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Our City, Our Voices.
REIMAGINE NANAIMO is our opportunity to create a collective vision and road map for our future City. Together, we will identify our strengths to appreciate what we have today, and look forward to new opportunities to strengthen and grow our community. As our population grows to 100,000 residents and beyond, we need to collectively imagine how our spaces and places evolve to better meet the needs of our natural environment and of all who live here.
What kind of city will Nanaimo be in 20 years and beyond?
Our community plans will be built with ideas from individuals, groups, and organizations through their participation in REIMAGINE NANAIMO. To be successful, we need voices from across our community to share in the conversation. A key aim of this process is to be accessible to everyone – regardless of your age, your time constraints, or your knowledge base – it's easy to be part of building our community vision. We are committed to cultural safety and humility, LGBTQ2S+, accessibility and inclusiveness. The plans that we create together will guide the decisions that shape our City over the coming years.
Nanaimo is for all of us. Let's reimagine our future – together.
Our City, Our Voices.
REIMAGINE NANAIMO is our opportunity to create a collective vision and road map for our future City. Together, we will identify our strengths to appreciate what we have today, and look forward to new opportunities to strengthen and grow our community. As our population grows to 100,000 residents and beyond, we need to collectively imagine how our spaces and places evolve to better meet the needs of our natural environment and of all who live here.
What kind of city will Nanaimo be in 20 years and beyond?
Our community plans will be built with ideas from individuals, groups, and organizations through their participation in REIMAGINE NANAIMO. To be successful, we need voices from across our community to share in the conversation. A key aim of this process is to be accessible to everyone – regardless of your age, your time constraints, or your knowledge base – it's easy to be part of building our community vision. We are committed to cultural safety and humility, LGBTQ2S+, accessibility and inclusiveness. The plans that we create together will guide the decisions that shape our City over the coming years.
Nanaimo is for all of us. Let's reimagine our future – together.
How about addressing the issue of the housing market being inflated by foreign investors, thus making it impossible for local hardworking people to be able to ever afford a house? Even the rent for a 1-2 bedroom apt is higher than some full-time employees' monthly wages! How in the world are these working folk supposed to survive and build a future for themselves in this community? Not to mention, small studios are simply non-existent in this town. Single adults are forced to rent rooms in shared houses. Who cares? The city council is busy teaching cats not to overstep property lines.
There is huge potential to drive traffic to and from the Mews to the businesses and galleries along Terminal Avenue with a beautiful, safe, and well-lit bridge or walkway down from the bridge to the road below. To add on from an earlier idea, this new concourse could be a place for food trucks to set-up to really invigorate the area.
It’s simple, create more and more routes that connect to get cyclists safely from any imaginable destination and make sure they are well lit. Have crossing buttons accessible from a bike, have safe spots for bikes to wait at intersections, have recycling bins easy for cyclists to dispose of cups etc. Incentivize drivers to get cycling, make it unbearable to drive and incentivize companies to have safe bike storage and showers for employees.
Do you have ideas that would help Nanaimo's Parks, Recreation, and Culture services be more accessible and inclusive to everyone?
I'm not sure why Nanaimo is so barren of quality community parks. Yes there are nature/forest parks (of which we also need more), a few small neighbourhood/playground parks, and sports fields.. but almost no small or large community parks. Large public park landscapes are an important part of a livable city. If we look at almost any high quality city in the world parks play a huge part in their makeup and the quality of life for their citizens.
Stop painting murals over everything like you’re trying to polish a turd. Invest in real city beautification; not tacky ‘art’
Inclusive Grand Water Park Play
There is a community pool in South Nanaimo, one Central, now we need one for North Nanaimo (this one could be saltwater).
