Downtown Oakville BIA
41st Midnight Madness Crowd
I arrived in Oakville with my wife, Jemma, and our two boys, Ruadhán and Caelen, in April of this year. We had previously lived in Salzburg, Austria, where I directed a contemporary art museum, and Sligo, Ireland, where I directed a contemporary art centre. Before that, I was managing the Blackwood Gallery at the University of Toronto, Mississauga campus. Now, I am directing Oakville Galleries and making a few changes.
This is a thrilling time to be arriving in Oakville. Plans for Oakville’s Downtown Cultural Hub are underway. A New Museum is also in the works, and my next article will speak to that.
For now, I can say that a downtown site has been identified for the New Museum. And the strategizing for that New Museum has also brought up other conversations around urban planning.
These conversations take me back in some ways to my role in Ireland, where I was also actively involved in conversations about urban improvement and pedestrianization. In Salzburg, the city around the museum I directed was already largely pedestrian and bike-friendly.
The Austrians seem to have many of these issues sorted.
When we envision Oakville’s overall Downtown Cultural Hub (which includes the New Museum, a new library, a new performing arts centre, and the demolishing of the existing Centennial Square), perhaps we might think creatively about how urban space may be used.
Currently, as in almost every urban center in North America, Oakville’s downtown core is devoted to the automobile. The Toronto historian Jane Jacobs reminded us of the importance of designing cities for people to create a collection of villages within an urban framework.
Many cosmopolitan centers, however, were framed through the lens of car accessibility. In many European city centers, on the other hand, there are simply downtown areas where cars cannot go. Their overall planning complements the existing landscape and architecture.
Nature is given freer expression, and the air quality, freedom of movement, and gathering of people in these areas is remarkable. Many of us have had the luxury of having a cappuccino or beer in the bustle or quiet of a European town square.
Naturally, it is not always this good overseas.
The Irish economist David McWilliams says that Irish towns are often built with their “backs to the river.” This means that roads and buildings were constructed alongside riversides without creating a healthy zone for people around the river.
Instead of facing the river with greenery, parks, footpaths, terraces, boulevards and gardens, walls, streets and cars cut off the river from the town and, thus, from the people.
With Oakville’s Downtown Cultural Hub, including our plans for the New Museum, Oakville has an opportunity to create a meaningful urban center that offers healthy, meaningful space that complements the landscape, urban offerings and the creek and lake. We could be in line with future trends that move us into a greener future.
Imagine no cars on the Downtown section of Lakeshore Drive, for example.
I was having lunch on a patio there recently, and not only were countless cars passing by within centimetres, but there were constant emissions and eruptions from mufflers to deal with. Cars not only constantly move through these beautiful streets, emitting fumes and noise pollution (the 95 decibels law for car noise in Ontario is virtually never enforced), they also deaden public space when they are parked.
Twenty parked cars take up 2,000 square feet, requiring 6,000 square feet of asphalt. This is an enormous loss of space and an inefficient and irresponsible use of resources. Imagine then if we decide to rid urban centres of traffic and parking spaces. Incredible transformation happens: People fill those spaces.
The deafening tailpipe racket is replaced by the music of children playing. Hard, grey concrete becomes soft, green space, much cooler in the summer, providing necessary shade from a warming climate. Leisure, play, conversation, friendship and culinary delight replace parked cars. Splash pads and gardens replace asphalt.
People do desire more green spaces.
Abbie Siu at Oakville Galleries
Oakville Galleries in Gairloch Gardens
Come to Gairloch Gardens, where Oakville Galleries is located and see swarms of people enjoying the gardens, escaping traffic and noise, and simply hanging out in a beautiful spot.
And as the beauty, quality of life, community health and freedom of movement increase, so does the economy. There are countless economic studies that inarguably link green and pedestrianized city centers with increased economic health.
Take the cars out, and people spend more time and more of their hard-earned income in those areas.
Besides, isn’t it now imperative that we change how we plan and live in urban centers?
The climate crisis is well underway. We cannot go about building our cities as in the past when forest fires burn rampant, and glaciers are melting.
Oakville’s population will double again in the coming decades, but the automobile as we know it is on the way out. Younger generations do not have the same fascination for them as older generations do.
David McWilliams suggests actually that we “think like teenagers” when we plan socio-economic growth. A “growth mindset” is not through the prism of how things were done in the past but rather by considering what will accommodate the needs of future generations.
McWilliams applies the concept of Cathedral Thinking to managing growth. Medieval cathedrals were built with the future in mind. Architects, stonemasons, and artisans laid plans, and countless workers laboured to build sacred architecture to serve future generations. This idea applies to countless cultural heritages across the globe.
Today, this concept applies to the climate change crisis. Therefore, we curtail our behaviour, adopt constructive policies protecting the environment, and develop robust green technology. Thus, we are also compelled to think about urban planning.
New plans for Oakville’s Downtown Cultural Hub could enable the future to unfold in Oakville in a healthier, more attractive, more beautiful, and more exciting manner. Imagine walking through a quieter downtown where you can hear crickets and chatter as you pass thriving restaurants and shops, through a park where children play to arrive at the lakeside, all without encountering a car.
Our children and grandchildren deserve it.
So do we.
