So that big Longboat Development project downtown was unveiled today. You might have already heard something about that.
200,000 square feet, a 154-room hotel, ground-level retail and restaurant space, five floors of office space, a twenty-story tower and a 450-stall parkade in a project to be built with seventy-five million dollars of private funding. So at the risk of understating the matter somewhat, I'd say, yeah, that sounds pretty good.
Showing posts with label A and B. Show all posts
Showing posts with label A and B. Show all posts
Wednesday, June 29, 2011
The Curious Case of the Third-Tier
Saturday, November 07, 2009
Downtown, Let's Go Downtown
Love Me, Love My Uptown Magazine!
So this week saw the publication of my most recent column for everyone's favourite local weekly (haha oh snap), and I hope you'll pardon me my once again musing on the state of the downtown. But after listening to and reading so many different proclamations about the National Hockey League, none of which covered this particular angle, I figured that it would be worth considering the actual environment around our prospective hockey team's prospective hockey arena.
The MTS Centre is one of the top twenty arenas in the world, but I'd suggest that you can't quite credit its neighbours for pulling their weight in the equation. So I brought up the immediate area around the block of the MTS Centre, suggesting that the reader could take a walk around the block and judge for themselves -- but who has time to go all the way downtown and just walk around, these days? Who even goes downtown these days? (Besides me, I mean.)
Well, never let anybody tell you that James Howard talks the talk without walking the walk!
Monday, October 19, 2009
James Howard Just Does Everything at Once
Man, time flies around here! I had a whole bunch of stuff to talk about a few days ago, but then I was working full eight-hour days and helping people move and going to bonfires and trying out this video game where you punch people in the face -- and then here I am and all of a sudden it's Monday, which must be the fault of that dadgum Daylight Savings Time I've heard about.
Friday, December 07, 2007
I've Been Better
First things first -- it's that time again!
When I say "Uptown", you say "Mag"!
Uptown!
Okay, we'll work on that later.
You can read my article by picking up a copy of this week's issue -- available now! -- or peruse the electronic version at your leisure. What am I up to this week? Well, not to spoil the column too much for you, but those of you more familiar with my oeuvre have heard me ask this before:
Why is this building still empty?
My previous posts on the subject are now tagged,for her pleasure for your convenience.
Uptown and ugly buildings aside, what's new with me? I haven't had the chance to post everything I've been wanting to, so obviously I've been sidetracked. By what? Why, by work stress and by my own failing personal health, that's what!
To wit, and to recap -- I last posted here on Tuesday. Wednesday I woke up feeling a bit sick, but shrugged it off and went in to work; midday at work I was given an hour's notice to clear everything off my desk, then immediately moved to another department. As this was the third department I'd been assigned to in the past calendar week, you can imagine how I felt about that. (I may have taken this better if I hadn't been feeling increasingly unwell.) And the work day starts an hour earlier for this job, which is probably their way of telling me that they don't actually like me.
Speaking of which: in talking to another employee (an actual employee, one that doesn't have a quarter of her wage chopped off and diverted to a temp agency) and giving her the backstory that I've worked in five different departments with this same company since January, she widened her eyes in genuine surprise and asked in a tone of amazement: "And they still haven't hired you on permanently?" No. Clearly, they haven't. Thanks for that, though.
Thursday morning I woke up quite conclusively ill, but dragged myself to work as best I could regardless. I'm too noble to miss my 'first day' of work at a 'new' job, and I'm too stubborn to admit when I'm obviously out of commission, so in I went; halfway through the day I was sent home, partially because the work wasn't coming in as expected but mostly because I was almost immobile by that point.
I got home, slept ten straight hours, woke up feeling worse still, and spent the night hovering in and out of consciousness before finally calling in sick this morning.
And here I am! It is Friday evening, and here I am -- lapsing in and out of ineffective recovery rest and weighing the comparative benefits and drawbacks of dying in my sleep.
