A Walker's Thoughts on Salmon Arm's Core

Salmon Arm has changed in the last few years, has become a more walkable community. This past weekend I wandered the core area and found a lot to photograph.

In this post I outline some of the features that make the streets interesting for walkers. I encourage businesses, building owners, and residents to incorporate more of them into their properties.

I'd love to see the whole of Salmon Arm become a truly walkable community!

Streetscapes

Streetscape, Harbourfront Drive

Curved streets. These add an aesthetic and flow. A curved street is much more interesting to walk than a long straight one!

Plus, cars are forced to slow down, which makes for quieter traffic, and a more pleasant and safe walking experience.

Of course, street layout is something that is up to city planners and developers. Let them know that is what we want!

Trees.  This photograph shows that there are trees on both the right and the left hand side of the sidewalk. These make for a lovely cool arbour in summer.

Notice that there are two different species of trees here. Tree variety creates resilience; if there is a disease outbreak or drought problem affecting one species, the others may survive. This is going to be ever more important in our changing climate.

Variety of scale. As the walker moves along, there is a variety of sizes and shapes to engage the eye - variation in building mass and height, trees, shrubs and other plantings, and perhaps a featured object or two in the foreground. In the photo above there is the larger hotel in the background, the smaller scale building on the right, and the trees above.

Beatty Avenue merging into Harbourfront Drive

Lampposts. I like the human scale curved lamp-posts. The white posts in the photo above are located throughout the area north of the tracks and add an intimate feel to the street.

Note the sidewalk with pavers. Besides being attractive, these have the added benefit of helping absorb more water into the ground, compared with straight concrete sidewalks.

Hudson Street

Building canopies. Streetscapes are improved by canopies and overhangs on commercial buildings. These break up flat building facades and make streetscapes much more appealing. As well, they provide much needed shade for pedestrians in summer, and protection from rain and snowfall.

Outdoor spaces. Use of the outdoors through patios, decks, and tables on sidewalks helps the building flow into the street. They allow the street to become part of the restaurant experience, and the restaurant to become part of the street experience.

Lively and attractive outdoor spaces are part of an enriching urban walk.

Lampposts. Downtown has chosen black posts for streetlights. Like the white ones north of the tracks,these are human scale.

Lamppost on Ross Street, looking north.
Trees and paving stones add to the appeal

Benches. I am always looking for benches to sit upon, to enjoy the moment, the view, to have a conversation.

Outside Shuswap Theatre

Benches located at Brushstrokes Signs

More and more places to sit are cropping up around the city.

Ross Street and Lakeshore Drive; notice the banners as well as the tree, shrubs, planters and picnic table

Hudson Street

This image shows a few other features of a street that is interesting for walkers: a unique sign; the canopy; outside tables with people; an appealing window; tree and planters; and curved lines with the brick paver inlay.

Hudson Street

Ease of Walking

Walkability includes making navigation easy for pedestrians with mobility challenges. We can't engineer a hill out of existence, but broken pavement can be dealt with.

Salmon Arm's sidewalks generally provide ramps for wheelchairs, scooters, walkers, baby carriages.

Scooter navigating ramped sidewalk

Trees

Trees make our town livable, soften the streetscape, attract songbirds, and add to the overall walking experience.

Here are a couple of examples of parking lots with trees.

Parking Lot near Ross Street, north of the tracks

I'd like to see more of these! Our built up core area needs trees.

Piccadilly Mall parking lot

Trees can be incorporated into the smallest landscaping spaces - medians in parking lots, or corners created by the juxtaposition of two buildings.

Outside the Salmar Theatre

 

Public Art

There are increasing numbers of public art scattered in small ways around the city. Two of the most visible ones are in the Ross Street Plaza, and by the Credit Union.

Detail from mosaic, Ross Street Plaza stage

Detail from mosaic, Ross Street Plaza stage

The water is not yet in the fountain, nor the flowers planted in the numerous planters around town, but with the rocks and mural, it is still an attractive piece of public art. Apples, sockeye salmon, the lake, forests, and mountains... the mural captures some of the elements of Salmon Arm's uniqueness.

Ross Street Plaza stage, fountain, and benches

Paying homage to Salmon Arm's agricultural past at the Credit Union

Bicycle racks outside the art gallery

Outside a hair salon on Shuswap Street

Sometimes public art is unconscious, a by-product of something else, such as a store placing something on the sidewalk to attract attention, soften the harsh line of a building, invite the walker inside.

