Well, Mel Rothenburger leans towards picking it, as well as few other airport improvement stories.
While the airport improvements and Westjet's "sniff" was certainly long in coming and is welcome for travelling people like me, I would like to suggest another story as the story of the year. Actually, its a combination of stories.
2008 saw two game changing neighbourhood plans approved - one for the North Shore and one for Aberdeen. These plans offer incredible opportunities for developers to remake our city for better for worse. The Aberdeen plan might be the last of a relic - a plan that will undoubtedly increase sprawl development - although the Aberdeen plan designs this sprawl in the most sustainable way sprawl could likely be designed. It remains to be seen if economic and environmental factors in the next 5 -10 years will allow the plan to stand as it is written now.
The North Shore plan offers a pretty solid blueprint for what many think will be development of the future - building up and not out, prioritizing pedestrian access to great amenities, and allowing people to live in one neighbourhood comfortably for their whole lives. The issue here will be selling this kind of development, not only on the North Shore, but downtown, and in our neighbourhood hubs across the city. The other question is who will champion the selling.
The tension and interaction between these two plans will determine what kind of community we have in Kamloops in the coming years. A tad more impactful, methinks, than the arrival of Canada's favourite airline.
I'm glad to hear that the plan for the North Shore is up, and not out, and deeply disappointed that the plan for Aberdeen is the opposite. I have traveled extensively, and lived abroad for around seven years, and I have to say, from what I've seen, a sprawling city is a boring, lonely, and inefficient city. I lived in Japan where the majority of (but not all) cities are built upwards, and are based around foot traffic and public transportation, not cars. These cities had vibrant, interesting, and dare I say it, fun, downtown cores and distinct neighborhoods. Even in cities smaller than Kamloops, foot traffic was very high. You'd see your neighbors often, and you'd see people who weren't your neighbors often enough to become friendly. You knew what was going on, and there was a real sense of community. You saw characteristics of individual neighborhoods as they developed. In Kamloops, I don't believe there is much of a sense of community at all, certainly nothing comparable to what I saw in Japan. Not one of the neighborhoods in Kamloops has a distinctive feel to it. I believe there is a lot of potential here, but it's not being utilized. The city of Kamloops could have *at least* three distinct centres, on the North Shore, downtown, and in Aberdeen with their own flavors. Right now, the only thing distinctive about Kamloops is the downtown core. Aberdeen is just housing and big boxes, and the North Shore is just housing and a few stores. It's too bad, really, but hopefully, on the North Shore at least, things will improve.
Posted by: rick | January 19, 2009 at 07:21 PM