Touch the Water Promenade / River Valley "Seawall"

[Platinum107]

Also @Daveography , what if there was a special poll on this thread where we could vote for either Gateway or Threads? That'd be neat

 

[kcantor]

^

if there was a "special poll", it would be falling into the very binary trap the city has already presented.

"even though our goal was to "touch the water" and neither of these conceptual plans does that particularly well, please select your choice from one of two options that don't really facilitate touching the water so we can at least check the "consulted with the public" box as we move forward."

 

[Platinum107]

@kcantor Okay, I was just trying to make a fun suggestion to gauge which option we all like, not thinking that deep in the moment . I agree that public consultation is valuable for any project and I’ll give more feedback other than just what option I like, but in order for people to give feedback there needs to be at least a base concept to work off of which this is, and as the city refines the design of these areas I hope they keep the floor open for people to offer their ideas.

 

[itom987]

I like the stairs to the water, but don't want the stairs in front of the pumping station. The pumping station would make excellent restaurant. I would like to see more stairs to the water, in exchange for fewer pedestrian bridges.

 

[itom987]

If they are going to build a creek by Groat Road, they might as well build a waterfall falling down Government Hill.

 

[Edmcowboy11]

I like elements from both.

 

[positive1]

I quite like all these ideas but I'd like to see the money going to simply widening or adding separate bike lanes to existing paths or adding in new/missing link sections of path/upgrading sections. There are quite a few areas of trails in different parks next to the river which have eroded and closed which ironically were touching the river. Also the south bank, opposite where all the plans are, is right on the river and quite susceptible to erosion and could be upgraded and long term survival ensured.

In saying all of the above, I would love to see any of the proposed options built as they would be major improvements and draws to the river......just think more bang could be got for the buck elsewhere.

 

[Omega Prime]

I love most of these concepts because of the more pleasing public pathways experiences. I particularly like the High Level Bridge pathway improvements, including a landing halfway up, and a winding bridge. Makes the area far better for bikes/micro transit.

Additionally, I would like to see a major bike pathways improvement in the area; River Valley Road ROW is just ripe for something better, including being a tourist improvement for River Valley adventuring.

 

[David A]

The current public pathway west of the high level bridge is fairly nice, the one around the new 105 Street bridge is good, but in between to the east of the High Level bridge it is horrible - narrow and in poor condition. Lets call it the missing middle.

I'm not sure we need so much need grand new plans for the river valley, just need to fix some parts the city seems to have missed.

 

[tkoe_]

I really like the concept of day-lighting Groat creek. That said, I am not a fan of some of the strange pedestrian overpasses along River Valley road. Pedestrian and motor traffic should be mixed -- separation only allows cars to drive way too fast through an area that should be pleasant and natural.

 

[archited]

@danimori and all of the want-to-do-more-ers on skyrise I am offering a link to show how possibilities for the river valley are greatly expanded when they are removed from the inept hands of City administrations -- https://oma.eu/projects/11th-street-bridge-park -- using as a sample here the kind of solutions that are missed in Edmonton's skimpy effort. Imagine if the piers of the old Fifth Street Bridge had been repurposed to something like this. I can think of literally dozens of active uses for the river valley that would make people want to engage there and none of them are represented in this anemic concept. This is one clear and obvious example where Edmonton City-conceived renderings far outweigh the prospects for the reality. This seems to boil down to a few "planters and benches" 9-to-5er idealogues' imaginings (hard to believe that it took them years to come up with this).

 

[quit]

I really like the concept of day-lighting Groat creek. That said, I am not a fan of some of the strange pedestrian overpasses along River Valley road. Pedestrian and motor traffic should be mixed -- separation only allows cars to drive way too fast through an area that should be pleasant and natural.

Agreed. I always have found it odd since I have lived in Edmonton that the speed limit on river valley road is 60 km/h, yet you are encouraging so much pedestrian traffic along the route in the area. If city planners want it to be a traffic route, fine, but then the built form should align with that thinking (four lanes, overhead crossings, etc). I dislike the current half baked approach. It is currently unsafe for both uses.

I would prefer it be pedestrian oriented in the future, but administration needs to figure out what they want out of the route - the current proposal indicates they are between two schools of thought and can't decide which one to go with. Seems like a waste of money to build a pedestrian bridge over a route that is not intended for high volume.

 

[kcantor]

Agreed. I always have found it odd since I have lived in Edmonton that the speed limit on river valley road is 60 km/h, yet you are encouraging so much pedestrian traffic along the route in the area. If city planners want it to be a traffic route, fine, but then the built form should align with that thinking (four lanes, overhead crossings, etc). I dislike the current half baked approach. It is currently unsafe for both uses.

I would prefer it be pedestrian oriented in the future, but administration needs to figure out what they want out of the route - the current proposal indicates they are between two schools of thought and can't decide which one to go with. Seems like a waste of money to build a pedestrian bridge over a route that is not intended for high volume.

emphasis added

but, but, but, but think of the poor engineers... for a "touch the water" project, there's an awful lot of engineered infrastructure here that doesn't really get people any closer to the water.

one of the differences between these images and what we do here is that the sea wall is at the edge, net separated by 10 metres of scrub.

as for river road, i'd be happy to see it widened to 4 lanes provided that two of them would be parking outside of rush hour. it would both increase the accessibility while also serving to slow down traffic just as it does in stanley park...

 

[northlands]

Like the others have noted, very little of what has been proposed involves the river. How do we stop Edmontonians (including CoE Admin) from being so petrified/disgusted by the North Saskatchewan?

Seems to me like it's not lack of imagination (Gateways Gov't House Park is cool as hell), it's general public opinion that the river is an endless moving cesspool of wastewater that nobody wants to look at nevermind dip a toe into, and the minds behind these proposals have built that into their design parameters.

 

[kcantor]

we need to get over this longest/largest urban park in the world fixation that turns our entire attitude towards it into “look/don’t touch”. for some reason we can allow epcor to use 51 acres - roughly 2 1/4 million square feet - for a solar farm but we can’t have a weir to create a beach unless it’s accidental. we can’t have a restaurant or patio unless it’s on a golf course or in a theme park. we also need to make our river more visible and stop cutting off all of the water views with 42” concrete jersey barriers and scrub/weed growth... why would you want to visit what you can’t see?