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Cascadia Liquor Stores


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#21 G-Man

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Posted 19 August 2009 - 05:52 AM

Strange how people don't want to walk into a social service centre to withdraw money. I agree though a bank would be good too.

#22 Bernard

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Posted 19 August 2009 - 07:36 AM

It is only a short walk to the government liqour store at Hillside and Blanshard and only a few more steps to a Bank of Nova Scotia. If those couple of blocks are too far for people to walk, then there is an issue with people walking to any location.

#23 Chris J

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Posted 19 August 2009 - 09:53 AM

Well I'm not opposed, after reading the arguments here. Not interested in advocating for it either. Liquor just is not that important in my life anymore that I feel it is missing from my trips through the village. Nor a bank, though a Vancity branch would be preferable.
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#24 Caramia

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Posted 19 August 2009 - 10:03 AM

I was going to say - sticking with the local flavour - a credit union instead of a bank. Also, a small hardware store and a proper bakery.
Nowadays most people die of a sort of creeping common sense, and discover when it is too late that the only things one never regrets are one's mistakes.
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#25 Chris J

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Posted 19 August 2009 - 10:10 AM

Oh yeah, I agree with those too.
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#26 D.L.

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Posted 19 August 2009 - 10:56 AM

we're the only neighbourhood with a head shop

#27 Bernard

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Posted 19 August 2009 - 11:49 AM

we're the only neighbourhood with a head shop


We have at Burnside and Tillicum, but it is never open for the public to shop there......

#28 Bob Fugger

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Posted 19 August 2009 - 12:23 PM

OK, I am prepared take a lot of flack for this (especially from QV denizens), but isn't the whole concept of a 'Quadra Village' just a public relations exercise by the City to sort of 'class up' the area without actually doing anything to improve it...well, except for the welcome signs erected in the boulevards?

The reason I ask is because most everyone sniggers at the mention of the term "Quadra Village." Isn't it just a bad strip mall in a high crime / low-income area?

And before you get angry at me, this is a common impression of the place that I am espousing here.

#29 Caramia

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Posted 19 August 2009 - 12:40 PM

I think it is more than that. The idea of creating village centers throughout the municipalities where amenities are available within walking distance is a central tenant of most progressive urban planning these days.

There are a whole lot of reasons behind this - including encouraging walkability, and with it, accessibility for children/seniors/handicapped and other "non-drivers" to those same amenities. Villages should be walking distance from one another, but encouraged to develop their own flavour, adding to the cultural diversity of each neighbourhood. They should include an integrated retail experience, promoting the growth of small and local business - serving in a way as incubators for those businesses (often village businesses are start-ups, which, if successful, then tackle the more expensive downtown rents, or franchise). They should included places where neighbours can gather and meet - such as coffee shops, neighbourhood pubs, parks...

This kind of thing has been in the OCP as well as the regional plan for quite some time, and we've seen results on the ground, often mistaken for spontaneous growth of retail clusters, but actually the result of careful planning policy. In my opinion, promoting the urban villages of Victoria are one of the (few) areas in which our planning departments have excelled.

Of course, I've spent most of my life living within a block or two of one neighbourhood village or another. Fernwood Village, James Bay Village, Cook Street Village - they've all been my haunts, as Quadra Village is now. So I am very biased.
Nowadays most people die of a sort of creeping common sense, and discover when it is too late that the only things one never regrets are one's mistakes.
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#30 Holden West

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Posted 19 August 2009 - 01:03 PM

Quadra Village is vastly improved over what it was 20 years ago and it keeps getting better. The mix of tenants is better and the overall ambience, including the sidewalk improvements have had a positive impact.

A liquor store that complements, not competes with, the big government store would be good.
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#31 Bernard

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Posted 19 August 2009 - 02:28 PM

The area has improved a lot with the opening of the Fairway in the old Brick location (this is was a Safeway till the early 1980s)

Physically it is well set up to be a good walking/hanging out sort of area, especially along Quadra from Bay to Hillside. The parking lot by the Fairway and Rogers helps open the area up for more walking and pedestrian traffic.

