Beyond Aesthetics: Assessing the Value of Strip Mall Retail in Toronto

Orly Linovski

Journal of Urban Design, 2012, vol. 17, issue 1, 81-99

Abstract: Many city planners are increasingly focusing on urban design guidelines to shape future growth. However, the social implications of this type of planning rarely appear in city plans. Toronto's new planning policies are shown to establish a polarized view of the city, focusing on aesthetic concerns rather than the use and users of spaces. Interviews with small business owners and local planners were used to establish the benefits of, and threats to, strip malls. The findings reveal that strip malls provide affordable retail space for small businesses not available elsewhere and the spaces are seen as highly desirable by many ethnic business owners. This paper highlights some of the problems associated with design-centric planning.

Date: 2012
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/13574809.2011.646247 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:taf:cjudxx:v:17:y:2012:i:1:p:81-99

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/cjud20

DOI: 10.1080/13574809.2011.646247

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Urban Design is currently edited by Professor Taner Oc, Professor Michael Southworth, Professor Matthew Carmona and Dr Elisabete Cidre

More articles in Journal of Urban Design from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().