Five priorities for downtown Montreal
MONTREAL, Oct. 24, 2022 /CNW Telbec/ - Downtown Montreal's strategic importance as Quebec's economic, academic and cultural engine requires an official status and clear intervention mechanisms to ensure its long-term vitality and competitiveness. This is one of the conclusions put forward by the independent study Our downtown, a source of pride, unveiled today by Montréal centre-ville as part of the efforts overseen by the Alliance for downtown Montreal.
The study identifies best practices deployed in several cities around the world to keep their city centers dynamic. To guide the study, different areas of intervention were identified:
- The development and maintenance of private and public spaces
- Mobility and parking
- The revitalization of downtown's commercial fabric
- Cleanliness and the feeling of safety
- Territorial programming and animation
The solutions put forward in this study are intended to feed into the work of the Alliance for downtown Montreal's consultation tables, which were initiated in September 2022 and aim to prioritize concrete collaborative initiatives in order to ensure the city center's sustainable vitality in a post-pandemic context.
"Quebec's metropolis benefits from a world-class city center, which is why it is essential to draw inspiration from the best practices deployed by major international cities around the world in their own recovery efforts. This study comes at a good time, as the work of the Alliance for downtown Montreal, already well underway, has identified certain findings that corroborate the conclusions unveiled today. Downtown deserves to have levers of intervention that are commensurate with its economic, academic and cultural weight within Quebec," says Glenn Castanheira, Executive director of Montréal centre-ville.
Beyond the best practices identified in other jurisdictions, the study highlights some of the winning conditions needed to ensure the success of initiatives aimed at propelling downtown Montreal's growth.
1. A clear objective
The identification of specific targets and performance indicators is essential to mobilizing stakeholders and ensuring success.
2. A 360° view
The importance of considering all facets of each issue and of identifying levers to maximize impact.
3. The participation of all key players
The understanding that solutions cannot be imagined and deployed by a single organization; their implementation requires the contribution of many key stakeholders.
4. The population's mobilization
Citizen participation plays an important role in ensuring that the initiatives proposed are relevant, accepted and successfully deployed. Civil society must feel directly involved and invested in improving its city center.
5. A clearly identified ball carrier
Acting as a resource person for the initiative's various stakeholders, the leader must coordinate activities and serve as a single point of contact.
To rally the capacity for action around these objectives, the study proposes the creation of a concerted action plan implemented by a multi-party entity responsible for the territory. This entity would bring all of the city center's key players together in order to develop and carry out joint initiatives with well-defined leadership and accountability structures. Downtown's development, the study argues, requires a tailor-made approach commensurate with its key role within the Metropolis and the whole of Quebec.
"We are proud to contribute to the work of the metropolis' Alliance for downtown Montreal through this study, which compares best practices observed around the world. The post-pandemic context we are currently experiencing is a unique opportunity to consolidate new ways of doing things. It is time, more than ever, to act together, in order to revive the territory in a concerted manner and register this new approach as a future standard of development," affirms Félix-Antoine Jolicoeur, President and founder of IdéesFX.
- Consult the highlights and the complete study Our downtown, a source of pride
Founded in 1999, Montréal centre-ville is the Merchant association (SDC) of downtown Montreal, a non-profit organization that brings together nearly 5,000 businesses located between Atwater Avenue and rue Saint-Urbain, and between rue Sherbrooke and rue Saint-Antoine. It is the largest organization of its kind in Canada.
The Alliance for downtown Montreal is a collaborative initiative led by Montreal centre-ville and made possible thanks to the financial support allocated to it by the Ministry of Economy and Innovation in order to support initiatives aimed at revitalizing the territory. Resulting from a concerted effort between some forty decision-makers actively involved with the city center, this alliance aims to perpetuate the unprecedented mobilization organized during the pandemic in order to maintain downtown's strategic assets in the long-term.
SOURCE Montréal Centre-Ville
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