A couple of weeks ago I took my staff to River Landing for coffee and a staff meeting. There is a great coffee shop down there now with a variety of hot and cold drinks, pies, and other good stuff to eat. If you haven’t checked it out, it’s well worth your time. It was a bit chilly out there but it was nice enough that we didn’t perish.
Today I talked the Management Team that we needed to meet there. Most of them hadn’t been there yet. After a quick ten minute walk, we were there. In today’s heat it was a great place to sit and have a meeting. A bit to our west is the splash park and it was full of kids and their parents cooling off and enjoying the day. Despite not being close to being done and developed, it is bringing people downtown and is becoming on of my favorite places in the city.
It will be interesting to see how River Landing Village impacts the area. I hoping that bringing down more people, commerce and energy to the area pays off.
If I was the city, I would take advantage of River Landing on one side of the river and the parks along the other side and close down Victoria Bridge on Canada Day and have all of the festivities downtown instead at Diefenbaker Park. In a city whose lifeblood, and identity is tied to the South Saskatchewan River, it only makes sense to make that space the centre of civic life again. There is easy access to downtown, a public transit hub, and it’s a lot nicer than heading out to Diefenbaker Park.
Being down there a lot this summer, looking at plans and ideas for the riverbank, you get the idea that the city is on the verge of something great which is exciting for us all.
