Fix Your Downtown 2: Start With What Has Worked for Other Cities

Learn from those cities that have already grappled with how to revitalize their core

This is the second in a series of common sense solutions for fixing downtowns.

Revitalizing Times Square in New York focused on creating a place for people day and night

People-focused plan

A downtown revitalization strategy is not a communications exercise. 

It is a city-building exercise that contemplates the unique features of your city. It includes the investments needed for success and it understands how change will occur when you allow it to do so organically.

And most importantly it is a plan that centres people in each step of the way — residents, visitors, business owners, artists and workers each contributing to a new diverse mix of life and fun.

Revitalizing your downtown will require both government and private investments. Shying away from a dollar figure will only stall efforts.  And it will require governments stepping out of the way and allowing the new community to grow organically.

Most of all it will require cities to be bold.  They will need to try new things and to understand that success will only come if some setbacks are an option.  Of course, no one should expect a failure on the scale of a large infrastructure project but there will be setbacks while progress happens.

The good news is that many cities are finding new ways of defining their downtown core.  Some are moving at a quick pace and some at large scale.  There are ideas to borrow and lessons to learn.

Let’s look at a few examples of cities that have taken the bold steps to a revitalized downtown.

Calgary, Alberta

Calgary has been a leader in investing money, ideas and partnerships in its downtown core.  Along with other partner investments, the city has seen over $500M invested into the revitalization of its core through office building conversions into housing, new hotel spaces, student housing and post-secondary academic spaces.  

By removing 6 million square feet of vacant office space by 2031, the city anticipates it can provide over 2300 new homes for Calgarians in the downtown.  The city also recognized early in its process that these new ‘vertical neighbourhoods’ need more to thrive than just housing. They  planned for an increase in greenspace and amenities for these new communities to ensure a diversity of household types.  

As a result, Calgary has witnessed record levels of investment in its emerging tech and startup sector. Success breeds success! And lessons learned for other cities.

Denver, Colorado

Denver was forced to reckon with its empty downtown in the 1990s with the fallout from the oil and gas bust, so it has had a head start on many other cities.  They started by exploring how people will want to live in a new built-up downtown. 

It was no surprise that having a home close to a job that you could walk to or take transit to was essential for most people contemplating this new way of city living. And of course, this emphasis on what people are looking for — restaurants and retail and nightlife — are also what attracted companies to relocate to Denver.

The city was then able to focus on arts and culture as catalysts for further redevelopment. Because, success breeds success! 

And can we talk about the nightlife a bit more ...

Any City with a Thriving Nightlife

Think about a city you have visited or might want to visit.  What draws you to this place? People? Arts and cultural scenes? Interesting shops? Great food? Fun activities in the daytime and nighttime?

We rarely want to visit any city neighbourhood at night that isn’t animated and bustling with people.  While we may not always want to interact with people around us, they always make the spaces around us feel safer and more interesting.  

More and more cities are looking at revitalizing their downtowns for both daytime and nighttime experiences.  

This article by Jess Reia, assistant professor of data science at University of Virginia walks us through the science of nighttime governance.  As a member of the City of Montreal’s first Night Council from June 2020 to November 2022, she considered two fundamental questions that allowed Montreal to form a nightlife ecosystem: ‘Why should cities govern themselves after dark?  How can they responsibly do so?’

How does a Night Mayor or Night Council contribute to a revitalized downtown?

Well much activity is already taking place after hours — cafes, transit, restaurants, garbage collection, emergency services, convenience stores and museums to name a few.  Understanding how new residential spaces can interact with what is already happening outside during the nocturnal hours in a way that draws people — residents and visitors — out to interact with each other adds an exciting dimension to the downtown.  People will want to keep returning. Businesses will want to keep investing. And the downtown can become a more diverse, equitable and interesting place day and night.

Elephant that Marched into Downtown

Cities everywhere are grappling with how to reimagine their downtowns. 

Some began to change decades ago because they knew that thriving downtown cores would bring artists, tourists, businesses and others who want to experience vibrant streets and neighbourhoods. 

Others began when they had to come to terms with the negative impacts on an entire city when their downtowns emptied out because industries were shutting down and moving elsewhere. 

Today most are forced to reckon with where to start because COVID has marched the elephant into their downtowns. 

We suggest that you start by looking where others have succeeded.  That number is growing - your city would do well to join it in a serious way.