It hurts to swallow, it hurts to turn my head, I feel freezing cold under three blankets with a heater running full blast, and -- to paraphrase Captain Murphy -- my lymph nodes are as big as cats. It could be strep throat, the flu, tonsilitis, or some combination of the three; it could be a voodoo curse, an unknown karmic backlash, or West Nile contracted from a mosquito so tough that the deadly winter weather just led it to grow fur. I'm hoping my immune system can just armour up and kill it, whatever it is; I'm a busy man with things to do, and it's hard to get stuff done when you're wincing every fifteen seconds.
Things could be better, you guys!
When I say "Uptown", you say "Mag"!
Uptown!
Okay, we'll work on that later.
You can read my article by picking up a copy of this week's issue -- available now! -- or peruse the electronic version at your leisure. What am I up to this week? Well, not to spoil the column too much for you, but those of you more familiar with my oeuvre have heard me ask this before:
Why is this building still empty?
My previous posts on the subject are now tagged,
Uptown and ugly buildings aside, what's new with me? I haven't had the chance to post everything I've been wanting to, so obviously I've been sidetracked. By what? Why, by work stress and by my own failing personal health, that's what!
To wit, and to recap -- I last posted here on Tuesday. Wednesday I woke up feeling a bit sick, but shrugged it off and went in to work; midday at work I was given an hour's notice to clear everything off my desk, then immediately moved to another department. As this was the third department I'd been assigned to in the past calendar week, you can imagine how I felt about that. (I may have taken this better if I hadn't been feeling increasingly unwell.) And the work day starts an hour earlier for this job, which is probably their way of telling me that they don't actually like me.
Speaking of which: in talking to another employee (an actual employee, one that doesn't have a quarter of her wage chopped off and diverted to a temp agency) and giving her the backstory that I've worked in five different departments with this same company since January, she widened her eyes in genuine surprise and asked in a tone of amazement: "And they still haven't hired you on permanently?" No. Clearly, they haven't. Thanks for that, though.
Thursday morning I woke up quite conclusively ill, but dragged myself to work as best I could regardless. I'm too noble to miss my 'first day' of work at a 'new' job, and I'm too stubborn to admit when I'm obviously out of commission, so in I went; halfway through the day I was sent home, partially because the work wasn't coming in as expected but mostly because I was almost immobile by that point.
I got home, slept ten straight hours, woke up feeling worse still, and spent the night hovering in and out of consciousness before finally calling in sick this morning.
And here I am! It is Friday evening, and here I am -- lapsing in and out of ineffective recovery rest and weighing the comparative benefits and drawbacks of dying in my sleep.
It hurts to swallow, it hurts to turn my head, I feel freezing cold under three blankets with a heater running full blast, and -- to paraphrase Captain Murphy -- my lymph nodes are as big as cats. It could be strep throat, the flu, tonsilitis, or some combination of the three; it could be a voodoo curse, an unknown karmic backlash, or West Nile contracted from a mosquito so tough that the deadly winter weather just led it to grow fur. I'm hoping my immune system can just armour up and kill it, whatever it is; I'm a busy man with things to do, and it's hard to get stuff done when you're wincing every fifteen seconds.
Things could be better, you guys!
Wednesday, August 22, 2007
It's Your Downtown Recap Post
Hey, folks! Been a while! Nice to see you!
For a variety of reasons, I haven't been home very often or for very long lately and I've been near my computer even less (I spent all that money to buy the damn thing and I barely even encounter it these days) -- but I remain ever vigilant, paying close attention to my surroundings.
Since I work right downtown, this means that I've been paying close attention to our city's core. And since I've concerned posts with various downtown concerns a few times now, I figure I may as well bring 'em up to speed. So, for the sake of argument, let’s get ourselves caught up on some downtown happenings that I’ve happened to write about before.
Firstly, and probably most germane to the interests of fellow Winnipeggers:
The United Army Surplus clearance sale, which kicked off almost three weeks ago, remains ongoing -- and more importantly, the store-wide discount has finally been bumped up from its original measly 20% to a respectably enticing 40%.
