The Tisdale Main Street Redevelopment Project Touches Upon The Essence Of Placemaking

Placemaking has been described as the art and practice of building communities; and as the way all of us as human beings transform the places in which we find ourselves into places in which we live. In many ways, that is precisely what the town of Tisdale has embarked upon with its Main Street redevelopment project.

“2005 is our centennial year,” explains Joanne Messer, a spokesperson for the project. “We already have a hospital, a rink and those types of infrastructures. We thought it was time to explore how we could create a more pleasant environment downtown that imparts a progressive character to the place; that makes it more inviting for our citizens and visitors; and that will perhaps convince young families to move here, or more mature families to retire in our community, knowing they will enjoy a rich quality of life here for years to come.”

The Town set up a committee to guide the project, and it hired a firm of landscape architects to explore the goals and objectives such an initiative should have. Crosby Hanna & Associates, a Saskatchewan firm with offices in Saskatoon and Regina, was selected for the job.

Roger Green is the lead landscape architect for the project. “We started by analyzing the existing conditions — what is good or could be improved,” he says. “From the spatial and physical points of view, we tried to move the environment forward to meet those goals and objectives and we helped them articulate those objectives from the quality of the physical environment and quality of space, comfort and aesthetic perspectives.”

“Specifically,” says Green, “we looked at the whole Main Street over five to six blocks. It is a very wide main street. It is also imbedded into highway 35, which comes from the south and goes out the north end towards Nipawin. In a case like this, the urban environment is characterized by rather heavy vehicle traffic, which brings its own set of challenges.”

Economically, downtown Tisdale is healthy. The overall goal was to improve the appearance of the district — enhancing its pedestrian environment as well — and to slow down traffic somewhat. One goes with the other.

“We widened the sidewalks a little and ended up with still maintaining nine meters of traffic flow and three meters of parking on each side. There is a lot of heavy traffic on that highway, a lot of transports and semis which has an impact on the environment from a human point of view,” explains Green.

The firm ended up putting together an Enhancement Master Plan that proposed some dramatic changes to the urban landscape. The conventional gooseneck type of streetlights would be replaced with more aesthetically pleasing and adequately spaced ones. Public benches and bicycle stands would be added. Street corners at intersections would be shaped into protruding bulbs that have a traffic calming effect by keeping the through traffic in the centre, while maintaining parallel parking lanes on the sides.

One of the other main objectives was to redefine a focal point for downtown by reconfiguring a key area in particular that straddles main street and encompasses the Post Office at one end, and a vacant parcel of land that was being used as a kind of overflow parking lot at the other end.

“The Post Office is a key social element in the fabric of downtown, but it is located off Main Street,” says Green. “The redevelopment physically reconnects it to Main Street by tying it into a new Town Square that has been developed between the Post Office and over the vacant lot on the other side of main street that is no longer vacant. Three permanent pavilions that can be used for a farmers’ market and multiple purposes have been built — that space has been reconfigured entirely.”

Joanne Messer is quite proud of what has been accomplished so far. “Phase One of the project has been completed. There is now an area for public performances and facilities for other outdoor events. We even have a town clock coming in next summer in time for our Homecoming. Hanging baskets and banners are also being added, and to finance all this, we have set into motion an ambitious sponsorship program. This is a $1.2 million project and we have raised about $600,000.”

All the benches in the Town Square were sold at a cost of $2,000 each. Interlocking paving bricks were used for the new sidewalk which helps harmonize the built environment — there is a sponsorship program for these as well. Broken curbs, exposed pipes, cracked and uneven surfaces would just not do. There are plans for the addition of colourful awnings or canopies, updated signage and sculptural elements or touches that make a difference. For landscape architect Roger Green, the lesson to draw from what is happening in Tisdale is simple enough to grasp.

“Many small communities out there in the province are feeling a lot of economic pressures. Once transportation improves, people are willing to travel further to get groceries, but a lot of towns are in a situation where they are trying to turn things around. Tisdale’s move is gutsy. Fortunately, it has a large trading area and is prosperous from an agricultural point of view.

We should stop giving up on our small towns and do what we can to bring them up into the 21st century. Some will survive and thrive. Central to achieving that is the built environment in these towns. It is a key factor in the enhancement of business and social life.”

For more information, contact:

Joanne Messer
Town of Tisdale
(306) 873-2681

Roger Green
Crosby Hanna & Associates
(306) 790-7635