Finally, to see a community sports field adjacent to a container terminal, as one does in Tokyo Bay, is to know that Japanese waterfront experts have really absorbed the idea of the integration of uses.
3 e. The Toronto Waterfront in the 1990's
Japan continued to build its waterfronts whilst living through its "bubble economy" experience but in Toronto the recession brought waterfront development virtually to a halt, certainly in the central waterfront, and waterfront development was left almost entirely in the hands of public agencies.
Most of them lacked the financial capacity to act on a large scale, so they were induced either to adopt incremental and/or partnership approaches, or to wait for market conditions to pick up.
In these conditions the Trust promoted the construction of the Waterfront Trail. As described in the Trust's preliminary paper for the International Symposia - the project could be divided into many small affordable increments, with many participating partners.
The recession led governments to provide seed money for the Trail for job creation purposes and for environmental reasons. To help stimulate economic recovery they also looked for other waterfront projects that could be built on a cost-shared basis within a limited time-frame. A new $180 million National Trade Centre at Exhibition Place on the central waterfront was commissioned on this basis, cost shared between the federal, provincial and metropolitan governments. It will open in June 1997.
But Canadian governments did not go as far as their Japanese counterparts to attract private sector investment in the waterfront. No special grants or contributions were offered; no tax concessions or tax forgiveness, no bonuses. Instead the pendulum swung the other way. Governments focused on reducing their roles in society and the economy. "Shrink the deficit! Disentangle the relations between government! Unshackle the creative energies of the private sector!" became the watch cries.
Under the impetus of this policy the waterfront roles of the federal and provincial governments have been diminishing while those of the municipalities and the private sector are increasing. The Province of Ontario is reducing the number of municipalities in the Greater Toronto Area from 35 to perhaps 15 or 18, starting in the centre by combining the Metropolitan Toronto and six local governments to form a stronger more powerful City of Toronto with some 2.2 million citizens.
Consistent with this policy large blocks of government-owned land on the waterfront, particularly in the centre, are being put on the market. The province is also offering
