It must ensure that waterfronts are reconnected to the urban fabric and that the quality of the public realm is upheld and sustained. This is what makes great waterfronts. Big plans are important, and so are bold moves. Many communities can now point to one or two key projects that got the ball rolling and created the impetus to do more. Sometimes that project is a large consolidation of land, sometimes it's a project of great architectural beauty, and sometimes it's a bold new policy.
Waterfronts are places of great meaning, because it's here that nature meets culture head on.
Many individuals and whole communities have felt disconnected from their waterfront - physically, mentally and ecologically. But that is changing. We cannot adequately shape the rapid pace of change if we do not understand and celebrate our heritage. This is one of the really important lessons of the last decade - and it presents huge opportunities for the next decade of regeneration. At the start of the decade our objective was to see the Lake Ontario Trail become the backbone of a network of trails in the bioregion - that goal is well underway.