10 years of the master plan for downtown Sudbury: A work in progress or a vision 'squandered'?

In 2012, Sudbury city council accepted a list of 61 projects that promised to transform the downtown core.

At the top of the list of short-term projects in the downtown master plan was the Elgin Greenway— a forested path connecting the downtown with Ramsey Lake and Bell Park.

"Clearly one of those important public realm moves that's going to redefine the way downtown Sudbury looks for the next generation to come," former city planner Jason Ferrigan said in 2013.

But it may take a generation before the Greenway is actually built.

In 2017, five years after the master plan was completed, city council balked at the $8.5-million cost for the linear park and agreed to build a $3-million section of the greenway, as long as federal and provincial funding was secured.

Greater Sudbury city staff say they continue to lobby for that money.

Susan Thompson, the former managing director of the Downtown Village Development Corporation, calls the greenway a "tragedy"

She said she and others had corporate sponsors lined up who would have seen it built years ago

"That was the way to do it, to take the burden off the taxpayers and let the private sector help pay for it," she said.

"However, the city decided they were taking it over and it just disappeared."

Sudbury city Coun. Deb McIntosh said the Elgin Greenway is very much alive and pointed out some small pieces of it can be walked on today, including a short stretch on the grounds of the architecture school.

"I wish it had happened sooner ... the vision is still there and it's still valid. It's just taking a little bit longer than we expected," she said. 

"The plan's not written in stone. It's going to evolve as you go along."

Kris Longston, Greater Sudbury's director of planning services, said it seems the delays with the Elgin Greenway are tainting the public perception that the downtown master plan has been shoved in a drawer at city hall and forgotten.

"It's frustrating ... when you do a lot of engagement, expectations are high and then people don't see something happen. And that probably leads into the perception that other work on the master plan hasn't been done," he said. 

"Elgin was supposed to be the first and it didn't end up happening that way, just like other things in life ... the outcome is just as good."

Longston points to the architecture school, Place Des Arts, Brady Green Stairs and redevelopment of the Tom Davies Square courtyard as master plan items that have been realized in the past decade. 

"It's not meant to be a to-do list for city staff," said Meredith Armstrong, the city's director of economic development.

"It's a way that we come together as a community and make decisions about how we want to use otherwise very limited resources to advance common goals related to downtown."

City staff say they are looking to do an update to the downtown master plan in the coming months, partly to reflect some of the changes that have happened since 2012.

One of the biggest and most controversial is the decision to build a new arena as part of the proposed Kingsway Entertainment District instead of in the downtown.

As for the former managing director of the Downtown Village Development Corporation, Susan Thompson said the city's focus on the Kingsway has "taken all the oxygen out of the room."

"I think how a great vision was just squandered completely," she said of the master plan. 

"Despite what they may say, their policies and their decisions that they made subsequent to that demonstrated their lack of commitment."