While everyone seems excited that Stephen Avenue is getting a makeover by internationally renowned urban designers, I am less so. Why? Because I think Stephen Avenue Walk (SAW) needs more than a physical makeover.

Full disclosure: I was involved in the management of SAW from 1995 to 2005 as the Executive Director of the Calgary Downtown Association.

Yes, SAW needs to be redesigned to better accommodate, pedestrians, bikes, scooters and cars. And I truly wish Gehl Studio all the best in creating a better SAW design that will attract more Calgarians and tourists to want to play, live and work on our historic main street. But don’t expect a new design to solve all of its problems.

Stephen Avenue becomes very animated at lunch hour Monday to Friday when the weather is nice.

Needs Unique Merchants

What SAW needs most is more diversity of things to see and do. Over the past 20 years, it has evolved into a restaurant row for the business community i.e. a lot of high priced expense account restaurants. Many of the restaurants don’t even open during the day on weekends. Some of the restaurants are so exclusive they have windows so dark they look closed even when they’re open. And, more recently chain restaurants like Earls, Milestones and Cactus Club have unfortunately become SAW’s anchor restaurants - all available elsewhere so no need to come to SAW.

What SAW needs are new merchants and property owners who are less corporate and conservative in their thinking. Calgary-based Sport Chek missed a golden opportunity to create a flagship concept store on SAW. Instead, they created a suburban store that captured nobody’s interest.

Stephen Avenue needs more unique things to see and do which hopefully with happen with the mega makeover of the old Scotia Bank pavillion a the corner of 2nd street.

Needs less restaurants

Gone are retailers like Soundsaround, McNally Robinson, Arnold Churgan, Riley McCormick and Out There. The addition of Simons department store in the Lancaster Building is great, but it has a poor entrance to SAW. As well, you can easily walk by Banks Hall and The Core entrances on SAW and not know there are 150+ retailers inside. I have had many a tourist ask me “Where are all the shops?” when they were standing next to Bankers Hall and TD Square! Even Hudson’s Bay has leased out its SAW street frontage to an upscale restaurant, so it’s not obvious is a department store inside.

One of my biggest pet peeves is that retailers like Indigospirit, Winners and Lammle's Western Wear rarely change their windows and while Holts and Brooks Brothers windows, are too conservative to capture anyone’s attention. The retail windows along SAW at Stampede this year were lame and the same holds true at Christmas.

SAW’s current mix restauranteurs, retailers and property owners do very little to create a unique experience. The street is too conservative, too corporate and too contrived to be funky or quirky.

The new owners of Stephen Avenue Place are looking at creating a unique entertainment experience in the old Scotia Bank pavilion - I hope they are successful.

The Guild’s patios along Stephen Avenue is inviting in the summer but not so much in the winter. It hides the fact that there is a major department store behind it.

This entrance doesn’t say there is a major shopping centre inside unless you go right up to the doors.

Simons doesn’t take advantage of its corner location to create an inviting entrance for Stephen Avenue pedestrians - too many blank windows.

Needs Funky Signage

What will help Stephen Avenue is for the City to relax their signage rules to allow more neon signs, more advertising billboards, to add colour and animation to the streetscape.

SAW needs is to have the happiest happy hours in North America, a great live music scene, and some mega new anchors unique to Calgary. Stephen Avenue needs to have its own signature event – what about a huge summer sidewalk sale or patio party?

It would be great to have more neon signs on Stephen Avenue, but we have to loose the black, blank windows. It almost looks like it is closed. Surely the windows could be used to better advantage.

Needs More Residential

What SAW needs most is more residential and hotel development nearby. Though Telus Sky and the Baron Building conversion will add a few hundred more people, what is really needed is thousands, tens of thousands of people living along or near Stephen Avenue.

What would be best for Stephen Avenue would be if all of the surface parking lots along 9th Avenue were suddenly transformed into residential towers.

While I am sure some want to ban vehicle traffic on SAW 24/7, I think doing so would be a huge mistake. Pedestrian malls were tried in the ‘70s and ‘80s across North America and failed. Sure this is a different time, but great streets most often are multi-modal i.e. accommodate cars, transit, pedestrians and cyclists all sharing the space. Both Denver’s 16th Street Mall and Minneapolis’ Nicolet Mall are examples of successful incorporation of pedestrians and transit.

Stephen Avenue will become the backyard for those living at the new Telus Sky tower.

What Stephen Avenue needs is for the 9th Avenue surface parking lots to be converted into thousands of homes for residents who would adopt Stephen Avenue as their urban playground.

Traffic 24/7 in the winter

Perhaps one of the biggest mistakes Calgary planners made was segregating transit to 7thAvenue, pedestrians to 8thAvenue and cars to 6thand 9thAvenues. Look at some historic photos of Stephen Avenue and you will see a street bustling with street cars, horse and buggies, cars and lots of pedestrian traffic. I think the new design should allow vehicle traffic 24/7 from November to March, when the patios are gone and there is lots of room on the sidewalks for pedestrians. Merchants would benefit from having people next to their windows and the sidewalks would look more animated as pedestrians wouldn’t be scattered all over the road.

SAW’s vitality is also hindered by it being Calgary’s Financial District – Bankers Hall, TD Square, Royal Bank Tower, TD Canada Trust Tower, Scotia Centre (now Stephen Avenue Place) – it is more like Wall Street and Bay Street than Queen Street or Robson Street.

And, while some like to blame the +15 system for the lack of street vitality, it too lacks vitality evening and weekends.

Stephen Avenue was a bustling street early in the 20th Century with pedestrians mingling with street cars, automobiles and even horse and buggies. Perhaps we have too many rules governing how we use Stephen Avenue aka Eight Avenue.

There are too many banks at key corners along Stephen Avenue, although that is changing.

This is The CORE shopping centre on a summer Saturday afternoon. Not exactly a busy place.

Needs more clutter

Great pedestrian streets are messy and cluttered, filled with small UNIQUE shops, restaurants, cafes, lounges and pubs, with a mix of office, hotel and residential buildings and signature anchor tenants. Sometimes you have to face reality – SAW is in the middle of a 40 block office district, in a harsh winter city!

Don’t give me the argument Scandinavians cities are also winter cities. They don’t get weeks of -30 Celsius and snow that lingers for months on end. And, they don’t have high-rise buildings that result in streets that get no sun for six months of the year like Stephen Avenue.