“Mississauga needs places.”
That was one of the subheads in the phase 1 summary of the Placemaking in Mississauga report that was presented to City councillors earlier this year.
Ain’t it the truth. Exciting places. Preferably in the pubescent downtown.
The report by the New-York based consulting company Project for Public Spaces (PPS) makes a number of sweeping suggestions for remaking the Mississauga Civic Centre and the much too sterile squares in front of City Hall and the Central Library.
The gist of the report is that the city centre and City Hall have great bones, but we’re missing the boat when it comes to using them properly.
Most of the ideas are common sense, starting with tearing down many of the walls that provide physical, visual and psychological barriers (maybe that was the idea) between the public and the post-modern masterpiece created by architects Edward Jones and Michael Kirkland. That pair would no doubt blanch at many of the proposals which are aimed at function, not form.
Most of them make eminently good sense.
How can one build a tribute to the history of (especially agrarian) architecture, such as this civic centre is intended to be, and not have one single, solitary entrance point worth its salt?
One of the recommendations is to fix that design problem by creating an entrance through the first floor conservatory. The conservatory never worked properly because of humidity problems which severely limited the horticultural showcase. I’ll bet most citizens have never seen the wonderful arch leading into the Great Hall that’s in there. We have a Great Hall. We need a Great Entrance.
Many of the proposals are aimed at generating more action to make the squares the magnet for lunchtime lounging and people-watching that they ought to be.
Among the many stimulating suggestions are:
• moving the Art Gallery of Mississauga out of its sleepy secluded corner office on the main floor of City Hall and giving it a place of pedestrian prominence, perhaps in a new building on the east side of the library square, the spot where a City Hall annex was once slated to go. Then making the art gallery space a restaurant with a patio that would spill out onto the square and into the sculpture court, which now features outdoor art no one can see because of the surrounding walls. (A potential adjunct - a Whine Bar where City staff could debrief each other after work.)
• blowing up the rarely-used amphitheatre and replacing it with buildings that front on Duke of York where City services that require the attendance of the public could be located on the ground floor.
• creating an outdoor wedding chapel. The wall around the contemplative Jubilee Garden at the west end of the civic square is proposed to be removed so the secret public garden is finally revealed, with obvious post-vow picture possibilities.
• launching an outdoor reading room on the library square, with cafés, sofas (Chapters may have a surplus) and an authors’ reading and speaking series, possibly making use of the obvious UTM connections.
• hosting a permanent indoor farmers’ market.
• installing a pavilion on the library square for children’s programs and other events. The best part – an international newsstand.
The City made a good start last summer with its concert series on the square but much more needs to be done to energize the downtown. There are loads of good ideas in the Placemaking report waiting to be seized for action.
Frankly, you’d think there would be more buzz about the entire report.
This summer it will be 20 years since Fergy and Andy opened the Civic Centre on a steamy July afternoon and Prince Andrew noted wryly that, “It is a truly remarkable building. It will be noticed.”
What better way to celebrate that anniversary than to fulfill all the promise of that day by making the key civic square the public draw it was always intended to be?