Thursday, May 19, 2011

http://www.yorkregion.com/news/article/964399--pan-ams-aim-to-generate-energy

http://www.yorkregion.com/news/article/964399--pan-ams-aim-to-generate-energy

Jim Jones on MISTA


The Town of Markham in a joint venture with private sector investors are proud to announce the development of a 750,000 square feet iconic Markham International Sports Training Academy (MISTA), 100,000 square feet of world class retail and restaurants, 300,000 square ft of class A office for the sports, health and wellness segment, 400 room 4 star hotel and 1500 residential condo units.
Run by the private sector, MISTA will be Canada's premier Olympic multi-purpose sports training facility. MISTA will be a centre of excellence for the development of high performing athletes of all ages for indoor and outdoor Olympic summer sports in Canada.
Outstanding athlete results combined with skilled coaches, world-class facilities and staffing in sports science, sports medicine, conditioning, recovery and athlete welfare services will give MISTA its international reputation as Canada’s best summer sports training facility for athletic development.
Our sustainability strategy is membership based, strong club system in all Olympic sports will attract the best coaching available, a multi-revenue stream approach, dedicated facilities for many Olympic sport training events, excellent retail, dining, meeting rooms facilities integrated with 300,000 square feet of office, 400 hotel rooms and 1500 residential condo units.
The Academy will offer many sport programs in 25 plus sports, with planned scholarships offerings annually to Canada’s finest young athletes based on MISTA’s iconic presents and advertising revenue scheme. MISTA is a International Sports Training Academy, located in Markham City Centre near a major Metrolinx hub, adjacent to Toronto.
“Plan for the day after the games, not for the day the games begin”

Iconic signage can form an integral and ancillary component of any significant project regardless of the primary function and purpose of the development. There are global examples where spectacular signage including LED’s (Light Emitting Diodes) have resurrected communities, branded districts and provided exciting elements of activity. Think of commonly known locales such as Times Square, New York City, Piccadilly Circus in London’s west-end district of Westminster, the Boardwalk at Atlantic City, the Westgate City Centre in Glendale, Arizona, Las Vegas and even in Toronto at Dundas Square where an evolving district of signage led the way to the resurrection of a befallen neighborhood. All of these communities are significantly enhanced as a direct result of developmental vision and spectacular signage.

MISTA, as a community gathering place will share many of the attributes of the aforementioned municipalities. With vision and planning at the inception, and not as an “afterthought”, not only can MISTA benefit by having iconic branded signage displaying events and community information but also can derive significant financial returns through the marketing of advertising sponsorship. As MISTA will have access to many thousands of attendees and additional “passerby’s” due to its strategic placement along the major 407ETR corridor, the property is well-suited to find its place among North America’s most elite, recognizable and profitable communities.

Spectacular Signage, first and foremost should never be an afterthought. Properly designed and executed spectacular signage is considered during the planning and design stage of the architectural and developmental process. The end result of this careful and strategic planning model will be significant, aesthetically-pleasing base-building design.

The execution of the spectacular signage design component will facilitate revenue-generation that in turn can assist in the overall project financing model. Over the last five years, financial institutions have realized the economic strength and security of an advertising-sponsorship funded model. MISTA, with careful planning, design, execution and strategic geographic locale, can generate as much as 4-5 million dollars in its first year of full operation. Continued growth both on-site and on the vehicular corridor could ultimately raise this amount to as much as 7.5 million dollars per annum by the 10th year of operation if not sooner . Also, MISTA has the potential to generate an additional 2.5 million dollars per year in Naming rights and sponsorship.

Revenue projections are defined as Gross Advertising, naming rights, sponsorship before operating costs, capital and lease-sharing options.


MISSION
To provide world-class summer Olympic sport training facilities through a sustainable business model where Canadian athletes can discover, develop and excel.To provide the highest quality of training, to insure all athletes and fitness enthusiasts reach all of their goals and ultimately their dreams in a safe and effective manner. By providing these services, we expect to make MISTA a household name in the sports performance, training and fitness industry.
The Markham International Sports Training Academy (MISTA) will be Canada's premier sports training academy. MISTA will be the best summer training facility for the development of high performing athlete of all ages in Canada.
Outstanding athlete results combined with skilled coaches, world-class facilities and cutting-edge sports science and sports medicine services will give MISTA its international reputation as Canada’s best sports training facility for athletic development for multi-sport games, national and international competition.


