I've been working on a B2B interview project for a couple of weeks now, and I'm driving into industrial parks and suburban shopping areas all over the place. As well as the downtown core.
It's been a real eye-opener.
Yesterday, I went to the wrong corporate building downtown. No problem, the other building was a 10 minute walk away, I just trotted over and held the interview.
But last week, I went to the wrong business outlet in the suburbs. The owner maintains offices in both locations, but he was in the other one. It was a short distance as the crow flies, but I had to get back on the highway to get there. [Embarassing mis-communication between our respective helpers. Fortunately, he was a really nice guy, and didn't take it out on me.]
It made me think about the dynamics of the work day for these different groups. How you might bump into other people, or not bump into them, for example, just coming and going.
An executive I saw downtown yesterday had just been delivered a brown bag from Tim Horton's by his executive assistant. Few of the buildings I've been at in the industrial parks would have anything like this within walking distance, let alone a choice of options.
One of the really weird things I noticed is that there is almost no public parking in the newer communities. None is needed, since every commercial location has abundant private parking. Of course it's all free parking too.
Stats Can is always saying that the >majority of Canadians live in urban area. Well, what they count as an urban area would not pass muster as a town in most places in the USA.
More importantly, I think there's a big difference between the life experience of living and working in the sprawling burbs, versus living and working in the urban core. Shopping behaviors aren't the same. Business opportunities aren't the same. Parking, for heaven's sake, isn't the same.
Don't we need to be taking this into account more?
Resources
StatsCan "Dependence on cars in urban neighborhoods" by Martin Turcotte,
Historical urban and rural stats from StatsCan. 1911 - 1941
StatsCan definition of urban area: minimum 400 people per square kilometer. And some other stuff. Probably makes sense, but doesn't tell the whole story.
