RiversdaleReporter.ca

My partner and I moved into the Riversdale Community with our toddler son nearly 3 decades ago. Where do the years go?

We moved into the area for a few reasons. A friend* of a dear friend had a sister* who had a place available for a very affordable rent. This sister knew and liked my partner but they had fallen out of touch. This sister and her husband had also socialized with my partner and I previously and they thought about us when their tenant, a friend of my partner and a Godmother to our son, moved to Medicine Hat. Thanks to grape vine communication we found out and were flattered to learn the couple wished to rent their property to us. Additionally, I had a girlfriend before I met my partner who used to waitress in one of the restaurants in the area -- she left Saskatchewan long ago shortly after completing her University degree -- and knew thanks to her and my friendship with tireless Riversdale boosters and business people Art and Teresa Mark* that 20th Street was a better area to live than its reputation then suggested. Lastly, Riversdale was affordable and so close to the downtown, my partner's workplace, and the South Saskatchewan River and the then quite underutilized but beautiful Victoria Park.

Because someone we came to know on our street wanted to sell their home and move elsewhere in the city, because of the convenient location, and believing that if Saskatchewan boomed like Alberta and BC had Saskatoon would follow Edmonton, Calgary and Vancouver and see a significant rise in its property values, especially in its downtown proximate other side of the tracks community, we ended up buying a home in Riversdale.

The home purchase was made before 20th Street's Gentrification. The street didn't have all the great restaurants, though it did have an Asian bakery now long closed that had awesome lemon chicken, a place run by the Fong family where you could get a good meal and a variety of ice creams and May's Chicken. Just off 20th on Idylwyld was the Saigon Rose. These became our favourite local eating out places -- we've always believed in shopping local and did so long before it was a trendy promoted thing. The restaurant that former girlfriend of mine had worked in was by this time closed and the building it had been in was empty. 20th Street was a lot of Pawn Shops and a lot of empty business spaces.

Of those favorite local restaurants of ours, only the Saigon Rose, now the Saigon Roll, remains.

We witnessed the beginning of the revitalization of 20th Street, beginning when Riversdale resident and United Church Minister Lorne Calvert was the NDP Premier of Saskatchewan from 2003 to 2007. In those last two years, Saskatchewan starting to click on all cylinders as resource revenues were growing, the rural depopulation consequent to the Liberal killing of the Crow Rate was beginning in earnest and the owners of now marginalized farms were moving into the city. Albertans looking across the fence also saw that real estate in Saskatoon was a lot less expensive than it was in Edmonton and Calgary and that there was a lot of opportunity for them to acquire revenue properties here.

The market value of our home doubled in 2 years

These were the first real boom years Saskatchewan experienced since Rhodes scholar Allan Blakeney was Saskatchewan's Premier. The revitalization accelerated in the first four years of Brad Wall's government (2007 - 2011). Saskatchewan was humming, optimism was in the air. For perhaps the first time since the Great Depression University graduates didn't have to flee the province in search of post-graduation employment. Even more impressively, some of the people who had in the past fled Saskatchewan in search of opportunities elsewhere returned home. The pawn shops and empty spaces gave way to new restaurants and shops, and even small grocery stores. For the first time in a long time Riversdale residents could tell other Saskatoon citizens their home addresses without fear of being stigmatized after doing so.

Saskatoon was booming because of the strong economy, because of the Albertans looking to buy cheap revenue properties and because the rural depopulation that had taken place consequent to the Liberal killing of the Crow Rate and allowing the railways to abandon branch lines en masse and holus bolus and Roy Romanow's horrible government's legislative changes that enabled Mayo Schmidt to steal the Saskatchewan Wheat Pool out from under its farmer owners' noses and replace the small town elevator with US-style inland terminals. The result of these attacks on the Saskatchewan rural way of life promoted urbanization by sending the farmers with smaller and now unviable farms into the city, further driving up Saskatoon housing prices and increasing the urban home owners' net worth.

All this, some special city tax rules to stimulate business in the core communities, the relocation of the Saskatoon Farmers' Market Cooperative to 19th Street, the Victoria Park Dragon Boat races - one of Art Mark's projects, and the construction of the South Downtown Riverbank Promenade, was making small businesses on 20th Street viable.

While the later Wall years were much less impressive in terms of Saskatchewan's economic growth, and Saskatchewan's economy was far from boast worthy from the period between the date on which Scott Moe became the Saskatchewan Party leader and Premier to the time the pandemic began, 20th street continued to impress and develop for a few more years.

The great Taste Legend opened and closed with Primal taking over its space. Jason Sung, formerly a Chef at the Samuri, opened Sushi Raku - one of western Canada's best sushi restaurants, just off 20th on Idylwyld. The Odd Couple opened, Cohens opened, the Hometown Diner opened, Little Szeschuan opened, Leydah's opened. The Hollows opened and closed. The new restaurants added to the offerings of long-time Riversdale stalwarts Saigon Roll, Jin Jin Dumpling House,and the Park Cafe.

People had reasons to go to Riversdale. Good reasons. Magazines and newspapers published articles about Riversdale that were saying good things. You could tell anyone you lived in Riversdale.

