it will be a boost to the revenue base of the beleaguered city government and certainly increase the economic growth of the city and no doubt encourage the rise of the Canadian dollar. On the negative side, it will reduce the affordability of the city for current residents, potentially displacing low-income residents. It puts additional strain on public services and adds to the de-industrialization of the inner city. Historical preservation has become an issue as we have seen with the saving of the old fire house and the frontage of the first site of Mt. Sinai hospital on Yorkville Avenue. We run the risk of creating concrete caverns that block the sun and increase gridlock on already-busy city streets. It is an opportunity and a challenge, and it is happening faster than most people realize.

Toronto is certainly changing. While I generally agree with Cooper, I think she may be over-stating the case for current change — although not Toronto’s potential. I’m not sure it is achieving the status of New York or London — at least not yet. But it may be securing a role as the number two financial centre in North America after New York. And Toronto has a lot of advantages in terms of growing in this area:

In particular, Toronto offers an attractiveness to potential foreign immigrants and an easier immigration process, in comparison to New York. With over 40% of the population foreign born in the Toronto area (know locally as the GTA), most immigrants can find an ex-pat community from their birth country, should this be important. And Canada has been easing immigration restrictions, particularly for young, educated professionals — talent — which is becoming scarce in some industries and cities.

Toronto as a city is more like New York and London than most North American places. Although automobile-centred sprawl has created some challenges in recent decades, the older districts in the core are more human centred and walkable — and well serviced by efficient public transportation options used by all levels of society (much like New York and London). As oil becomes expensive and more sustainable living desirable, Toronto like New York and London is better positioned.

Certainly, Toronto lacks the same history as a global hub that London and New York share. But has Dubai has shown, this can be overcome with ingenuity, determination, and boldness. Further growth in Toronto may, therefore, require some clever and brash steps from business and political leaders.

And, Cooper is correct in noting the challenges. One she doesn’t mention is that Toronto’s infrastructure is decaying. Roads, overpasses, sewers, etc. require upgrades. Moreover, the city is desperately short of funds and cutting back services to citizens. I’m not sure that new deluxe condos will bring in enough new revenue to really help.

Without good infrastructure, the city will start to decline under its own weight and become less livable, undermining its potential as a financial centre. It’s the federal government’s revenues that will really benefit from Toronto becoming a bolder, global city and financial hub. And its from Ottawa that more support will be needed in order for Toronto to continue on this path.

Category: attracting talent, commercial development, downtowns, economic development, national politics, real estate, urban history /

Ending an era and new beginnings

October 18, 2007 / Wendy Waters / 2 comments

The rapid revitalization of downtowns and urban cores has driven up demand for housing in many North American (and especially Canadian) cities, raising property values and pushing some uses out. New townhouse and condominium developments often require long-standing businesses to close – as can new retail projects to serve the growing population.

Toronto Star columnist Tony Wong wrote a great piece a couple weeks ago about what is being lost.

The last customer in Tony Pontieri’s neighbourhood garage shop drove a black Honda Civic.

She had wanted a front licence plate put on her car, for which the dealer wanted to charge her an hourly rate. Pontieri did it free.

“I’m going to really miss you,” she told Pontieri, 49.

So will a lot of other customers. Independent garages in downtown Toronto are a rarity, and now one of the city’s oldest establishments is selling out for an undisclosed sum.

“It’s going to be tough leaving. I’ll really miss the customers,” said Pontieri, in shorts and a T-shirt, packing a skid as he prepared to move out by Monday. “This place is as old as I am.”

The Pontieri story is a familiar one. Toronto’s real estate boom has meant older, established businesses are cashing out to new development. Earlier this year, the iconic Addison on Bay Cadillac dealership closed its doors to make way for a condo.

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The area has changed considerably from the time father Frank Pontieri opened the shop in 1958. “There were train tracks and hobos living in abandoned trains. Now I’m surrounded by million-dollar condos.”

Even the St. Lawrence Farmers’ Market next door has gone upscale. A sign outside advertises Organic Gourmet Tofu.

Pontieri figures at least half a dozen local garages have ceased to exist over the past decade.

Increasing population density in the city is generally a good thing for decreasing environmental impact and improving urban livability. But there is a cost.

Category: "back to the center", commercial development, downtowns, real estate, residential development, urban history /

Slow cities

October 8, 2007 / Wendy Waters / One comment

How do you make a city livable? City planners, development specialists and urban residents debate and struggle with this issue — particularly in North America. Meanwhile in Europe, a solution taken from the past is gaining momentum — slow cities.

A great article in Der Spiegel (found via Planetizen) details how the slow city movement works.

