OSCA President Michael Jenkin's Speech to Council on Lansdowne Park Redevelopment, June 25, 2010
Good Evening Councillors.
As a community organization, the Old Ottawa South Community Association (OSCA) has faced a difficult task assessing this proposal, given its complexity, its less than transparent character, and the frequent changes to it.
However, I think it is important to make it very clear from the outset that OSCA, like virtually every community group involved in these discussions, wants to see Lansdowne Park redeveloped.
The current Park is poorly maintained, is an eyesore, and most importantly, fails to build on the site's potential as one of the largest pieces of public open space in the centre of the city, fails to build on its wonderful setting next to the canal, and fails to build on its distinguished history.
But most community and citizen groups are deeply, deeply concerned that the proposal before you will fail to correct these problems, and bring negative consequences for us as taxpayers and residents.
The first issue I think you need to consider is the relative balance of risks and benefits this project poses for the City and its taxpayers.
The usual objective of public-private partnerships is to find a happy medium where private investment can support the attainment of public objectives. This proposal seems to have reversed the point of such initiatives—here we are designing a mechanism where the public interest is being subordinated to private interests.
The City is putting in by far the largest share of the investment to pay for the capital costs of the project: the renovated stadium, a large part of the parking facility, the green park and most of the public spaces, and the necessary road and utility infrastructure. We are looking easily at an ultimate public investment of somewhere in the $180 million range.
The developer is putting in something in the order of $90 million and most of that will go to build retail and commercial facilities that have no public benefits attached to them at all—in fact, as we will see in a moment—they have public costs attached to them.
Is this really a good deal for us as taxpayers? Given our huge public investment, what precisely are we getting back from the developer to support the public interest here?
I guess we will never know because we did not allow any other groups to come forward with alternative proposals. We never tapped the imagination and sharp pencils of the private sector to see what it could deliver to us.
The second major issue I believe you should ponder deeply are the transportation realities of this development.
First of all, the site just does not have access to the transportation facilities of similarly sized commercial developments in the city.
You only have to look a kilometre and a half away at Billings Bridge Plaza to see the difference. A slightly larger retail facility is supported by a four-lane divided highway running east to west (Riverside Drive), Bank Street which at this point varies from four to six lanes wide all the way to the southern boundary of the city and a double level Transitway station serviced by dozens of bus routes.
Look at other major retail facilities across the city: St. Laurent Shopping Centre (Queensway and St. Laurent Boulevard, plus a major transitway station); Bayshore, same thing—the Queensway, major local arterials and a transitway station.
Lansdowne has Bank Street, effectively a two-lane road during most of the day and only two local bus routes that are vulnerable to any congestion it suffers. The site is surrounded by water, which means there are only a few entry and exit points that your own traffic consultant has shown are prone to congestion.
These problems are magnified when you talk about layering on top of this a retail and commercial facility, and a major sporting and concert events facility.
The solution proposed by your traffic consultant is to encourage people to use distant satellite parking lots with shuttle buses taking patrons to Lansdowne.
Is this really the magic bullet that will make this site viable? Will these cobbled-together arrangements really attract people to Lansdowne?
Is it any surprise that virtually every other Canadian city that has decided to construct a major sports and events facility such as Lansdowne has put it on both major arterials and rapid transit stations?
If Bank Street is paralyzed now with a few thousand people attending a minor hockey game or a local garage sale, how well do you think it is going to cope with major sporting and concert events and a major retail, office, and residential complex all shoe-horned in on one site?
Is this a recipe for a successful site? How long do you think people will put up with it? After all, it is not as if they don't have any other alternatives for their retail dollar or their leisure time.
We are afraid, Councillors, that you are designing for failure—a failure that will cost us big money as City taxpayers, and cost us dearly as local residents when our access to the rest of the city and our neighbourhoods is cut off through congestion.
In summary, Councillors, this is a very bad deal for the city and its residents, but a very good deal for the developers.
If you approve Lansdowne, you will not be solving a problem, you will be building a taxpayer supported white elephant that you own constituents paid for but won't be able to get to.