And it turns out that isn't the only change going on in the market. As you'll recall, following the declaration of bankruptcy, the remaining inventory of United Army Surplus was bought out by local outfitting giant S.I.R.; between then and now, S.I.R. has itself been bought out by Americans.
When United Army Surplus finally went under and S.I.R. bought them out, I initially assumed that the town wasn't big enough for two locally owned outfitters; I guess after all of that the town isn't big enough for one locally owned outfitter.
Ah, well. I'm sure we'll survive (or soldier on, if you don't mind the pun); it'll be a bummer knowing the money won't remain in the community when I purchase a much-needed camouflage Mag Lite, but such is business in our modern era.
I don't know where to even begin making fun of the poor decisions that would result in a camouflaged flashlight, so let's move on to the second item of discussion:
The mysteriously absent cop statue remains mysteriously absent. You’ll recall that I was a little sad to see it go, despite myself; now I'm just curious as to what the hell happened to it.
I still hold out hope that it's just being refurbished or something. Or -- I might just be kidding myself on this one, but maybe -- the possibility exists that they switch it out in the summertime for the sake of foliage, then put it back for the other nine or ten months of the year when we can’t grow much of anything. You know? Perhaps they just put it aside for the summer to cultivate the soil, and they're going to bring it back as soon as the flowers start dying.
This seems like a terrible idea, of course – “It’s tourist season! Quick, hide the downtown art!” – but humour me while I grasp at straws. At the very least, if it were gone forever, you would think its placard would have been removed instead of simply grown over.
But then, surely something must be eluding me about all this; I'm not party to the mindset of Portage Place types.
Speaking of which! (A wonderful segue!) This leads us along perfectly into our third topic of consideration:
The Gourmet Cup shenanigans and goings-on remain a complete mystery; I've heard nothing either way since my original post, and nobody else bothered acknowledging the initial protestors in the first place. So I've nothing new to report; the Gourmet Cup may or may not be a wretched hive of scum and villainry, and that's as far as anybody cares to determine right now.
I’m still keeping an ear out for this one, despite its seeming inactivity; feel free to comment or drop me an email if you’re more familiar with the story than I am. I am a man of natural curiosity, and men of natural curiosity do not simply abandon curiosities.
And, hey, speaking of curiously abandonded (I am on fire with my transitions today):
The A&B Sound building remains conspicuously empty -- and, yes, the A&B Sound building also remains wretchedly, unspeakably ugly.
I know by now you're probably tired of hearing about this from me, but come on! Does anybody actually think this is an attractive colour scheme? Unless you are a sports mascot, a tropical bird, or some delicious sherbet, you are better off adorning yourself in a combination of colours that isn’t purple, orange and green simultaneously!
The longer I think about it, the less appealing it even seems. What kind of world would we live in if that was considered a widely acceptable palette? No doubt you’re familiar with ourobtuse sculpture of a giant dead fishfly Esplanade Riel pedestrian bridge, which is already pretty goofy-looking to begin with –- can you imagine if we had foregone the tacky Salisbury House logo and instead painted the thing in garish secondary colours?
Oh. Wow.
Okay, you know what? That would have been immensely funny. But my point still stands!
Anyway. That about wraps it up, as far as previously mentioned downtown distractions go; tune in next time, when I might finally get around to posting music again. Remember those days? The very idea!
For a variety of reasons, I haven't been home very often or for very long lately and I've been near my computer even less (I spent all that money to buy the damn thing and I barely even encounter it these days) -- but I remain ever vigilant, paying close attention to my surroundings.
Since I work right downtown, this means that I've been paying close attention to our city's core. And since I've concerned posts with various downtown concerns a few times now, I figure I may as well bring 'em up to speed. So, for the sake of argument, let’s get ourselves caught up on some downtown happenings that I’ve happened to write about before.
Firstly, and probably most germane to the interests of fellow Winnipeggers:
The United Army Surplus clearance sale, which kicked off almost three weeks ago, remains ongoing -- and more importantly, the store-wide discount has finally been bumped up from its original measly 20% to a respectably enticing 40%.
