Attractiveness

My biggest concern about Edmonton is that I believe it appears to be a dirty city and I think this is a huge drawback to newcomers and tourists. I love Whyte Avenue and our beautiful river valley but it doesn’t take much time around either of these attractions or really anywhere around the city to see how much garbage, trash etc is laying around. Since this concern has come to mind I have mentally surveyed some other cities that I have been fortunate to travel too and you don’t see the garbage or just the general unclean feeling you get from being in Edmonton. I have become accustom to the site of vomit on the sidewalks of Whyte ave as I stroll to the market on Saturday mornings but could you imagine how revolting it is for visitors to our city. Some other examples that come to mind are the amount of public urination, which shows the respect that the citizens of Edmonton have for their city. It takes minutes of walking through the River Valley to find a dirty mattress, a shopping cart or a rusty bike. I believe the River City Clean-up is a fantastic idea but I don’t think there is enough incentive to stop the cycle. “Don’t worry, toss your garbage on the ground! We’ll just pick it up next summer”. Where are the people that are supposedly enforcing littering fines, writing tickets for public urination, and why are businesses not accountable for the mess their patrons make. I think Edmonton has the potential of being a beautiful city but I don’t think that is currently how it is perceived.

I find Whyte Avenue an attractive area, both from its aesthetic appeal and its integrated community. Old Strathcona is a very desirable area of the city to live in because of many of Whyte's activities.

To me, a key driver in the creation of attractive communities is first generating a strong neighbourhood. Edmonton has many unattractive areas (eg. Jasper Place) which could not be developed without first making the area a more attractive place to live. Social services, education, health care and policing should all be involved in conversations with this neighbourhood to solve root causes of these problems. Following a high level of civic engagement and the implementation of strong social safety nets, it would be very feasible to begin planning strategically for business growth and suburban (possibly transit orientated development) in Jasper Place.

Some parts of the downtown are not very inviting. The city has done a good job with the clean up programs but more work needs to be done.

At times, there is a strong smell of sewage downtownand by the low level bridge. This needs to be eliminated