Brandon Donnelly — Daily insights for city builders. Published since 2013 by Toronto-based real estate developer Brandon Donnelly. — Page 460

So, I of course think this is silly. But here's a claim that living in high-rises -- that is, buildings with elevators -- is bad for people's physical and mental health:

In the midst of a Vancouver civic election where housing is a hot issue, Vancouver councillor and mayoral candidate Colleen Hardwick stated that “highrises are not good for people’s physical and mental health.”

Last week we asked Hardwick to expand further on her views about health and building types. She told The Tyee she believes highrises radically reduce chance encounters between people because they separate people from the street and from each other.

“Ground-oriented housing typologies are ideal,” she said,  referring to housing that allows a resident to reach their place of residence using stairs, perhaps, but not an elevator.

Apparently what happens when you get into an elevator is that you immediately lose your ability to interact meaningfully with other humans. Yeah, I'm not the only one who disagrees:

“Coun. Hardwick is cherry-picking her data” about highrise living and the isolating effects of structures with elevators, accused urbanist and author Charles Montgomery. A six-storey building with an elevator, he told The Tyee, is “the most social place I’ve ever lived.”

Cities, it turns out, are complicated. And there are always trade-offs to be made. During the pandemic, some people thought it would be nice to live in a ground-oriented home in the country and now they are realizing that the country lacks things like amenities and, you know, other people.

Personally, I will happily take an elevator over a soul-crushing commute to a home without one. I also agree with Charles that multi-family buildings can be very social .

Neat B and I were in the Niagara wine region over the weekend and I was reminded of a few things:

• Winemakers in Niagara will tell you that southern Ontario isn't the easiest of places to grow and make wine. But whatever, I think that Niagara is highly underrated. Niagara has some exceptional wineries that you really should explore if you aren't familiar. Ontario is also the largest ice wine producer in the world, by a long shot. We produce something like 90% of the world's supply. Ice wine can be a bit of an acquired taste -- they're sweet. But if you get a chance, try one from Stratus. They are supposedly the driest in the world.

• I don't know how the wine demographics have shifted in other regions, but we were told over the weekend that 10 years ago it was mostly gray hairs who were out at wineries buying wine. Today, there are tons of young people in their 20s, 30s, and 40s. And we certainly saw that over the weekend. This shift has winemakers now adjusting their wines. I couldn't tell you what a younger wine palate wants, but apparently it's something.

• Lastly, there is a complete lack of cool and modern boutique hotels in the area. I would imagine that part of this is because the Niagara wine region is still emerging. But I think the other reason has to do with my previous point: younger people now want to go to wineries and the hospitality sector hasn't yet caught up. This strikes me as a massive opportunity.

The general rule when it comes to bike lanes is that, if you build them without some sort of grade-separation, at some point a car is going to park in them. But here are two possible solutions to this problem. The first is that you could build some sort of grade-separation that can't be driven over. And the second is as follows :

Now a New York City Council member is pushing  a bill  that would give civilians the power to report bike lane scofflaws, as well as vehicles that block entrances or exits of school buildings, sidewalks and crosswalks. New Yorkers who submit evidence of a parking violation can earn 25% of a proposed $175 ticket. The Department of Transportation would review the evidence to determine whether an infraction has occurred, according to the bill’s text.

What this essentially does is decentralize rule enforcement by paying people to be rats. Off hand, I can't think of any other cities that have done something like this and so I don't know how effective it might actually be. But being a rat sounds like it could be a good paying job.

Let's assume that somebody decided to treat this as their full-time job and work 8 hours a day, Monday to Friday. And then let's assume that they were able to rat out one person per hour. Here's how much money they could make in a year:

• $175 x 25% = $43.75 per illegal incident

• $43.75 x 8 incidents per day = $350 per day

• $350 per day x 5 days a week = $1,750 per week

• $1,750 per week x 52 weeks = $91,000 per year

Now, if the goal of this rat-people-out program is to ultimately change behaviors, then it might make sense to assume that your revenues would decline over time as more people start following the rules. Either way, something tells me that more than a few people would be happy to take on this job.