Alas, the pandemic came. Out of all the Canadian provinces, it caused the most economic damage to Saskatchewan, economic damage whose signs you now readily see in its small towns and villages, and of course, in Riversdale. Moe mismanagement. Moe Saskabust.

20th Street is now looking about as bad as it has looked in decades, as bad as it looked when we first moved into the community.

While many of the restaurants are still here - Leydah's closed but has been replaced with another great Japanese restaurant, also owned by Jason Sung - there is a lot of vacant space again on 20th. 22Fresh, a Regina based clothing store moved in, operated a few years and then closed. The Mennonite furniture store and thrift store moved out of the area for a space on Quebec Avenue. The An An Market, an Asian grocery store we liked to shop at because of its very friendly owner and the vegetables and fruits it sold, closed. Rumour has it that the friendly owner gave up on Saskatchewan and Canada and moved back to Vietnam, which did much better health wise than most of world's countries when covid-19 was at its worst and which is now supposed to be doing much better economically than western Europe, or Canada and the US. Other places have also closed. The bad economy, lack of federal government support, fairly useless provincial government, bad city hall policies including the forced relocation of the Farmer's Market Cooperative from its 19th street home, and an angry person who keeps breaking the windows of 20th street businesses leading to unnecessary and costly expenses and higher insurance rates, have taken their toll.

Thankfully the closing of the Sears in the Mid-town Plaza and its replacement with an upper floor food court with lots of windows looking to the west can still send some traffic down 20th and into some of Riversdale's great restaurants and the remaining businesses.

The fire department recently had to put out a fire that caused around 30K damage to the building the Mennonite thrift store had until quite recently been located in. The cause of the fire is "suspicious".

Since this story was first published For Lease signs have appeared on the building occupied by Freedom Functional Fitness on the corner of 20th Street and Idylwyld Drive and a building occupied by SoCa hair salon on the corner of 20th and Avenue D. has emptied. SoCa's website remains operational.

Since Addendum 2 was published the RiversdaleReporter has learned that SustainMarket, formerly TheBulkBasket, is closing down. The owner of the business plans to leave Canada, together with his wife and young child. The healthy powders and goods the business sold are presently discounted 40% as the owner sells out the inventory. This is sad news for the Riversdale Community -- quickly after its opening the market and its wares became one of the best reasons for living in Riversdale. Meanwhile, the Moe government has a billion dollar surplus thanks to increased commodity prices as a result of the Nato-Russia war. Deja vue Roy Romanow and Janice McKinnon the Moe government will use the surplus to pay down debt rather than stimulate Saskatchewan's economic growth and slow the outmigration.

Since Addendum 3 was published, the Sustain Market has closed. The Market's closing out sale was cut short. According to information obtained by the RiversdaleReporter, the Alberta based owner of the former SLGA building the market was located in locked the owner and employees of the market out. What was formerly quality, healthy product may be going rancid inside. What is up with former SLGA buildings being owned out of province? Scott Moe, all the economic acumen of Boris Yeltsin with Saskatchewan playing the part of Russia under Yeltsin's reign?

*     All three of these dear ladies have since passed on.

The Giant Tiger on Avenue F and 22nd Street is closing. So is Chung Wah Chinese Grocery, an Asian grocery store that has operated in Riversdale for years. However there are two focused grocery stores in diverse and inclusive Riversdale, Glory House Foods that caters especially to the African community and Eastern Market which caters especially to the East and South Asian community. The closures will create additional hardship for Riversdale residents, especially those who don't have motor vehicles.

Covid-19 Related - besides providing check out wait times information you can now also provide information on what the grocery store is doing or has done to combat the spread of covid-19, the store's efforts to promote social distancing, and how well stocked the grocery store is, something sure to become an issue as the pandemic deepens - all outside the watchful eyes of American big tech.

*     You can get some groceries and household goods on 20th Street through newly relocated to Riversdale Bulk Basket :) and delicious Asian fruits, vegetables and groceries through Chung Wah Chinese Grocery and An An Market. Eastern Market, also in Riversdale and located in the mini-mall across from the Midtown-Plaza, is also a great place to get delicious Asian fruits and vegetables, seafood, sauces and dry goods.

Grocery Store Check-Out Wait Times

There are few things more frustrating about living in Saskatoon than the constantly increasing property taxes, ill-timed traffic lights, closed-for-construction streets and avenues, and train or accident caused traffic delays. Some say Saskatoon has two seasons, Winter and Construction. To its credit Saskatoon has a tool that allows you to see which streets and avenues it has closed for construction. Access it here: https://www.saskatoon.ca/news-releases/daily-road-report-may-27-2019 for week day reports, and here: https://www.saskatoon.ca/news-releases/weekend-road-report-may-25-26-2019Sed for weekend reports.

You can report and view train and accident caused traffic delays here: http://traintrackeryxe.ca or http://traintrackrstn.ca This locally developed on-line tool can be accessed through your smart phone or laptop and doesn't use supercookies to track your browsing habits or require access to your cell phone files or camera or location data to work. Best of all, you can report just about anything that may affect traffic flow through the site, including police traffic stops.

Train and other Traffic Obstructions