Six rural spots looking for ways to grow

Life is a highway. But life is not Yellowhead Highway for many Canadians.

East of Brandon, the Yellowhead branches off from the Trans-Canada Highway and steers northward. It stretches to British Columbia, but on a route that runs high above major cities like Calgary, Regina and Vancouver.

Rural communities along the highway are less likely see traffic flowing through. So when it comes to growing those communities, a concerted, creative effort may be needed. In Manitoba, a group of municipalities has set out to beautify and enhance public spaces to make their communities more of a destination for Canadians.

Staff representing six communities north of Brandon have teamed up with a brand called Your Town Rising to brainstorm strategies for community enhancement. Staff invited the team to visit Minnedosa, Shoal Lake, Russel, Binscarth, Strathclair, and Neepawa this week.

“What we do is visit small towns and come in with fresh eyes,” Leslie Fournier of Your Town Rising told the Sun. “We’re seeing it for the first time. We walk around the downtown with a small group of locals, and we’re able to hear the stories of the community, the history, the challenges, and we take that information along with some photos as we walk through, and make a presentation later that day.”

Fournier says she and her business partner Gregg McLachlan are working with the economic development staff in Westman to build a strategy about how to make public spaces more exciting, engaging and valuable to the community.

“We try to get communities to think about placemaking in genereal,” McLachlan said. “You’re trying to create spaces where people want to be. Where they want to hang out. We talk about public space enhancement, ideally taking something that you have and enhancing it and bringing it to life. For instance, if you have a little gazebo in your community, but it’s not being used, how can you add music, or add an evening market, or throw a vendor in there, or a pop up, or using public art to create wow factors … creating a lot of layering that creates a buzz and gets people walking through your community in all seasons.”

According to Fournier, revitalization starts within a community. The first focus is making the space more valuable to locals, because that has spillover effects for the community come summertime.

“Tourists go where locals go,” said Fournier.

Having already visited 30 communities and received testimonials from several economic development staff members in regions of Ontario and Manitoba, Fournier says she has learned that development is a process.

“There’s no silver bullet. There’s no one thing that will change a community overnight. It’s a thousand small projects. Sometimes it’s a hard thing for small towns to hear.”

Sabine Chorley works for the Town of Minnedosa in marketing. She explained a little about why the town chose to bring in Your Town Rising.

“What we’re trying to do is small changes that have a big impact on how residents feel,” Chorley said. “I think it’s just bringing attractions up this way, and realizing there are these little hidden gems along the Yellowhead.”

The goal is to build Minnedosa’s appeal. That could be through installing public art, cleaning storefronts, planting flowers — small things that build value without breaking the bank, she said.

If Minnedosa is more of an attraction for people to stop on their way to Winnipeg, that’s a win-win. She recalls roadtrips as a kid, where she stopped in little towns with charming stores and spaces in Florida.

“I just think its good for the soul,” she said. “Slow down life. There’s more to life than going A to B.”

Bringing more stop-and-look-around to rural towns in Manitoba is the goal. And it’s not just for passersby: the town also wants to make itself attractive to nearby locals who may have never stopped by.

Chorley said the six communities would be happy if they became more of a destination for road trips.

After visiting southwestern Manitoba a few years ago, Fournier caught on to some local characteristics that could be brought forth in making communities more appealing and attractive.

“The overarching theme we saw last time in our visit to Manitoba is friendliness, and pride and a real strength in nature and agriculture. Those were the things that really stood out in the small communities we were in. What really hit home in all these small towns and communities, is it really was all about friends and community.”

There are also unique strengths each community has to indentify and lean into, she said, such as nearby amenities like skill hills or parks.

But one challenge for small towns in Manitoba is that the cities don’t have nearby big towns to rely on for traffic and growth. Fournier said they then have to partner up.

“There’s places that are really out in rural spots, and they have to work together,” she said. “The difference with Ontario is you can live in a small town but an hour away there’s a big city.”

Your Town Rising was scheduled to visit the Manitoba communities the week of Sept. 8. Representatives were to begin in Russel onthe Monday, move to Shoal Lake on Tuesday, visit Minnedosa on Wednesday and finish in Neepawa on Thursday.

The intinerary was to take a walk with locals through communities in the morning of each day, then compile what they’ve learned into a presentation about strategies for economic development. They’ll put on the presentation in the evenings, sharing insights about strategies for developing the public spaces of the small communities.

At the end of the week, they will meet for a recap with the group of economic development staff that invited them out to Westman. They have also done the same work in communities in Ontario and Saskatchewan.

» cmcdowell@brandonsun.com

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