And it turns out that isn't the only change going on in the market. As you'll recall, following the declaration of bankruptcy, the remaining inventory of United Army Surplus was bought out by local outfitting giant S.I.R.; between then and now, S.I.R. has itself been bought out by Americans.
When United Army Surplus finally went under and S.I.R. bought them out, I initially assumed that the town wasn't big enough for two locally owned outfitters; I guess after all of that the town isn't big enough for one locally owned outfitter.
Ah, well. I'm sure we'll survive (or soldier on, if you don't mind the pun); it'll be a bummer knowing the money won't remain in the community when I purchase a much-needed camouflage Mag Lite, but such is business in our modern era.
I don't know where to even begin making fun of the poor decisions that would result in a camouflaged flashlight, so let's move on to the second item of discussion:
The mysteriously absent cop statue remains mysteriously absent. You’ll recall that I was a little sad to see it go, despite myself; now I'm just curious as to what the hell happened to it.
I still hold out hope that it's just being refurbished or something. Or -- I might just be kidding myself on this one, but maybe -- the possibility exists that they switch it out in the summertime for the sake of foliage, then put it back for the other nine or ten months of the year when we can’t grow much of anything. You know? Perhaps they just put it aside for the summer to cultivate the soil, and they're going to bring it back as soon as the flowers start dying.
This seems like a terrible idea, of course – “It’s tourist season! Quick, hide the downtown art!” – but humour me while I grasp at straws. At the very least, if it were gone forever, you would think its placard would have been removed instead of simply grown over.
But then, surely something must be eluding me about all this; I'm not party to the mindset of Portage Place types.
Speaking of which! (A wonderful segue!) This leads us along perfectly into our third topic of consideration:
The Gourmet Cup shenanigans and goings-on remain a complete mystery; I've heard nothing either way since my original post, and nobody else bothered acknowledging the initial protestors in the first place. So I've nothing new to report; the Gourmet Cup may or may not be a wretched hive of scum and villainry, and that's as far as anybody cares to determine right now.
I’m still keeping an ear out for this one, despite its seeming inactivity; feel free to comment or drop me an email if you’re more familiar with the story than I am. I am a man of natural curiosity, and men of natural curiosity do not simply abandon curiosities.
And, hey, speaking of curiously abandonded (I am on fire with my transitions today):
The A&B Sound building remains conspicuously empty -- and, yes, the A&B Sound building also remains wretchedly, unspeakably ugly.
I know by now you're probably tired of hearing about this from me, but come on! Does anybody actually think this is an attractive colour scheme? Unless you are a sports mascot, a tropical bird, or some delicious sherbet, you are better off adorning yourself in a combination of colours that isn’t purple, orange and green simultaneously!
The longer I think about it, the less appealing it even seems. What kind of world would we live in if that was considered a widely acceptable palette? No doubt you’re familiar with our
Oh. Wow.
Okay, you know what? That would have been immensely funny. But my point still stands!
Anyway. That about wraps it up, as far as previously mentioned downtown distractions go; tune in next time, when I might finally get around to posting music again. Remember those days? The very idea!
Monday, June 11, 2007
I'm Still On About This
As part of my ongoing watch, an update:
Still empty. I'm mystified.
Why is it still -- still -- empty? Is there a training camp of panhandlers inside honing their skills? Is it overrun by particularly aggressive geese? Is there a portrait of Gary Doer buried deep within the building, its visage growing ever uglier and less politically viable?
Is our downtown revitalized yet?
Have I mentioned previously how ugly this building--yes? Okay, good. Just checking. It's been a while since I did this. Good to be back!
Still empty. I'm mystified.
Why is it still -- still -- empty? Is there a training camp of panhandlers inside honing their skills? Is it overrun by particularly aggressive geese? Is there a portrait of Gary Doer buried deep within the building, its visage growing ever uglier and less politically viable?
Is our downtown revitalized yet?
