The following article appeared in the November 10 edition of the Guelph Mercury:
In the summer of 1990, more than 12,000 vehicles a day drove along Wyndham Street through St. George’s Square.
Seventeen years later, daily trips on the same stretch had dropped to about 5,400.
Lorenz Calcagno is hoping to reverse the trend.
A board member of the Downtown Guelph Business Association, Calcagno has met with various downtown stakeholders as well as current and former city councillors in an attempt to understand why the core, in his view, “is not living up to its potential.”
He will present his findings tonight during a meeting at the Alma Gallery on Wyndham Street.
Calcagno said one of the key concerns is simply the amount of traffic passing through the downtown core, which is down nearly 50 per cent in the last two decades.
He explained the city has turned downtown into “a physically bypassed district” by developing streets which route traffic around, rather than through, the core.
“We’ve changed it from a thoroughfare district to a destination district you have to be specifically looking for,” Calcagno said. “All roads go around the downtown.”
The title of Calcagno’s presentation is “Returning to Main Street: Busyness means Business.”
Ian Findlay, a city councillor and downtown business owner, agreed the steady decrease in traffic is a concern.
“The health of the downtown is directly related to the amount of traffic,” Findlay said.
The councillor said a point of contention downtown is the pedestrian crossing at St. George’s Square, which provides all-way walk signals resulting in longer waits for motorists trying to drive through the area.
“I think … we should review traffic patterns, and in particular the programming of that light,” Findlay said.
He added if the city wants to attract regional or national brands to the core, it must increase traffic flow.
Calcagno suggested for anyone traveling through the city, Wyndham Street “is a street to be avoided,” which hurts businesses along that stretch.
He hopes to have the issue raised at an upcoming meeting of the community development and environmental services committee.