Forever Yonge: Don’t stop celebrating Toronto’s main street

Yonge Street is alive again. Let’s keep it that way.

The historic centre of the city and Toronto’s main drag hasn’t always had a great reputation. It’s been called kitschy. Undesirable. Even dangerous. Things got worse in April 2010, when a heritage building at Yonge and Gould was allowed to crumble and later burn to the ground.

But these days, things are different. As part of a month-long festival called Celebrate Yonge, two lanes of vehicle traffic through the downtown section have been turned over to pedestrians and retailers. Where cars once idled in traffic, people now sit on expanded restaurant patios and in makeshift public spaces.

It’s a remarkable transformation, but so far only a temporary one. And Yonge Street deserves better than temporary. Following the success of this festival, it seems obvious that the street could use a more permanent change.

Coun. Kristyn Wong-Tam, whose ward includes the section of Yonge Street affected, is onside.

“One-off experiences are wonderful to give people a taste,” she says, but, ultimately, she says she supports a vision of Yonge Street that can stand as the “true iconic main street of Ontario.” She favours a “complete streets” model that leaves room for all modes of transportation as opposed to creating a pedestrian-only zone.

Wong-Tam, who has been focused on bringing change to Yonge Street for much of the last two years, credits the local community of retailers, property owners and residents for leading the charge for change.

“The real success story of Celebrate Yonge is not just about the change on the street,” she says. “It’s been a tremendous community-building and city-building exercise. I knew the aesthetics of the street had to change, but something else wonderful has come out of it. A community has come together.”

With businesses and residents on board, there’s a slam-dunk case for a more permanent transformation project. But then there’s the elephant in the room: Can Wong-Tam really sell car-loving Mayor Rob Ford on a plan that would inevitably call for the removal of downtown traffic lanes?

For her part, Wong-Tam seems pretty confident that she can. She says she’s kept Ford informed “every step of the way,” and met with the mayor about the plans for Yonge Street earlier this summer. Though Ford hasn’t taken the time to drop by the festival as of yet, she says he offered his support as long as it was what businesses in the area wanted.

It seems pretty safe to assume that those businesses have spoken. The expanded patios are busy. The feedback received by Wong-Tam and others has been overwhelmingly positive.

Celebrate Yonge has sparked a renewed excitement for Yonge Street.

So why let the celebration come to an end?