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I made another visit to a 905 downtown earlier this week. It’s fairly accessible by transit and not too hard to find by car. The small downtown is quite lovely and pleasant, with your typical banks and real estate offices but also restaurants and pubs, an organic food store. This little downtown isn’t fully enveloped by sprawl, but the tell-tale signs are appearing – heavier traffic, new big-box stores on the periphery, and empty farmhouses next to fields occupied by backhoes, not tractors.<\/p>\n
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Unlike many old Ontario towns, this one is quite linear – there’s no main intersection that defines it, where all the banks locate, or where the town hall looms.<\/p>\n
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Can you guess this one? We’ll hold on to your comments until 5:00, when we’ll reveal the answer and I’ll give some further thoughts and news about this neck of the woods.<\/p>\n
UPDATE:<\/strong> Most of you got it, it is indeed Stouffville (I didn’t know the Fickle Pickle was such a well-known landmark! Or did you just Google it?).<\/p>\n One of the things that I think makes this little downtown great is that the GO Station is right there on the main street, with parking behind the station building or across the tracks, not the typical sea of asphalt that usually accompanies GO stations. Some of the stores and pubs are nearby the station, and I observed commuters stopping in for a quick shopping or a drink and dinner. The downtown really was nice.<\/p>\n Compared to most towns its size, transit access is quite good. GO Transit doesn’t even provide the same level of Union Station service to Brampton, closer to Toronto and 15 times its size. The limited York Region bus to Markham is a relatively new service as well.<\/p>\n The ride on the GO Train is interesting on the way up. After leaving Markham, the train winds its way through a mostly agricultural area and into the Oak Ridges Moraine. Just before entering Stouffville, the crops and grass turn to muddy fields, bulldozers and sales offices. To the east are the frozen Pickering Airport lands, and to the west towards Highway 48, Main Street peters out with fast food restaurants, strip plazas, car dealers and sprawling industry. This is where Whitchurch-Stouffville’s municipal offices are located, in a simple low-rise office building.<\/p>\n And right on the southern end of Whitchurch-Stouffville, well removed from anything else (and where the undeveloped parts of Markham begin) is a brand new big-box centre anchored by a Wal-Mart Supercentre, surrounded by yet-to-be developed lands and well back from Highway 48 itself, which was almost surreal.<\/p>\n![](\"http:\/\/farm2.static.flickr.com\/1354\/711686298_a8e4b02289_o.jpg\")
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