"Rethinking the Niagara Frontier" A 21st Century Park February 7, 2000 Meeting Notes Draft Notes Attendees

1. Welcome and Context

David Crombie welcomed all participants and thanked everyone for attending the meeting. He noted that there are many cross-border economic development initiatives currently underway in the Niagara Region including transportation, trade, the environment and others. The Waterfront Regeneration Trust and The Urban Design Project at the University at Buffalo have come together in an effort to bring all these initiatives together in a forum. This is not inventing something new, but a way of integrating and building on the work that local municipalities are already doing.

Mr. Crombie suggested that the group look at the Niagara map distributed by Clint Brown as a way of thinking about what can be done and as a way of bringing people and ideas together. He described the importance of maps to the group by speaking of Hugh Brody’s book titled Maps & Dreams which illustrates how maps were used by the Beaver Indians as a tool for survival – they were used to indicate where to get food, where to set up camp etc. – and how these maps were redrawn as conditions changed.

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2. Introductions

Participants introduced themselves and briefly described the organizations which they represented.

3. Roundtable Discussion

Bob Shibley explained that this meeting was a working session to help plan a March/April workshop that would result in an action agenda for a June symposium.

Bob used maps of the Niagara River and adjacent lands to describe bi-national assets of the region including parks and open spaces, transportation, roadways cultural amenities and waterways. He distributed a map showing these assets and explained the meaning of placing our cities within parks. He used Germany’s Emscher Landscape Park as a regional example to describe how economic, ecological and community values can be integrated and promoted.

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