What does DTK need?

[neonjoe]

Businesses certainly do care. Perhaps you don't remember the uproar about the loss of parking uptown on King St due to LRT construction. Many of of the mindset that people will ONLY come if we go out of the way to make parking easy. but their thinking is stuck in the 1960s. Ideally we do want businesses to become mode agnostic. In practice eliminating parking makes all modes shorter. Many people forget that each mode of transportation does end with walking. Fewer cars parked the less distance one has to walk.

How are those businesses doing these days? I did hear there was quite the vacancy rate in DTK - businesses want people to visit irrespective of how they arrive, and it's obvious that as time goes on their grievances were on point

I also disagree that we (taxpayers) should subsidize private businesses downtown or anywhere for that matter

It's funny that very few people want to acknowledge the pink elephant in the room - crime, homelessness, addiction/mental health and the stigma associated with these issues (whether justified or not) are massive barriers for economic activity and prosperity, but yes cars are bad and the people driving those cars are just the worst!

I mentioned uptown, directly where the LRT is running. In DTK the businesses pushed to not have King become a transit mall and we have this circuitious route. In uptown where the LRT line is directly in front of the businesses and the on street parking was lost they are all leased or have closed and trended towards hip/upscale since the LRT opened.