Sparks Street was a good idea, but it was destined to fail. The decline of North American urban centres was just beginning when Sparks Street was officially declared a pedestrian only zone. The hope of having vibrant downtown shopping street zoomed away, like a car driven home to the suburbs every night.
Sparks of the past
It took a long time for the shopping street to die. Holt Renfrew on Sparks closed its doors in 2014. But die it has, leaving us with a street of limited options. A few restaurants, some small stores, and hundreds of metres of empty walls is what we have left.
Once more, the city is planning a redesign of Sparks Street.
Examples of well designed, and well-used pedestrian malls abound. Every summer, Ste Catherine is closed to auto traffic, creating a long pedestrian mall through Montreal's core.
Ste Catherine
Church Street, Burlington Vermont's version of Sparks, was created as part of an urban renewal, and continues to be a lively and exciting place to visit, covered in patios, and filled with people.
Church Street
Further abroad, Temple Bar, a pedestrian street in Dublin has also enjoyed success as an entertainment spot for tourists and locals.
Temple Bar
There are many examples of well designed, and well used pedestrian streets worldwide. Sparks Street has some elements in place, but there is always room for improvement.
Sparks street
The fact is, the attention grabbing streets, the places that everyone wants to visit, are almost never created by the government. They are created by the people of the city, and then later embraced by governments and organizations.
Take the Kensington Market in Toronto, for example. The neighbourhood grew with waves of immigrants, notably Jewish immigrants in the 1900s, many of whom made money selling products to other neighbourhood dwellers. Those roots are still alive today in that vibrant and diverse neighbourhood.
So how can we make Sparks better?
The entrance to Sparks Street is just okay. Honestly, it’s not the most enticing, especially from the west entrance off Lyon, but you can see that it is a pedestrian mall.
An easy step to make it more appealing though, would be to improve the overhead game. Get some string lights, little flags, pretty baubles. Whatever it takes to make people feel enchanted.
As for the actual use of the street, that might be a little more complicated. I think the city does have a role to play. The role of facilitator, not dictator.
Another top-down redesign isn’t going to change the myriad problems that plague Sparks Street.
The issues are systemic, and many of them relate to our overbearing bylaws. Want to make a unique street that can attract visitors 7 days a week, 20 hours day? Rethink everything you do with it.
Sell more permits to street food vendors. Create Canada’s (minus Quebec) first open-carry booze zone. Let people wander around with a cup of beer on a hot summer day, or some mulled wine for those cold winter nights. Hell, let craft breweries operate little beer carts all over the street. Let musicians play, let buskers busk, just open up the street for the people to use.
Beyond that, I think it’s time for our city to get into its rebellious teen phase.
The federal government has already said they aren’t going to let businesses use their ground floors. That’s old news. Doesn’t mean the space is useless. I think it would look pretty good with murals, with street-art, with people. Use guerilla tactics to beautify the street, but celebrate the vandals, rather than punishing them.
Street art in Berlin
Innovation isn't always about flashy technology. At its heart, innovation is the search for a better way to do something. How can we innovate, if no one is willing to take the first step. We don't need to force change, just create the environment for it and see how far it will take us.
It probably can't get worse than this.
Let's take a chance, and see how much better Sparks Street can be.