The Art of Creating and shaping City Centers Markham Live involves the arrangement and design of buildings, public spaces, transport systems, services, and amenities. Markham Live is the process of giving form, shape, and character to groups of buildings, to whole neighborhoods, and the city. It is a framework that orders the elements into a network of streets, squares, and blocks. Markham Live blends architecture, landscape architecture, and city planning together to make urban areas functional and attractive.MISTA is about making connections between people and places, movement and urban form, nature and the built fabric. MISTA draws together the many strands of place-making, environmental stewardship, social equity and economic viability into the creation of places with distinct beauty and identity. MISTA is derived from but transcends planning and transportation policy, architectural design, development economics, engineering and landscape. It draws these and other strands together creating a vision for an area and then deploying the resources and skills needed to bring the vision to life.


This looks really thoroughly done, with lots of data and comparatives for a prospective sponsor to consider. Putting on my high performance hat, if MISTA is designated as the Ontario Sport Institute (instead of the Scarborough facility), then this will have many national teams training there, and thus not only team/athlete sponsorship possibilities, but plenty of recognition as the summer sport centre of excellence in Canada, with lots of sports media coverage.
“A famous Olympian”



MISTA will be the recognized leader in developing and sustaining the facilities required for Canada to be the number one summer sport nation.
VISION
Our vision at MISTA is to develop a Olympic Training Center that will provide sports specific training to athletes of all ages and levels. Each sport will have its own designated area or location and all sports will share one common area, the strength and conditioning room. This room is a place where all athletes can train with state of the art equipment and with knowledgeable and focused trainers who use old school traditional methods along with cutting edge functional training techniques to improve the athleticism, movements and strength of the athletes.
MISTA is also focusing on creating and training people to live healthier lifestyles and is targeting non athletes to combat the ever spreading problems of obesity, diabetes, heart disease and many other preventable chronic diseases that plague our youth and adult populations at alarming rates today.



Markham International Sports Training Academy supports every need of Canada’s competitive and elite athlete, providing venues for training, residential, education, recreation and the latest in sports medicine and sports science as well as administrative facilities for the sports governing bodies.
Growing evidence and understanding of the social, physical, psychological and economic role that recreation and competitive athletics play in our personal lives, communities, and public institutions continues to fuel investment in capital facilities development. Success in these projects is an increasingly complex equation — balancing standards for human performance, program requirements, environmental sensitivity, adaptability and funding with the athlete and spectator experience. Achieving this requires experience, leadership and talent.
Master planning and programming of sports and recreation facilities requires vision, expertise, and an in-depth knowledge of all sports and recreation typologies. With an endless range of requirements and understanding for each physical activity, clients seek architects who can share their knowledge of sport and bring focus to the overall planning process in an streamlined and efficient manner.
We will finalize our sports master program with the aid of our users which will include our national and provincial sport bodies, elite athletes, coaches and sport club executives.