“Slow City” advocates argue that small cities should preserve their traditional structures by observing strict rules: cars should be banned from city centers; people should eat only local products and use sustainable energy. In these cities, there’s not much point in looking for a supermarket chain or McDonald’s.

For such a plan to work, citizens have to support it. In a large city, it would be difficult to ban automobiles in the downtown and still have a viable business and retail district — many people simply wouldn’t go there. Indeed, to belong to the official slow city movement in Europe, a city must have fewer than 50,000 residents. Most cities joining the slow city network have histories dating as far back as medieval times and residents are proud of this heritage.

No North American city dates back that far (even those few places with settlements dating to the 15th century or before like Mexico City or Santa Fe, Taos, etc. no longer have the same roads and buildings). Unlike in the European slow cities, downtowns in North American cities (whether large or small) were typically built either for automobiles or at least for a combination of streetcars and horse carriages which required wide roadways.

So could larger North American cities (or larger European cities) learn anything from the slow city movement in terms of livability. I think they could at the neighborhood level. Some neighborhoods have community spirit, and are small enough to continue fostering that camaraderie.

While banning automobiles might be challenging as a 24X7 policy, it might be doable in a busy pedestrian area on weekend afternoons, for example. Encouraging residents to support local family owned businesses can inherently discourage large chains from setting up (if the locals won’t shop there, they don’t last).

Could it work? Are there any “slow neighborhoods” in big cities? If you know of one, please leave a comment.

Category: communities, downtowns, public spaces, urban history, urban lifestyles /

Kids in Cities Learning Network (CEOS for Cities)

September 14, 2007 / Wendy Waters / No comments

CEOs for cities has launched the Kids in Cities Learning Network. Their goal is to understand the reasons why many families choose the suburbs and as important, the ways in which other families are finding the city to be the perfect place to raise children:

To get answers, we turned to the Institute of Design. We asked teams of designers there to help us develop a deep understanding of the market and how they might be moved to alter their behavior.

Their approach was to study pioneering urban parents. Rather than ask people what they might do in hypothetical situations, they studied what people choosing to raise their children in cities are actually doing. They also interviewed urban and suburban “discontents” — parents not completely satisfied with their current situations.

What they found is that the top concerns of parents about city living are safety, space and schools. But they found that satisfied urban parents had ways to address each of these concerns. The very nature of the city alleviated their safety concerns with its density and “eyes on the street.” They supplemented their lack of private space by using the city’s public spaces, such as parks and sidewalks. And they augmented their children’s education with the city’s diversity and cultural and other assets.

For pioneering city parents — and we found many of them — cities are the perfect place to raise children.

Preliminary findings as well as the framework for further study have been published.  It’s worth a read.  CEOS for Cities will now be hosting learning forums where other cities can learn from the parents and families — who have chosen the city — and who participated in the report.

I’ve only had an opportunity to skim the report.  What intrigues me are the numerous ways that urban parents interacted with their children and the city.  “There’s so much to do” said many people, and often within walking distance or a short transit ride.  Families used public spaces together — whether the park, a museum, planetarium, aquarium, the sidewalks, or the commercial community (store and cafe owners who knew the family).

In their lessons for cities generally, one conclusion is that more family-oriented spaces — as well as general public ones — would then, theoretically, increase the appeal of raising kids in dense urban areas.

Category: "back to the center", downtowns, planning policy, public spaces, resident attitudes, revitalization, urban families, urban lifestyles /

Urban Wi-fi

September 11, 2007 / Wendy Waters / One comment

Last year many city governments actively pursued partnerships or other means to provide wireless internet access (wi-fi) in certain districts like downtown or throughout the city.  

Today, ubiquitous urban wireless access is looking less likely in many US cities (whether paid or free).   As the Associated Press reports, major ISP Earthlink is banking off its crusade to help blanket American cities with wi-fi.  They have concluded that the risk to their company is too high, they fear that in most cities they will never be able to gain the subscribers to recover costs and turn a profit on this venture.   This is despite some subsidies and guaranteed contracts to cover all city workers in many municipalities.

Looking to the future, it nevertheless seems inevitable that most major cities and urban regions will offer widespread wireless internet access.  This will be important for business as well as urban life.  The question is who will pay for it. 

Is wireless internet access a new piece of urban infrastructure, like roads, that cities will need to provide residents and visitors alike?

Or, will the ability to connect to the wireless internet work more like cel phone access – user pay and competing providers?

