Business Beat by Matt DeBock
Incredible, the difference nine months can make. In January, this paper reported grand expectations for Bank Street in 2001.
The Bank Street Promenade called the year-to-come “exciting” and business owners boldly predicted that 2001 would be “all about Bank Street.”
Of course, they could not have predicted the months ahead.
No one could predict terrorist attacks would shatter our innocence, ensuring economic chaos. All predictions for the future are moot, as everyone has adopted a wait-and-see approach before trying to gauge the attacks’ true impact.
Here in Ottawa, the ever-sinking high tech sector dragged with it the local economy, fueling uncertainty with the announcement of loss after loss, and layoff after layoff.
Forecasts could not have seen how low this once-shining star could fall, and even now there is no guarantee the worst is over.
Even closer to home, the long-awaited condo development, which was expected at Bank and Gilmour, has now completely fallen through, leaving empty storefronts and vacant apartments.
In fact, Bank Street has more empty storefronts now than it did at the year’s beginning. This does not have to be a continuing trend.
The Bank Street Promenade was created to help fight the “donut effect,” in which people move to the suburban edges of a city, leaving behind an empty city core. The Promenade has been very successful at revitalizing the Bank Street community and preserving Ottawa’s downtown vitality, but now it must remember its purpose.
In the wake of such a tumultuous year, unsure business communities need more than blind faith and boosterism.
Rather than bold predictions and empty cheers, a nervous economy needs solid plans for the future. In the early 1990s, innovative thinking sparked revitalization. Property tax incentives attracted new life to a once-declining neighbourhood.
Hopefully such innovative ideas can surface once more, and then, perhaps, 2002 could truly be all about Bank.