Competitive Economy - Competitive Rail Transit Network
In order to ensure that we have a competitive economy, we must have a competitive rail transit network. Metrolinx, the regions and the communities that have major transit hubs must do proper Transit Oriented Development planning to ensure the success of its portion of the rail transit network. We should be able to work where we want to work, live where we want to live and play where we want to play. Proper connectivity produces choice, not congestion.
Approximately, 150,000 people move to the Greater Toronto Area each year. What is needed is to redirect some of that growth to the high speed 407 Rail Transitway corridor to help jump start the building of this critical and strategic piece of Transit infrastructure and thereby guaranteeing instant transit ridership success when the transitway is completed.
These fully integrated and complete communities need to be designed so as to accomplish a higher modal split in favor of rapid transit and reduce the dependency on the automobile. This will help lower CO2 emissions thereby reducing the carbon footprint and helping Canada and Ontario to attain our goals in curbing global warming and finding a solution to the challenge of climate change.
Connectivity:
Bounded by Highway 7 and the 407ETR, and served by a network of local streets, regional roads and 400 series highways, Markham Live is easy to access and parking will be available for 12,000 vehicles. A system of interconnected transit service converging at the on-site Unionville Go-Train Station will provide accessible and rapid service to and from Markham Live, including the 407 Transitway connecting to seven Go-Transit, four light rail and the Yonge and Spadina subway lines.
407 Transitway is the GTA’s Mega-Region Economic Alternative:
Emergence of rail-connected nodes or hubs along the 407 Economic Corridor throughout the GTA Mega-Region will spark a new economic opportunity for development and intensification that cannot be ignored or allowed to proceed piecemeal. The Mega-Region has outgrown traditional transit migration via bus routes. Population and densities being planned and their implementation along the 407 corridor support the move now to the ultimate solutions ... light and heavy rail. Markham Live will be one of the major nodes in this 407 Corridor. Running in its own elevated, grade-separated track, the 407 Transitway will provide high speed service across the GTA Region enabling direct point-to-point travel between Oshawa and Burlington in under 60 minutes.
The real legacy for the 2015 Pan Am Games should be a rapid rail transit network that works and allowing legacy facilities to be accessible to residents and athletes within the GTA. The Achilles' heel for hosting multi-sport games has always been the lack of mobility through the movement of thousands of people throughout the day.


What is the value of urban design? – Markham City Centre is a $20 billion project
Urban design is the collaborative process of designing and arranging all the physical elements that make up cities to create harmonious, vibrant and successful places for people. It is not simply about making places look good or just accepting any gift or solution because higher levels of government think they know what is best for Markham: equally as important is ensuring that places work and function better for the people who use and inhabit them.
Cities are highly complex systems that consist of many different components – streets, open spaces, parks, reserves and buildings with various uses from housing through to community facilities, shops and businesses – as well as many diverse groups of people who use, interact, access and move between these. Markham Live is part of the Markham City Center and by itself is over a $2.5 billion project integrated into a major Metrolinx hub.
Markham City Center’s Urban design is focused on understanding:
• the spaces and connections between buildings and different parts of Markham Live
• the size, appearance, use of buildings and their relationship with the spaces around them
• the location of activities, and maximizing opportunities for interaction between people.
Due to the complex nature of built environments, the market conditions that dictate their growth and the behavior of people who inhabit them, no one person or profession has the ability or responsibility to deliver successful towns and cities. It takes collaboration and creative thinking between all professions and processes that have an impact on the built environment. Urban design brings these professions and processes together, and applies the key principles of place-making to ensure that they are delivering outcomes that create quality built environments. MISTA is part of Markham Live and it alone is a $1 billion integrated sports and entertainment project and the cornerstone iconic facility for the Markham City Center. Markham has re-engineer our city center to a world class sports and entertainment destination and is not prepared to accept mediocrity.






Friday, May 13, 2011

Regional Councillor Jim Jones - MISTA

MISTA – Markham International Sports Training Academy
Markham has a plan to elevate the future of amateur sport in the province and create a level playing field for Ontario athletes, with great big dreams.
The Markham International Training Academy (MISTA) is innovative multi-sport training facility devoted to athletes dedicated to aspiring young athletes with national, international and Olympic dreams.
After several years pouring over ground breaking ideas, Markham planners have come up with an exceptional model for the long overdue Canadian Sports Training Academy – (Canadian Sports Institute Ontario)
So far, Pan Am planners have failed to come close to fulfilling the promise of accessible, stand alone, sustainable facilities for 2015, Markham’s CSIO proposal is second to none.
MISTA in Markham — is a vision of what Sport Facilities will become.
We believe this is the most exciting concept for sport in decades.
 MISTA will be — a Game Changer for athletes at every level
 Ease of access in the GTA GO Transit–the 404 and 407 highways
 Adjacent Bill Crothers Secondary a Sports centric High school
 Pan Am 2015 is not just a project it must leave a legacy for sport
 A total sports environment with Office space for all organizations
 Medical testing, and training facilities for all sports on site

We feel Provincial and National Organizations possess a huge influence on future plans for legacy facilities, simply because dedicated volunteers provide invaluable support for a multi-sport games.

Regional Councillor Jim Jones - MISTA









































Regional Councillor Jim Jones - MISTA