I lived in Capreol in the 70’s and Sudbury was a vibrant city back then. Watched Gretzky play in Sudbury. Saw my first concert in 1977 Kiss/Cheap trick.

Sudbury needs a local government rehaul. Too much of the local budget goes into wasteful projects and very little of it goes into the youth, what do the youth HAVE TO DO? As an outsider from Europe, when in Sudbury, there is very little to do for those who don’t drive and or don’t want to drink. Downtown is a no go zone after being threatened by both drug and alcohol users which as a young adult isn’t a safe interaction to have.

The Rainbow Centre was not its original name. From 1970 until 1998 it was called the “City Centre”. And it was an exciting mall to visit. New clothing fashions, Big Name Movies Premiered, Sam the Record Man, the Food Court was really nice & had no loitering. Yuk-Yuks Comedy Club. The Holiday Inn was a posh hotel!! I have great memories of the mall.

I left Sudbury in 1989 for Vancouver where the downtown is vibrant. It's vibrant because 80,000 people live in the downtown core. You are right that Sudbury's low density and sprawl has led to the downtown decline. I returned to Sudbury 24 years later and noticed a deteroriation of the downtown but I made it a point to try and patronize businessess there. I also supported keeping the Arena downtown. Sadly It's of course a bit of a chicken and egg argument but if people don't support their downtown it dies.

Online sales, Amazon in particular, has killed many brick and mortar stores. The pandemic that just he final nail in the coffin for a lot of them.

I was surprised that Southridge became a ghost town so quickly (relatively). Parking is a pita downtown and one of the main reasons why I avoid it and only go there when I have to. I worked in the stockroom of Kresges as a teenager, started just before they down sized the store. So, I got there just as the problems they had been feeling for a while bore fruit. They shut down the top floor and laid off a bunch of people, I left right around that time.

Southridge Mall is pretty much equivalent to the North Bay Mall, built just a few years before in 1976. If you lived in Ferris (our answer to your south end), North Bay Mall was the place to go. It once housed over 60 stores, now down to about 10 total, mainly outparcels. North Bay Mall looked a lot like the recent Southridge in the last few years. They are finally doing renos and making it just mostly an outdoor box store center, I believe. It is now billed as the 'North Bay Centre', not North Bay Mall, anymore. Northgate is alive and well, and seems to be doing OK. Shame really, and kind of sad, because the North Bay Mall was a big thing for it's time, being the first indoor mall in the city.

You're speaking my language! I think you hit the nail on the head with the core problems. One problem that you hint at, and that I'm sure you know of, is how Euclidean zoning means a city's residents need to park, and will choose businesses where it's 1) easier to park and 2) gets them close to the entrance. Hence why it feels easier to go to, say, Montana's at Silver Hills, rather than a restaurant downtown. One downtown revitalization approach I've heard of is to free up private parking lots: The usual situation is that numerous businesses have lots for employees and their particular customers only, and the idea is that sure, keep this arrangement in place... but only during the actual operating hours of the business. Employees go home at 5pm? Then 5pm is when the public parking starts in that lot. The City made a good decision in offering free on-street and municipal parking after 6pm on weeknights and all day on weekends, but I think ultimately we Sudburians are so accustomed to strip malls, that we want to cross one street max. Two blocks away is too far. This isn't the silver bullet, but it can be part of the overall solution, to encourage people to come downtown to eat (since that's mostly what it offers at the moment), leading to increased foot traffic, leading to more appeal for other small shops to open up. Well done video, I hope you'll continue talking about the topic online and off!

This was a very thorough documentary. Being only 21, I did not know what the lifestyle of downtown Sudbury was like. Due to this video, I now know how much things have changed, in even a short period of time. Thanks Kai!!!!!

In the 1970s, Sudbury produced one of Canada's greatest progressive rock bands, CANO. The band's leader, André Paiement, was also a brilliant playwright, who wrote plays that celebrated the city and were written in colloquial Northern Ontario French. CANO played a direct and important role in creating Sudbury's two important festivals: Northern Lights Festival Boréal and La Nuit sur l'étang.