Salmon featured on lamppost, wharf parking lot
The smoky atmosphere of a summer day in 2017 allowed them to be silhouetted.

We don't see much public art recognizing the salmon which give the bay its name, and are of such historic importance to the peoples who originally settled this land.

Three lampposts in the parking lot near the wharf have incorporated salmon into their structure. Perhaps this theme could be repeated elsewhere in the city.

Funky, unique, lightly humorous... these are some of the adjectives which come to mind to describe the pieces that can be discovered while walking the core area.

Window Treatments

I have been discovering some interesting shop windows around town.

Book Nook, Ross Street

Hudson Vintage, Hudson Street

Lazuline Art Gallery, Hudson Street

ReMarket on Hudson

Bella on Lakeshore

Signage

Besides the walker's view of windows, signs add to the feel of the urban walk. Unique signs are hard to find. Here are a few:

This sign works well with the wooden beams of the building facade;
both elements contribute to the marine theme of the waterfront location.

This sign for the Shuswap Family Centre makes
clever design use of the roof's vent opening.

Cheerful bright colours in a marine theme
for this building near the waterfront

Brushstrokes Signs demonstrating their work

An attractive sign for a building made much more attractive
by the door, and softened by the vines growing on it.

The old courthouse is an appealing  building with its pitched roof, gables, and brick and stucco finish. Now renovated and occupied by several businesses, the sign does it justice.

Building Treatments

Interesting buildings make for interesting walking.

The core area has been the focus of much building upgrading over the past years, thanks to the efforts of a few individuals.

Alexander Street

 Alexander Street, one of the central streets in the downtown, has been one of the streets which received a "do-over".

Alexander Street

The historic Salmar theatre on Hudson

As an aside, Salmon Arm's movie theatres are owned and operated by a non profit society which returns profits to the community via grants to a wide variety of organizations. Salmon Arm has the only community-owned movie theatres in BC!

Salmar Theater from the parking lot behind Alexander Street

Blue Canoe Bakery building, Shuswap Street

Another example of appealing building finish is the Blue Canoe bakery building, pictured above. A detail from the exterior is shown below.

Detail, Blue Canoe Bakery

Here is another building which uses a similar colour scheme very effectively:

Jade Buffet, Shuswap Street south of the highway

Continuing with the theme of colour and "funkiness" are the buildings which house the Cardio Connection / Lazuline Art Gallery, and the Pink Cherry coffeeshop.

Hudson Street

There are many other examples of interesting, colourful buildings in the Salmon Arm downtown core. I have featured a few; there are others.

One of the newest additions to Salmon Arm's colour swatch is the renovated old School Board office building, now the Innovation Centre.

The bright colours of this building are noticeable from several kilometres away; they can be seen from the top of the hill before descending into the downtown.

Salmon Arm completed a branding project last year, choosing the phrase "Small city, big ideas" for the city's brand.

The cheerful Innovation Centre building reflects the vision of this brand, with space dedicated as a "makerspace", and for co-working.

See https://www.innovatesa.ca/ for more information about what is implied by each of those terms.


I have mostly focussed this pedestrian's perspective on the core and waterfront areas.

Moving to the south side of the highway, I found more examples of interesting buildings.

Ecotreats Coffee Shop

Attractive building finishes for the Barley Station Brew Pub
and a popular outdoor patio add to its charm

Attractive building and courtyard, Alexander Street

Above building from the back, beside Fletcher Park

Mcintosh Grove on 6th St. S.E., with its significant trees

McIntosh Grove walking down the 6th Street sidewalk looking north

Trees Revisited

The neighbourhoods near the downtown still have some of their original trees. I enjoy the birds they attract, the ways that trees make the walking experience more aesthetic.

A fine pine tree south of Okanagan Avenue

Big firs like this are popular with songbirds. I hear birdsong whenever I was walk past tall firs in this area. Trees are so valuable; I cannot imagine the streets without them.

Fletcher Park playground with the unique City Hall on the left, and Mount Ida in the distance

Mount Ida is a frequent backdrop to the walking experience, almost wherever one is in Salmon Arm!

Thanks to the visionaries in the community who have contributed to it becoming more attractive, vibrant, and interesting for pedestrians.