The current location of University Canada West could be redeveloped to make it a core of the neighbourhood and offering a lot more housing in the area. I believe UCW was looking at developing the site at one point.

The area is definitely in the cusp of being a viable and good local urban village.

#32 ZGsta

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Posted 19 August 2009 - 03:33 PM

OK, I am prepared take a lot of flack for this (especially from QV denizens), but isn't the whole concept of a 'Quadra Village' just a public relations exercise by the City to sort of 'class up' the area without actually doing anything to improve it...well, except for the welcome signs erected in the boulevards?

The reason I ask is because most everyone sniggers at the mention of the term "Quadra Village." Isn't it just a bad strip mall in a high crime / low-income area?

And before you get angry at me, this is a common impression of the place that I am espousing here.


The area is way way better than I remember it a few years ago.

#33 D.L.

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Posted 19 August 2009 - 03:46 PM

We have at Burnside and Tillicum, but it is never open for the public to shop there......


that's a hydroponics store, which Quadra has as well. also a movie theatre.

anyways, back to the liquor store...

#34 G-Man

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Posted 19 August 2009 - 03:58 PM

The parking lot by the Fairway and Rogers helps open the area up for more walking and pedestrian traffic.


Dang it Bernard I almost agreed with you on something.

Are you being serious here?

I mean that parking lot is the one thing that is holding the village back from being a truly great destination in the city, sort of a small commercial drive.

If I had my druthers i would let Fairways keep the two rows of parking in front of the store and the rest of the plaza would be bombed to smitherines and some office residential building would fill up every last square inch of the rest of that area. It should be store fronts along there not parking lots.

Parking lots never improve the pedestrian experience, never. It is like a law of physics.

#35 D.L.

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Posted 19 August 2009 - 05:47 PM

the walkways in that parking lot are pretty good though

#36 G-Man

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Posted 19 August 2009 - 05:50 PM

^ As far as parking lots go they are pretty good.

#37 pseudotsuga

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Posted 19 August 2009 - 10:08 PM

Scotia bank never occured to me. Walking there would certainly work, but it isn't exactly in the 'village'

#38 pseudotsuga

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Posted 19 August 2009 - 10:16 PM

I was going to say - sticking with the local flavour - a credit union instead of a bank. Also, a small hardware store and a proper bakery.


Those would be nice. But for now italian bakery is just up the road, wildfire down the road, and the former do-it centre a few blocks away. None of them require crossing Blanshard...my main beef with the BCL.

#39 Bernard

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Posted 20 August 2009 - 11:25 AM

I understand that much of what is needed by residents is not in what is the village area of Hillside and Quadra, so me saying there is the Bank of Nova Scotia is not really fair and relevant to the debate. I raised in more to show how large streets like Blanshard create walls in people's minds.

Meanwhile on the parking lot, yes it is a parking lot but there is a nice natural flow through that lot for people living to the south east of the village core there. It is also a nice parking lot and does not feel like some honking huge piece of asphalt. I suspect this is because there is ample and nice pedestrian walkways through the parking lot and the core central area of the parking lot splits up the parked cars into individual rows that do not touch each other.

I would prefer to see some of the crappy buildings on the west side of Quadra redeveloped and offer some sort of walk through area there to the field behind UCW and then allow for a walking path through to the Blanshard and Hillside exit.

The Greater Victoria School Board is sitting on a lot of green space in the area and is not making any use of it and is not making it available as a park area. Imagine a concert stage in the field at the old SJ Willis, that would really give a boost to the area.

I am also a fan of large wide pedestrian overpasses over busy streets. I would love to see one go from the SJ Willis green space through to the UCW green space.

But this is all WAYYYY off topic

#40 Caramia

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Posted 20 August 2009 - 12:28 PM

Here's the concept drawing for the interior!

I'll try to get more details as the week progresses.


Nowadays most people die of a sort of creeping common sense, and discover when it is too late that the only things one never regrets are one's mistakes.
Oscar Wilde (1854 - 1900), The Picture of Dorian Gray, 1891

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