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There is a grainy, decades-old film of urbanist Jane Jacobs standing at the south end of Queen's Park, looking down Toronto's only grand thoroughfare and saying, with her characteristic firmness, “I hate University Avenue.”

Many have agreed with her over the years, but what to do? Architect Tom Bessai – an assistant professor at the University of Toronto's faculty of architecture, landscape and design, and partner, with his wife, Maria Denegri, in Denegri Bessai Studio – has a solution.

His scheme for the avenue's rejuvenation takes advantage of all of its unique features: its grand width, its role as a connector between the public buildings at its north end and the downtown, its ceremonial purpose. But it also takes square aim at its lack of humanity, its greyness and its outdated glorification of the car. “The tools for renewal rest right there in the boulevard itself,” Mr. Bessai says. “It is the most significant axial road in the city and it's a mess.”

His new design for the area would, most importantly, reduce its eight lanes to four (two each way). The freed-up space would be used to greatly widen the centre median, now virtually inaccessible as a public space. This could result in areas as wide as 27 metres across in some sections for reimagined spaces that would become – with inventive new paving, contemporary light standards that vary in height and placement, new benches and kiosks – like a “series of linked outdoor rooms,” Mr. Bessai says.

The goal, he says, is to use elements scaled to pedestrian life; animating the street at that level will counterbalance the façades of concrete and steel that line the road from College to Adelaide streets, a distance of 1.2 kilometres. The new light standards, for instance, would be designed to create different moods – “allowing for the intimacy of conversation,” for instance, in front of the Four Seasons Centre at Queen Street.

As the area becomes more inviting for pedestrians, vibrant retail elements would move into the space, creating a new destination for shopping, eating, strolling. None of the existing memorials would be changed; in fact, they are likely to become much more accessible, Mr. Bessai says. “This is about using University Avenue every day – not just for a parade.”