As a kid going to Suds in the 70's and early 80's was a treat. It was bustling. Christmas shops were divine. Many many happy memories of back then.

Though no longer in sudbury I grew up there, This Jenifer Novak must be about my age for she brought me down memory lane!

Informative and helpful, thanks.

👍👍✌️ Well done doc on Sudbury I enjoyed it very much…

I grew up there in the 60sAND 70S,We would go to Woolworth and take pics, welcome summer at Bell park were Epic its a shame what they done to that city,Best place to grow up ever, I was a west ender born and raised on Spruce st.

Great work, kid. I could definitely feel the passion and love you have for your city keep sharing more of that content, the best is yet to come. Sudbury is a relatively young city but it's resilient and and will only get back bigger better and stronger, The Best Is Yet To Come!!!

North Bay it was/is a pretty similar story, before malls and such. We had a few more bars, restaurants, at least two active movie theatres, a Kresge, Woolworths, Walkers, Eatons, a Rexall Drugstore, you name it. Every 'oldtimer' I talk too, my dad included, have all said the same thing pretty much .... downtown WAS the city, and main shopping hub/area.

This is so well researched and put together, fantastic job!

Like other mid to large cities, do you think there would be a market for condos and/or lofts downtown? Have they tried it? Then again, it's the old chicken and egg scenario, do you build shops and services FIRST to entice people back downtown and thus, create a market for condos like in cities like K-W, Ottawa, Toronto and Barrie? Or, can it be a case of 'If you build it, they will come?' I guess a place has to be safe too and people have to feel comfortable living and doing business in said areas in the first place .... a Catch 22.

This all exactly what Prince George British Columbia is experiencing.

The USA came out with Large shopping malls in California and the Auto companies fully endorsed and promoted it . That's what started to kill ALL the downtowns . Our son had a business in downtown Sudbury but couldn't make it so he closed up shop ..Small town businesses died off and everyone had to drive to the big city shopping malls with their big box stores. They are trying to re vitalize downtowns now and i wish them a lot of luck .

It’s a little confused. He says that downtown is built in the centre and equal distance between New Sudbury and the South End, yet those place didn’t exist at all when downtown was built. Until 1950, downtown wasn’t even downtown, because it was the city itself in its entirety. What happened was that New Sudbury (in the 60’s and 70’s) and the SouthEnd (in the 80’s and 90’s) developed at equal distances from old downtown and essentially pulled the downtown Main Street apart into two halves. There was one Canadian Tire and when two were needed, another was built in New Sudbury, then later, when a new one was needed, the downtown one was closed and a new one built in the South End. Many businesses went through this process. If there commercial space needed to increase, it was more sensible to have two spaces rather than one, and put one in the North in New Sudbury and one in the South in the South End. The story of downtown’s demise is one of cleaving main street and sending business north or south. These other locations didn’t exist in the first seventy years of Sudbury. Politicians in the eighties worried this would happen, and now it has happenedz

Very good journalism!!😃

Sudbury is still great, but economic decline in the area and the nation as a whole has hurt Sudbury. The downtown in particular is full of crime, homeless and of course drugs...all symptoms of economic decline...

Great video man! If you ever want to work on something together here in Sudbury, get it touch!

i work downtown mall security....the things ive seen

For me it's all about the parking. You have to pay ridiculous amounts for parking now. Yes, I know of the "few" places that you could park for free but it's such a struggle, even PAID parking spots are difficult to find and the mall is a ghost town. In New Sudbury, it's free parking EVERYWHERE so I don't even bother going downtown anymore.

I used to live in Sudbury about 10 years ago and I know this lady I remember her she came to my business she probably don’t remember me

When I looked into opening a business years ago, the RBC had a big push on opening downtown, probably still do.

