Solving the riddle of Winnipeg’s downtown

Opinion

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This article was published 21/10/2022 (699 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

When people come to a city to work or to visit, they often stay, eat and are entertained in the heart of a city — its downtown. Today, Winnipeg’s downtown is not where it needs to be. Like many Canadian cities, we’re facing challenges, including safety, homelessness and food insecurity.

Improving our downtown is a riddle that all of us, collectively, need to solve. It’s critical to our overall economic recovery and growth.

The choice of our next mayor and council is important. We need to put aside political differences and focus on the future of this city, beginning with creating the conditions for a healthy downtown.

According to our partners at Downtown Winnipeg BIZ and a recent survey by Probe Research, only 64 per cent of workers are back at the office (23 per cent are part-time or hybrid, and 41 per cent are full-time, five days a week). While that number is up from 47 per cent in March, it’s not enough.

Increased foot traffic helps to support small businesses and service providers in our downtown. More traffic also means more energy and vibrancy in our downtown, which translates to safety. Our challenge is to lead, and to bring people back to the office and create a downtown where workers are excited to be full-time.

We need to make an attractive and safe downtown a priority for the incoming city council. Not only will Winnipeggers feel more comfortable coming downtown, but it will also enable our Tourism Winnipeg team to secure meetings and conventions for our city. These events matter, as they represent the fastest economic impact a city can generate.

According to the Events Industry Council, people attending business events and conferences spend four times more than leisure travellers, with the latest average estimated at more than $600 per person. Meetings and conventions are good for business, and are critical to our downtown and overall recovery.

The International Winter Cities Shake-up Conference and the International Indigenous Tourism Conference, both coming in early 2023, will bring 1,100 delegates to Winnipeg, accounting for more than 1,300 room nights and cash injection of more than $1.7 million to our city.

In addition to meetings and conventions, Tourism Winnipeg works with many stakeholders to secure large-scale special events to our city. We all remember the excitement and energy that was generated when Winnipeg hosted the Heritage Classic and the Grey Cup.

Winnipeg will play host to the 2023 World Police and Fire Games, which will bring more people to our city than the 1999 Pan Am Games. With an estimated 8,000 participants and 20,000 hotel room nights, the games will inject $12.8 million into our economy. That matters.

A tool the Economic Development Winnipeg (EDW) team has in its toolbox when trying to attract large conventions or special events is the Special Event Tourism Fund (SETF). This fund was established by the City of Winnipeg and is funded by the Accommodation Tax to provide a financial incentive to events that select Winnipeg as their host city.

The SETF is used when Winnipeg competes with other jurisdictions to host events, and it incents groups or organizations to spend large sums of money in our city. This tool is invaluable, and is an investment in strong economic growth. It is important that our next city council prioritizes the SETF. We all need to do our part to protect and revitalize our downtown.

EDW is working to attract events and bring dollars into our economy. Many people are stepping up with ideas which include wrap-around solutions to help the most vulnerable. Others are supporting the Downtown Recovery Framework, a three-year co-ordinated action and investment plan to kick-start downtown recovery.

Some of the initiatives include the redesign of Air Canada Park and marketing plans to promote the area. At the same time, the Downtown Community Safety Partnership (DCSP), a non-profit organization made up of leaders in business, government, and police and fire services, is working collaboratively to develop services and approaches that will create a safer, more welcoming downtown.

We need our new city council to help us continue down this path to recovery. As we approach election day, ensure the candidates you are considering will put event attraction and our downtown recovery at the top of their priority list.

I encourage Winnipeggers to get engaged and involved. All of us can be ambassadors. All of us have a role to play. We know what we want for the future of our city. We all need to work to ensure that Winnipeg is world-class and a top choice for business, visitors and newcomers.

Dayna Spiring is the president & CEO of Economic Development Winnipeg Inc., the city’s lead economic development agency and champion for local growth.

economicdevelopmentwinnipeg.com.