Have I mentioned previously how ugly this building--yes? Okay, good. Just checking. It's been a while since I did this. Good to be back!
Sunday, March 11, 2007
No, Seriously, Why is This Building Still Empty
Malfunctioning electrical outlets? Burst water pipes? Random indoor explosions?
Family of bats? Rodents of Unusual Size? Infestations of zombies and werewolves?
Secret cult headquarters? Brilliantly disguised housing project? Black-market cigarette trading post?
I'm still on about this, you guys! I'm going out of town for a few days, but this'll probably still be on my mind. Downtown Winnipeg is a land of mysteries!
Friday, March 09, 2007
It's Your Downtown
I like music.
I bought fifteen CDs in three days.
That's normal, right?
Okay, no, of course not. But eight of these CDs cost me $2.99 and the other seven cost me $1.99, so you can understand my thought process here.
These fifteen CDs, most of them in near-perfect condition, came to $37.85 before taxes. $40 in an HMV will buy you two Black Eyed Peas albums. I do not consider this a difficult decision!
Half a day of work at my old job equals fifteen CDs, and I consider this trade more than fair. Granted, yes, I'm unemployed now -- but, man, it's not as though I'll need to buy any more CDs for a while!
So while I'm on the subject of employment situations, here's how it shook down on Wednesday. About fourty of us transient worker types showed up at an orientation meeting, the organizers told us about the job and passed out sheets for everybody to write their info on, and we were told that anybody picked for the position would be contacted. (I haven't heard boo from them since, which means I'm still unemployed yet -- but the fat cheque I'll be receiving for the previously mentioned overtime means I won't have to sweat my current setup right away.)
That took maybe half an hour. And I certainly didn't have any other pressing matters that day -- because, remember, I'm unemployed now. (I'm still getting used to that.) So, it being such a nice day out (it was a really nice day out), I poked around downtown a bit with the ol' handy-dandy outdated digital camera and took some shots of interest.
Of note:
This is one of the signs posted around the site of the future Manitoba Hydro building. You see a few of these as you circle the premises, just to remind you that PCL (Construction Leaders) is concerned about safety.
What made me notice these?
Ah, of course. Thanks, PCL! Construction Leaders! How glad I am that the construction of downtown's newest signature project is in such safe hands!
I sure hope that blueprints and materials lists never require proper proofreading, because if they do this building is probably going to collapse within a year.
Aluminum Sound is where I'd bought four CDs for $2.99 on Monday and another four on Wednesday. Right in the front of the store is where they're keeping the bin of three-dollar CDs (all of them in excellent condition, I can attest so far), and there are still a bunch of good ones left. If you're looking to bolster your 54-40 collection -- and as far as I am concerned you have no good reason not to -- you need to get down there as soon as you can. You live in Winnipeg! Don't even pretend you aren't interested in buying things for cheap!
Bourbon Street Billiards gets my patronage from time to time, but not for ever actually playing pool. The reason I consider this a notable picture is so you'll know where to go if you're downtown and want to play X-Men vs. Street Fighter, because the room to your immediate left when you go down the stairs is de facto the last 'arcade' left downtown. A couple pinball machines, Tekken Tag, Bust-A-Move, nothing fancy -- but it's all we've got, now, so I go down there whenever I'm nearby and drop whatever quarters I've got on me.
Remind me to talk about arcades another time. I bet I could go on for a while.
OMG IT'S THE WINNIPEG YOU GUYS
So, the A&B Sound building -- is it haunted? Is it cursed? Is it a disguised government base for covert operations? I've been wondering about this.
I mean, Manitoba is a land of countless business opportunities, right? Manitoba Means Business and all that? So obviously there must be a perfectly logical explanation as to why a highly visible and fully furnished two-story building, sitting in the heart of downtown and right across the street from one of the busiest large-scale arenas in North America, has been sitting vacant for over a year.
Pirate ghosts? Plague of locusts? Passageway to Xanth?
It can't just be that it's blindingly ugly. Winnipeg is not so destitute a city that the stores don't sell paint.
