Downtown revival Skywalk, concourse reopening meaningful signs as life goes on in city's core By: Melissa Martin Posted: 6:05 PM CDT Monday, Jun. 22, 2020

Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 21/06/2020 (1605 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

It’s lunchtime in downtown Winnipeg, a few minutes after noon. This is when the arterial corridors of the city’s heart should be pumping their hardest, people in suits and sensible heels spilling out of office towers, streaming towards restaurants and food courts and little cafés tucked into odd corners.

That’s what it was like before the pandemic, though. This is still the time during. The time after is still far away.

So on this Monday, the skywalk, open to the public for the first time since early April, is nearly empty. Footfalls beat out a lonely rhythm; on a walk through the whole system, a writer sees just five other people in a three-block stretch from Fort Street to Cityplace. For most of the walk, there is nobody else around.

The underground concourse at Winnipeg Square offers a little more buzz, though far less than the bustling midday crowds remembered from pre-COVID days. The food court is open, but only for takeout as of Monday and with the flow of traffic being directed one way; the concourse was not so busy that one couldn’t stay six feet away.

This is not unexpected. Reopening after COVID-19 has played out in scenes like these, where places look much the same as they did, but feel ineffably different: the arrow decals stuck to floors, the restaurants with half of their tables removed and, now, the skywalk with almost nobody in it.

There are a number of factors at play. It’s summer, which makes walking outside a more appealing proposition even when there isn’t a global pandemic. News that the skywalk and the underground concourse were reopened probably hadn’t yet reached everyone, and not everyone will feel comfortable yet in indoor public spaces.

But the biggest factor is quite simple: Winnipeg’s downtown is still missing most of its people.

Before the pandemic, it was estimated that about 70,000 people came to work downtown every day. The Downtown BIZ has recently been collecting data, trying to pin down how many are back in the office; even the most optimistic figure, BIZ CEO Kate Fenske says, would be about half the usual number.

Yet bit by bit, people are coming back. Fenske recalls riding her bike to work in the early weeks of the pandemic, a little unnerved by how it seemed as if she had the whole street to herself; in the last few weeks, she’s noticed more traffic and more people out in the streets, soaking up the summer sun.

That renewed presence of life is an optimistic sign. It’s easier to be patient when you can see the light coming in.

“We wouldn’t want the good work everyone has put in to go to waste,” Fenske says. “As a community we all did our part to keep those numbers low, so we don’t want to risk that. It’s important that we take a cautious approach as we come back. The activity has definitely picked up in the last weeks.”

That optimism is showing up in business owners, too. In April 2020, the Downtown BIZ asked its members how long they could stay in business if things remained the same; at the time, fewer than one in five respondents thought they could last more than a year. By early June, that number had jumped up to 65 per cent.

And the skywalk and underground concourse reopening does help, for many reasons. For one thing, it makes the downtown accessible to more people, especially during rainy weather. (The underground concourse being closed made finding one’s way across Portage and Main even more of a headache than it normally is.)

It gives the businesses located along the skywalk a chance to reopen. Many were still closed as of Monday, and those that were open had few customers; that will likely change, as people begin working at the office again. For Fenske, the key is to figure out what the next 30 to 90 days will look like downtown.

“We’re not expecting everyone to come back down to work all at once,” Fenske says. “It’s going to be that phased-in approach. At the Downtown BIZ we’re going to try and make that process a little easier… and hopefully provide some physically distanced fun for the summer.”

To that end, the BIZ kicked off its annual Fitness in the Park series on Monday, inviting folks to come enjoy a brisk outdoor workout while keeping appropriate separation. It is also looking at how to adapt its popular farmers market and Memorial Park movie series to physical-distancing regulations.

Each of those offerings are just one step in getting back to something like normal. Or maybe “normal” isn’t the right word; maybe it should be something like “livable.” For months, the city and much of its familiar rhythms of life were on hold, but now they’re finding new ways of bringing activity back to the streets.

And the skywalk is open again. It stands quiet for now, even as it offers an invitation to move through the city; after months of being encouraged to stay in the one place, that invitation holds some meaning. The pandemic isn’t over, and we have to stay wary. But we’ve made it this far, and that has to be worth something.

 

melissa.martin@freepress.mb.ca