ERBAN SPRÅLL -- slightly improved

Oooo. More info about the new IKEA development!

Michael Nozick, Fairweather's president, said the shopping centre is being designed with landscaping and other features to minimize the effects of a Winnipeg winter.

"If I used the word 'dome,' that would be a little bit of an exaggeration. That's close, (as) it will be out of the effects of winter," he said. -fp-

Um, sorry dude ... the stores are still outside, ergo shoppers are still going to be exposed to the effects of our weather. Anyhow ... I'm actually here to make some positive comments for a change! Yes really. See:

Along with the ceremonial digging of the dirt and the hyperbole about how revolutionary this mall will be, there were also a few new drawings. I have to say that the new layout looks much better than the original plan, which I have previously compared to buildings being puked out onto a concrete parking lot.

Old plan:

new plan:

The developers obviously read and carefully considered my previous blog post where I recommended that the smaller stores all be grouped together into a walkable outdoor mall format. I like that the big store at the NW corner of Kenaston and Stirling Lyon is gone, I like that the strip of stores along the northern edge of Stirling Lyon are gone, and I like that the stores are now clustered together without any parking between them.

The southern half of the development is also much improved, although I noticed that somehow the development extends much farther west than it used to. How did that happen? Was that another freebee thrown in by the city? Has anybody out there heard anything about this additional land being sold to Fairweather? Also, what's happening with the bike paths along the south side of Stirling Lyon?

Oh well, who cares! Soon I will be able to eat $1 breakfasts and buy more FURKEN shelves and KRÅPPY cabinets for my house! (I do like IKEA, by the way. For some things.)

Now if only somebody would pay attention to my other suggestion to get rid of that idiotic 56 lane controlled intersection on Kenaston and build a split-grade fly-over instead.

Here are some more pics of the project (source: Dorsky Hodgson):

related: policy frog | graham .