Regarding, Parking Stall, May 8:

According to Joe Diner, a vast sea of surface parking lots actually makes downtowns more vibrant. By that logic, Winnipeg should be the most vibrant city in the country.

Perhaps Mr. Diner should take a trip to Buffalo, Detroit or St. Louis to get a sense of how successful his favoured urban planning theory has been in those faltering cities.

I urge the city to multiply by 10 the meagre taxes it charges surface parking lots. Not until they are replaced by apartments and condos will Winnipeg see any meaningful revitalization. Building new suburbs full of cheap housing will not improve this city. If this city is serious about being a city and no longer acting like a small town, it will enact policy changes that focus development inwards.

Tax credits are a start: The city of Edmonton granted a $4,500 credit to new downtown residential units and its downtown populatioin has doubled in eight years.

Developers should be crawling over themselves to build infill residential development downtown, but we've skewed the market to promote sprawl.

Let's reverse our urban planning policies to encourage density and high-quality urban residential design. Kudos to the developers of WebbSite. Now if only we had a hundred more such projects chewing up parking lots throughout the core.