Today’s post is for reader DouglasM (former local) who wondered from Washington State if I had any photos of the area of Sandwich where the proposed twin span enhancement of the current bridge was going to be. Doug, here you go…
One of the more interesting motions on last night’s Council Agenda was put off at the Bridge Company’s request. It was their motion to request exemption from the interim control by-law and the demolition control by-law put in place in old Sandwich, and to request permission to allow demolition of 686, 718, 738, 750, 778 & 784 Indian Street. To rear rear of these houses it is plain to see that Mr. Maroun and the Bridge Company are progressing full steam ahead with their plans to twin the bridge enhance the current structure. I am almost to the point where I am so fed up with the local pickering among various factions, that I am almost pulling for a twinned enhanced Ambassador Bridge.
Looking south from Wyandotte St. on Indian the gaps in the streetscape are readily apparent.
686 Indian, one of the victims.
718 Indian
738 Indian.
John, it looks like your grandparent’s old house has been spared in the next round.
Apparently I wasn’t the only one who thought a trip to Indian Road yesterday was newsworthy based on the council agenda. Christy Bezaire of A Channel News was there.
750 Indian. I’m pretty sure this was Cock Paul’s house. (A supervisor I once worked with who earned his nickname).
784 Indian. I missed getting a shot of 778, but it looks similar to 784.
Around the corner on Mill St. there are some old stairs that now lead to nothing. This house too was a victim of the enhancement.
This apartment building at University & Indian was one of the final acquisitions in the Indian Road corridor for the Bridge company. They now own all the necessary land to “enhance” the current bridge.
If this doesn’t look like laying the ground work for twinning, I don’t know what is.
You tell me, what do you think? Also good to see former MP Susan Whelan is now a mouth piece for the Bridge Company. Looks like all the local Liberals certainly have only the best of intentions for the citizens of Windsor. With friends like these….
A copy of the document that went before City Council last night can be had by clicking here.
Cock Paul…I love it! You are correct that was his house.
But back to the bridge….has or will the Bridge company compensate Assumption Church Parish for the destruction of the church when they are driving those columns into the ground? How about for all of the trucks rumbling by taking construction materials for the “enhancement” of the bridge? I haven’t seen a penny yet. I doubt I ever will.
I agree with yoru assessment of the liberals in this area. Cozy up to who ever will benefit your election most (IE: possible $$$ donations).
Oh, Appendix B just makes me crazy!
The first thing I noticed is the re-occuring use of the argument by the bridge company that this house or that house is in deteriorating condition, needing this repair or that repair. Wasn’t it the bridge company that neglected many of these homes for the last ten years, renting them out and refusing to put any money into basic maintenance? So now they want to use the bridge company’s intentional neglect as Exhibit One in the case for tearing them down?! Why is such an unusually high number of homes on this street now “unsafe” and why are they so hard to lease? Has anyone been honestly trying? What a dog and pony show!
As for architectural value, that is a subjective matter, and indeed some of the homes there may be arguably of little value in that respect (ie. Cock Paul’s old house house), but there were/are some beautiful old brick homes on that street with many more years of service ahead of them.
I understand some things have to give way in the name of progress but please, Mr Bridge Corporation, don’t feed Windsor shit on a stick and tell us it’s ice cream just so you can have your way with this plaza expansion!
Thank you, Andrew. What peaqued my interest was a National Public Radio story I heard a week or so ago about the bridge, coupled with the ongoing discussion about the International Bridge Company on DetroitYes. I guess I can understand the arguement against the demo. Although none of the buildings are “unique (except the apartment building which is a type you don’t see built anymore) they all look to be in resonably stable condition and could possibly be brought back into the housing inventory without a lot of work.
My questions are as follows, though. 1) would tearing down the houses and apartment building cause serious damage to the Sandwitch community and b) would building the twin…sorry, enhansed….bridge do the same, or do you think it should be built at the proposed Ecorse site?
Doug Shirk
Rock Ilsland, WA
….and before someone chides me for mis-spelling “Sandwich”, I did the same to my current residence. It’s “Island”…….
Douglasm, another bridge would be very detrimental as it would widen the tract of land the bridge owns and displace more people from both the UofW and Assumption Church. Also of note is that Huron Church would have even more traffic (at times it cannot handle the volum eof traffic it has now) and this would alienate more of the west side from the West end mall and grocery stores.
I personally think that is should be done in Delray as they intend to do.
Christie is hot!
Big round of applause for Mr. Maroun. Get-R-Done. If we wait for our municipal, provincial, federal politicians it will take longer than our arena did (20+yrs) to get a second span.
What’s going on at Assumption Church…I noticed a lot of construction activity on the walls near the parking lot…Anything to do with there claims the bridge is doing a lot of damage to it?