If you have any ideas about why it's still empty -- or, hell, any ideas on what someone could do with the building -- let me know! I don't have a whole lot else to do right now (besides update my resume again, I guess), so I've hit the point where civic conceptual thinking exercises seem like a good idea.
Man, this unemployment stuff feels weird now. This'll take some getting used to.
I bought fifteen CDs in three days.
That's normal, right?
Okay, no, of course not. But eight of these CDs cost me $2.99 and the other seven cost me $1.99, so you can understand my thought process here.
These fifteen CDs, most of them in near-perfect condition, came to $37.85 before taxes. $40 in an HMV will buy you two Black Eyed Peas albums. I do not consider this a difficult decision!
Half a day of work at my old job equals fifteen CDs, and I consider this trade more than fair. Granted, yes, I'm unemployed now -- but, man, it's not as though I'll need to buy any more CDs for a while!
So while I'm on the subject of employment situations, here's how it shook down on Wednesday. About fourty of us transient worker types showed up at an orientation meeting, the organizers told us about the job and passed out sheets for everybody to write their info on, and we were told that anybody picked for the position would be contacted. (I haven't heard boo from them since, which means I'm still unemployed yet -- but the fat cheque I'll be receiving for the previously mentioned overtime means I won't have to sweat my current setup right away.)
That took maybe half an hour. And I certainly didn't have any other pressing matters that day -- because, remember, I'm unemployed now. (I'm still getting used to that.) So, it being such a nice day out (it was a really nice day out), I poked around downtown a bit with the ol' handy-dandy outdated digital camera and took some shots of interest.
Of note:
This is one of the signs posted around the site of the future Manitoba Hydro building. You see a few of these as you circle the premises, just to remind you that PCL (Construction Leaders) is concerned about safety.
What made me notice these?
Ah, of course. Thanks, PCL! Construction Leaders! How glad I am that the construction of downtown's newest signature project is in such safe hands!
I sure hope that blueprints and materials lists never require proper proofreading, because if they do this building is probably going to collapse within a year.
Aluminum Sound is where I'd bought four CDs for $2.99 on Monday and another four on Wednesday. Right in the front of the store is where they're keeping the bin of three-dollar CDs (all of them in excellent condition, I can attest so far), and there are still a bunch of good ones left. If you're looking to bolster your 54-40 collection -- and as far as I am concerned you have no good reason not to -- you need to get down there as soon as you can. You live in Winnipeg! Don't even pretend you aren't interested in buying things for cheap!
Bourbon Street Billiards gets my patronage from time to time, but not for ever actually playing pool. The reason I consider this a notable picture is so you'll know where to go if you're downtown and want to play X-Men vs. Street Fighter, because the room to your immediate left when you go down the stairs is de facto the last 'arcade' left downtown. A couple pinball machines, Tekken Tag, Bust-A-Move, nothing fancy -- but it's all we've got, now, so I go down there whenever I'm nearby and drop whatever quarters I've got on me.
Remind me to talk about arcades another time. I bet I could go on for a while.
OMG IT'S THE WINNIPEG YOU GUYS
So, the A&B Sound building -- is it haunted? Is it cursed? Is it a disguised government base for covert operations? I've been wondering about this.
I mean, Manitoba is a land of countless business opportunities, right? Manitoba Means Business and all that? So obviously there must be a perfectly logical explanation as to why a highly visible and fully furnished two-story building, sitting in the heart of downtown and right across the street from one of the busiest large-scale arenas in North America, has been sitting vacant for over a year.
Pirate ghosts? Plague of locusts? Passageway to Xanth?
It can't just be that it's blindingly ugly. Winnipeg is not so destitute a city that the stores don't sell paint.
If you have any ideas about why it's still empty -- or, hell, any ideas on what someone could do with the building -- let me know! I don't have a whole lot else to do right now (besides update my resume again, I guess), so I've hit the point where civic conceptual thinking exercises seem like a good idea.
Man, this unemployment stuff feels weird now. This'll take some getting used to.
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