How about a Sudbury Saturday Night

23:30 I've lived here most of my life but I've lived in 4 other cities in Ontario and I bike everywhere. I've been hit 5 times in this city and I couldn't count the close calls if I tried to. The last one I was riding on the paved shoulder on the South End bypass, a pickup truck crossed the buzz strip going by me at what I assume was around 110-120kph, they hit the back of my arm with their (gigantic, oversized, clown-like) wing mirror and I watched the mirror explode out in front of me in slow motion. Came away with nothing but a bit of glass in my arm, somehow. The other 4 cities? All totalled together, I've been hit 0 times, barely any close calls.

Greed, nepotism and a healthy criminal underbelly has transformed Sludgebury into an even larger mess. This place was beautiful and busy at one time.. ..then crept an in crooked money that got washed through the downtown Chamber Of Commerce to the benifit of a small few.. ..be a cool documentary to do..example Interpaving with its mafia ties shorting the aggregate in the roads is why the roads so crappy..

Quite clear. Most of councilors in Sudbury are not business people,,,,, no experience in budgets, planning etc etc ! Until that changes,,, Sudbury stays the way it is perceived by the outside population ?

Big box stores and cars kinda ruined everything about well everything

It’s a zombie apocalypse down here

you know what he doesn't show in the video is his rust bucket 06 passat with literal rust holes in the door and fenders

Well done

The city council is too absorbed in spending money on stupid expensive projects and should be spending on roads and dealing with homeless and derelict buildings. Sudbury looking very shabby. Council ( many are useless) should realize that tourists come here to go fishing, hunting, skidooing, canoe tripping etc not visiting arts centre, entertainment districts or watching hockey. money should be put in to the out lying rural towns. Tourists avoid sudbury and go to espanola. A much cleaner, nicer and safer city.

B+

YOu gotta get a better mic dude

While I appreciate the effort to understand Downtown Sudbury, you can't ignore context when you try and provide "evidence" as to why there aren't many people walking around downtown with your video clip. Is it the middle of the work day? Is it winter? Try a weekend summer day and I guarantee you'd see many more average people walking around. Elm place has recently been revitalized with the Farmer's Market being there. That draws hundreds of vendors and consumers to that very street you filmed (especially in the winter). Also, maybe explore the actual reasons as to why our roads are constantly in rough shape (increased traffic from average people from every outskirt community AND all the parallel business that comes from the significant mining in the immediate area of the city - of which both Timmins and North Bay don't have.) The Downtown currently has many opportunities to socialize, relax after work, enjoy entertainment and experience Sudbury culture. I think you missed the mark on not mentioning anything regarding amalgamation and it's impact on downtown as well. The parking argument has been debunked (if you are willing to walk less than 10 minutes which is comparable to other cities the size of Sudbury). It is not unsafe at night as your mother mentions (that is a perception not based on any facts or truth) and homelessness is not a downtown issue. It is a prevalent issue all over the city. Services just happen to be downtown where homeless people can access them. This video was referenced by a recent article in the Sudbury Star however it is pretty inaccurate and misrepresentative of the Downtown and does nothing to better our community. Big box retailers are the dinosaurs and NO downtown has big box stores. Declining retail (which started well before COVID) also has nothing to do with downtown. Shopping for shoes is not a cultural experience, as you mentioned being one of the draws of thriving downtowns. Zoning is also not the issue as there are large quantities of R zoning within a 5-10 minute walk of downtown if you examine the area outside of your drawn circle. While I agree that the City needs to step in to improve the downtown in some areas (rent, some zoning etc.) the large part of revitalizing the downtown will come from the new Cultural Hub, new arena and subsequent businesses and the most important part is people CHANGING THEIR ATTITUDES towards downtown. There is a serious lack of education, or ignorance towards downtown that was born out of amalgamation and all of the outskirt communities need to realize that some of them would have ceased to exist had we not amalgamated. An attitudinal shift by the citizens and the city making some changes will be the only way we get back to a vital downtown. And spending your money at the Townhouse rather than Kelsey's - way better food at the Townhouse anyway. Good effort but I think this video fell short in all the ways mentioned above.