That’s what I said at first, Guido, but then OTOH one has to consider that this is not a twinning. The new bridge will replace, not enhance the old bridge. They have already stated the old bridge will just be used for maintenance vehicles. I think they plan to tear it down once the new one is up and running. Furthermore, the project won’t remedy long lineups when U.S. customs has one of their heightened states of security. Nor will it solve the pollution issues on Huron Church road. Not much going there for a project that will seriously decimate a well established neighbourhood and disrupt the community of Sandwich town in ways we haven’t even learned yet. That’s why we have something called “due process”. Sure, it meant that things like the arena took twenty years to come to fruition, but that doesn’t mean a corporation should be able to just skip it due process and “get-r-done” and steamroll over the surrounding community as though nothing matters but the project itself. What if this was your backyard they were tearing to pieces?
John do you actually believe that they would tear down the old one. I think he is using that as a sales pitch so he can get his approvals. That bridge has lots of life left if they would redo the road surface, they just spent over 25million to repaint it not to long ago. Anyway you can’t stop progress pay me what my house is worth and you can build whatever you want. We need to keep the goods flowing through the city without traffic back-ups. I’m sure corporations base decisions on whether to locate here or current ones stay here if they can’t get their products in or out of the city. This NIMBY(not in my back yard) is rediculous.
I tend to agree with Guido. The biggest detriment IMO to Sandwich is Huron Church, not the Bridge itself. What needs to be done is Huron Church needs to become a direct link highway to the 401. Exproporate the few businesses and houses along Huron Church and let the trucks roll.
We need an honest to goodness freeway with overpasses at all major roads, on and off ramps etc… from the 401 to the I-75. With NIMBY’s no one wins.
I still maintain that the DRTP was a good idea too. If there is one thing this city hates it’s grade separations. 🙂
What happens if/when this direct link ever does come into existence, do the trucks cause less pollution while they are idling on a reworked 401 that extends to the bridge? If traffic doesn’t keep moving when it hits customs, then we’re still going to be in the same mess no matter what kind of infrastructure exists to accomodate the movement of trucks between talbot road and the bridge.
As for the NIMBYS’, yeah…we always point to and criticize them for getting in the way, but we aren’t the ones making the sacrifices. So I don’t blame any of them for at least having guarded optimism to outright protest toward any solution that impacts their area.
John very true. However all the studies show that most pollution comes from trucks accelerating from a dead stop, much like what happens at the 14 traffic lights from the 401 to the bridge. Sadly we can’t trust the city to do anything, or the provincial CABINET Ministers that are from Windsor, so I’m afraid that there is only one solution. Someone has to make a decision in Ottawa or Toronto and ram it down our throats.
It is painfully obvious that no one in Windsor can make a decision, and the amout of trade that crosses that bridge is of National importance. The need to efficently move goods back and forth is much bigger than any business, neighbourhood or park. That’s just my two cents.
Now is the perfect time to have a decision forced on us. We have a Conservative government in Ottawa with nothing to lose down here politically, so they can put an end to this nonsense once and for all without having to kiss ass with the local voters.
I understand how these trucks belch a little extra when they accelerate, it makes sense, But I still would go right back to the same question: if the traffic lights are all gone….but the truck in front isn’t moving an inch because the seventy five in front of it aren’t moving either, we still have a problem (including lots of start/stop/idle). And when did truckers start observing red lights anyway? 😉
Well John that’s the Million dollar question. They’re going to sit an idle somewhere, either on Huron Church or in Birghton Beach… Either way they’re going to be belching somwhere in Windsor, and somewhere a NIMBY will be complaining… 😉
Were there not proposed crossing solutions made for downriver locations that impacted fewer residents? And one that involved tunneling? There are (were?) solutions out there that didn’t necessarily mean crapping in someone’s cheerios and saying “too bad about your luck”.
Naturally no one wants it in their backyard, but like I said before, you and I don’t have to deal with this route going straight up Walker or Howard either…
Andrew, thank you for having some info about last night’s council meeting! I missed watching it on TV, expected something about this issue in The Star, but saw nothing today. Huzzah for blogs!
Mark, they are rebuilding some of the east wall and the turrets as they are leaking and the bricks have fallen apart. The trucks may have somewhat of an impact on this but I believe that this is about being older brick that has seen its days than it is just the trucks impact on the church.
The brighton beach location seemed to be the better option all along… And, what would have become of the ‘engineered redundancy’? — To build a new crossing adjacent to the existing does not solve the security problems of creating alternate crossing location should there be security hold ups at the other. If the feds actually supports the ‘enhanced’ Is it safe to say brighton beach will be shelved? From the outside looking in, the decisionmakers look like amateurs!