I’m inclined to believe the latter will be the basis for future urban wi-fi.   People who want to access the internet from anywhere will need an account with a service provider.   I expect it will work like cel phone services — one account and you can tap into the internet (like a cel network) from home, the street, the office or on the road in another city.  Indeed, I expect that cel phone providers may become the main wireless internet suppliers as they already have much of the required infrastructure and offer internet access on a more limited basis to users of the Blackberry and similar devices.

Google is offering another potential model reminiscent of the early days of land telephone lines (when phone companies subsidized home phones in order to profit from long distance service).  Google’s goal is to maximize internet use, which in turn increases the likelihood that people will see Google advertisements — and Google has already built a free wireless network in their hometown of Mountain View California with talk of extending it around the Bay area.  Users must view ads to use the internet, but otherwise it is free.

Cities will need the private sector to build this infrastructure.  Municipal governments simply cannot afford to become internet service providers.  They already struggle to maintain roads, sewers, parks, police, transit, etc.

However, city councils interested in economic development will also likely want or need to ensure that wireless internet service comes to their cities — and early.  It will be another competitive edge it the battle to attract talented people and national and global businesses, all of whom pay taxes.  

The question is just what model will prevail. 

Category: city hall, commercial development, downtowns, economic development, public spaces, urban technologies /

Is the city your workspace?

August 22, 2007 / Wendy Waters / 2 comments

As the knowledge economy grows, along with the percentage of workers paid to think, create and innovate, how and where people work is also changing.

Ironically, the easier it is to work from anywhere, the more important it has become to interact face to face with co-workers as well as others in the industry.

Cities, therefore, are important as spaces for collaboration. Power lunches at high end restaurants have long been a fixture of the elite business community and the site of mega power brokerage. Today, however, it seems a local cafe, the food court, or the patio of a simple burger joint have also become places where people come to think — whether alone or with a group, and generate new ideas.

Many companies now allow their workers to be fully mobile. To work from anywhere in the company’s leased office space — or from their house, the park or Starbucks.

Readers, I’m curious … how many of you regularly use “the city” and its amenities as workspaces?

If you do, are you self-employed? Or, do you work for an employer who offers and encourages this type of flexibility? Where do you like to work? why?

Assuming that this is a long term trend and not a fad, it has implications for urban economic development, and the locations where companies will choose to locate. A city may struggle to attract big knowledge-oriented employers without amenities where employees want to hang out and work. Downtowns may again rule over suburban business parks.

More on this subject soon…

And, e-mail me directly if you want to respond privately

Category: attracting talent, downtowns, economic development, urban lifestyles /

Parking rates, transit use and commute times

July 30, 2007 / Wendy Waters / 2 comments

It will cost you over $1000 per month to park a car in downtown London, England, around $700 per month in Tokyo or Sydney. By contrast, the average unreserved monthly parking rate in Dallas is only $85, in Reno only $45.

These are some findings from Colliers International’s annual survey of global parking rates, released last week. The average median rate among the surveyed US cities was $152, and the Canadian cities C$207 (about $194 USD).

12 most expensive cities in North America…

  1. New York, $630
  2. Boston, $460
  3. San Francisco $350
  4. Calgary, $328
  5. Philadelphia, $297
  6. Chicago, $285
  7. Toronto $281
  8. Montreal, $246
  9. Washington, $240
  10. Sacramento $205
  11. Charleston, $200
  12. Vancouver, $196

So what do these rates reveal?

The first thing that caught my attention is the strong correlation in the US between parking rates and transit usage, as there is in Canada. This suggests that in cities struggling to increase transit ridership, that higher parking rates might help.

If we were to look at commute times as well, there may be a connection. From a quick look at US 2002 census figures for commute times, it seems that average commute times, higher parking rates and higher rates of transit usage all go together– although the correlation is less strong between commute times and parking rates than parking rates and transit usage.

It may be that once there is no time saving in driving, that people will take transit. Some studies suggest that people are valuing their time, more than their income (money) — so this would make sense.

I would take transit if it were faster or even slightly slower (not 3 times slower as it is for me now) – would you? And, if we added in extreme parking rates, I might accept an even longer trade off.

If there were good statistics on the number of people who telecommute 1-2 days per week (as far as I know, the only good statistics are on people who work from home all or most of the time), we might also find a correlation between this growing trend and parking rates, transit usage and commute times.

It may bet that the higher the time, money, and energy costs become to have employees commuting, the more likely a company or organization will consider other options — especially given the technologies that exist and the growing number of people who work in knowledge-oriented jobs.

I’d like to read a super-study looking at all of these factors and what they mean. Anyone know of one?

Category: downtowns, planning policy, urban lifestyles /
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