I lived in Nanaimo for a short while in the 80's and recently moved back and was shocked to find that nothing really changed and the downtown is still a bit of a dive. Most of the good development was done in the north end of town. There are streets in the downtown with lovely, quaint shops, but they are surrounded by homeless. This is a place that I and I'm sure that visitors don't feel safe to walk around in. I understand that homeless shelters will be built in the south end of town, but I believe they should be distributed throughout the city and not concentrated in one area. There is very little economy in the south end except for a couple of grocery stores that have inflated prices that many of the people in the area cannot afford to shop in. It would be nice to see something that would attract visitors, as well as other citizens of Nanaimo. The pockets of nice areas in the south end don't deserve the property values to go down because someone doesn't want to see the homeless living in the north! Nanaimo's downtown could be such a lovely escape for visitors and we should have a lovely south end to attract visitors coming in...it's the first thing they see, don't scare them away.
What ideas do you have to continue making downtown better? What would encourage you or others to spend more time there?
An issue across Nanaimo is the distinct lack of quality public urban spaces.
The land beside the Gabe ferry should be set aside for future expansion.
Instead of painting over decrepit buildings, encourage actual real and tangible improvements like redevelopment, creating jobs downtown that bring people to the area, and entertainment to keep them there. If the space is livable, it will attract everyone including tourists. Owners of unsightly properties should be fined... land that is sit on and not used should be taxed. In Vancouver, empty lots have to be used somehow which is why there was a community garden downtown until development started. The hole in the ground beside the China Steps is actually quite dangerous, so I am shocked they haven’t been forced to fill it.
There are so few character/historic buildings in Nanaimo, it would be good to protect these from demolition. Obviously many will need rehabilitation, but there is a charm to the old wooden buildings (and the few brick ones) that would be a shame to not capitalize upon. This is something that should be done broadly, not just in downtown - though obviously many of these buildings are concentrated in that area.
What are Nanaimo's natural and environmental treasures that need to be protected and enhanced?
Conservation of biodiversity
so many trees have been chopped down
By better synchronizing traffic lights to reduce travel time and idle time at red lights, we should be able to impact the amount of emissions by reducing the time vehicles are on the road.
Our beautiful tall mix of trees are our unique feature, fast disappearing on private properties e.g. Turner & Uplands etc etc So sad.
What, if anything, could Nanaimo do that would encourage you to choose transportation options that help reduce greenhouse gas emissions (e.g. walking, cycling, transit, electric vehicles, ride share, etc.)?
People drive into neighbourhoods off the old highway and they do not reduce their speed. Traffic calming should be brought in for roads off the old hwy that go into subdivisions.
I want to be able to walk more in Nanaimo and would like to see the parks linked by a series of pathways. More shade in summer on the E&N trail would make it more appealing to use as well.
Add street trees, protected bike lanes, and more sidewalk space.
Increasing density provides a better urban sphere, a more enjoyable pedestrian landscape, and allows for adding commercial and residential space to our communities. Single floor strip malls are destructive to a healthy community and horribly inefficient.
There's a lot that we can learn from one another. What steps are you taking to lighten your personal environmental footprint - at home, at work, in your daily life?
I save up all the shopping I need to do on one end of town and walk when I don't have a lot to carry.
Refuse to buy plastics and single use containers. Reduce consumption and recycle everything I can. I darn my socks instead of buying new and buy from thrift stores.
I try to recycle as much as possible, but the city does not accept everything... It is inconvenient having two places (the blue bin and the recycling depot) where I have to bring my recyclables and then some things are still not accepted at either location. Also, the City only collects recycling every two weeks, so my bins get full and then I have to start putting things into the garbage bin... I have the biggest blue bin too, but I live in a 5-person house and there are a lot of materials to be disposed of... Too much packaging these days.
July – November 2020
This initial phase was focused on sharing information and listening to your ideas about Nanaimo's future.
January - August 2021
Develop options for how our community can achieve its shared vision, and evaluate how different options support our goals.
Fall 2021
Preferred directions will be developed into the plans, policies, and actions that will guide Nanaimo's future. These plans will be refined together with our community.
For more information and background on this project, please visit the REIMAGINE NANAIMO Project Page on the City's website.
Overall lead for the team of city staff collaborating to carry out of the REIMAGINE NANAIMO process
Phone | 250-755-4464 |
reimagine@nanaimo.ca |