Quote:
Originally Posted by J.OT13
To a point, yes.
This proposal here does not in any way encourage people to live a healthy, car free life. The nearest shopping plaza is around 3 kilometers away and no one will bus, or walk that distance in the suburbs.
They might take the bus to the city for work, as a lot of people who live in single family houses do (mostly park and ride), but they will always use a car outside rush hour.
It sort of defeats one of the main purposes of intensification, bring hundreds upon thousands of people at the doorstep of shops/services/entertainment where one can live car free by choice with no problem.
Now I do think there are circumstances where intensification in the suburbs could work. Examples include Hazeldean road, Robertson or near Kanata Centrum (the best spot in my opinion since it replicates a traditional downtown) where people are near transit and those all-important shops and services.
But of course that should not come at the expense of park and rides (at grade, below or above grade structures) because they are essential to encouraging the thousands of suburbanites living in single family homes to take the bus to the City, if only to avoid traffic.
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I feel that intensification needs to occur throughout the city, including the suburbs. While I personally wouldn't want to live in Beaverbrook, clearly more people do than the current number of units there permits or else these developments would not be getting proposed as they would be uneconomical.
Yes, development here will still depend on cars and not have the same positive impact as a similar condo tower might on a traditional mainstreet inside the greenbelt that is well served by transit. However, this development still moves towards a better city when compared to that same number of units having to be built yet further away from the core on an even-quicker expanding fringe (which is the alternative to this sort of development).
As compared to new development on Kanata's fringe, these units are centrally located. Beaverbrook is a good area for intensification as it is one of the few parts of Kanata that is (for this style of suburb) close to employment (March Road), shopping (Centrum) and proposed transitway alignments.
In short, this is a highly suitable area for intensification. Other suburbs have the occasional tower without loosing their caché. Alta Vista and Manor Park, two reasonably elite neighbourhoods, come to mind as places that have not suffered from the elephants in their backyards. Beaverbrook will also be fine, aside from a mild case of hysteria.