Two letter writers provide their opinions on Nanaimo's downtown, namely its development and potential solutions to help people experiencing homelessness. (File Photo/NanaimoNewsNOW)

By NanaimoNewsNOW Staff

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Water Cooler: Transforming Nanaimo’s downtown core

Jan 29, 2022 | 9:03 AM

NANAIMO — The Water Cooler is NanaimoNewsNOW’s letters to the editor-style segment, featuring conversations about the news in Nanaimo and Oceanside.

This week’s feature contains two letters surrounding the same subject, ongoing social disorder in Nanaimo’s downtown core and potential solutions around it.

Greg L., Nanaimo: I’ve lived in or close to a number of small downtown areas in smaller towns and view the downtown area of Nanaimo as similar except for one large difference which is the waterfront area. I am thinking of Nelson, Sechelt, Fort Langley and Qualicum.

It would, I believe go a long way towards a successful plan for the downtown area if the planners were to visit these four townsites and see firsthand what features create areas that are already being very successfully lived in, utilized and attracting large numbers of tourists.

Designing and creating a plan for Nanaimo could be an amalgam of these other small downtown area. This is not rocket science, the areas I refer to are extremely successful. The only part of the present conversation that is missing is the area adjacent to the Gabriola ferry, the area which in my view could be developed into a combination of a “Granville Island” and park. Why the “Granville Island” idea is being ignored I cannot fathom, it being probably the largest and busiest tourist attraction in the lower mainland missing only the “park” component due to lack of area to expand.

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My daughter was until recently one of the management team for Granville Island and so I had an inside view of how successful it was. The number of jobs and opportunities it creates for many different businesses is amazing. Anyway, the “Planners” need to do some trips to these already established areas and learn by observation and discussion with the owners of the businesses and the tenants how to develop the Nanaimo area. It’s already been done, just use the ideas already in use.

“New” ideas are fun to speculate but often don’t work and are overall more expensive to develop. My wife and I and most people I talk to ALL visit these other area where they shop and stay. Every summer we visit Fort Langley and I have spent more money there in short visits than I have in Nanaimo. Learn from them!! Good luck, and get out there.

NanaimoNewsNOW: We would wager planners from the City have visited places like Fort Langley and Granville Island. It’s one thing to say key areas of Nanaimo’s downtown should be like those places, it’s another thing to actually make it happen.

The City of Nanaimo’s Port Drive Waterfront Master Plan envisions drastically overhauling the area just south of Port Place shopping centre. Plans to extend the waterfront walkway will help immensely.

Currently only a framework is in place to set the stage for future undetermined land use decisions at 1 Port Dr. a 27 acre piece of City-owned land.

Undoubtedly future City and private sector investments will re-purpose the area into a much more dynamic place — it’s just unclear when that will happen and what it will look like.

On face value, a Granville Island-style setup downtown would be amazing. Using prime real estate along south of the Gabriola ferry terminal is the perfect spot for a destination element. These things take time and whether the City moves in that direction or not remains to be seen.

While not on the level of a Granville Island type development, “The Hub” project will help modernize Terminal Ave., making it a more pedestrian-friendly urban area. The block between Esplanade and Commercial St. remains unclear in terms of how the old Jean Burns building will evolve, while nearby transit exchange seems less likely.

However, there are more immediate changes taking place in downtown Nanaimo.

As City project manager Michael Elliott mentioned in our piece on “The Hub”, there is no reason to rush if the final product is going to suffer.

“While we all want to get downtown going again, we’d rather get it right than rush to do something,” Elliott said.

– – –

Doug S., Nanaimo: Why do we continue to support ineffectual, stop gap measures when dealing with vagrants in the downtown? By encouraging warming centers, free meals, free clothing insures the continued demise of the downtown itself. Getting these people out of the downtown should be the focus of everyone.

The homeless need one thing – a home. I suggest we terminate the funding of these well meaning but essentially band aid solutions and build small heated sheds ( 64 sq ft ) to house them. we cannot allow them to overtake the downtown area, rather they must reside in the area the city designates, just like the citizens of Nanaimo.

If we continue on this ad hock path we fail to solve the homeless issue and destroy the downtown. Think for a moment, in any successful downtown you ever visited do you recall seeing numerous shopping carts, open drug use, and panhandling? Tourists when confronted with these unsavoury situations simply leave, never to return. Those with money have no loyalty and simply seek safer locations to spend their money. Please stop the stop gap, temporary solutions and support a safe, secure downtown and allow it to flourish.

NanaimoNewsNOW: We hesitated a great deal before publishing this letter from Douglas. The messages contained in it are not reflected by NanaimoNewsNOW, but they are consistent with many, ill informed comments regarding ongoing social disorder in the city.

For that reason, we felt it appropriate to include in this feature.

“The homeless” need much more than just a home. The lack of housing is often a symptom and not a condition, to borrow a medical analogy. Many living on the streets are there primarily because of other factors.

Some are there through no option, whether it be financial or family issues. Some are there because of circumstance, such as mental health issues. Some are there as a result of addiction. Some are there as a result of criminal activity. It’s those last two groups we hear the most about and draw most of the negative attention towards the city.

Much like the letter above on downtown solutions, building tiny homes for those without permanent housing is a great idea on the surface, but it serves a symptom and not the cause.

A roof, while a major and positive step forward, doesn’t help when someone is experiencing homelessness due to substance abuse or unresolved trauma. A person’s own space doesn’t help them long-term unless they are taught the life skills necessary to care and prosper in that space.

That’s the challenge facing people living on the street and, by extension, those working on the front lines trying to help. Several projects designed to provide social supports have either failed or are on life support, primarily due to lack of finances.

To “solve homelessness” requires everyone. It requires a look at housing costs, it requires more funding for social supports, it requires better education of life skills to youth, it requires better treatment and preventions related to opioids and it requires a total commitment from government and society to say “we’re going to fix this, now.”

Until it’s the number one priority, the “stop gap, temporary solutions” are saving lives.

Join the conversation. Submit your letter to NanaimoNewsNOW and be included on The Water Cooler, our letters to the editor feature.

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