I think I have a destructive relationship with the citizen: for every bizarrely written electoral endorsement, they do a really good series on a civic issue in Ottawa. Case in point, today’s series of articles on the future of Lansdowne park. My two favourites are their 10 cool ideas and the look at public vs. private space.
One important thing to note about the list of cool ideas: it notably doesn’t include a football stadium. Which is odd, because yesterday an editorial described bringing football back to the site a must (no link- page f4, Oct. 26, “Lansdowne Park: Let’s Get it Right.”) Today, they quote the “father of Kanata”:
Ottawa developer Bill Teron, the father of Kanata, believes football is a great asset enjoyed by many people, but he says sports can be a shaky foundation for development. He points to the empty stadium left by the Lynx. “I was a director of the Ottawa Football Club and I know how fragile it was as an undertaking.”
Now, I like most of the ideas in the cool list- though if the Glebe is annoyed by 2 weeks of amusement park, I can’t imagine that they would appreciate a years worth of it- and am generally dubious of the prospects of bringing football back to the site. We forget that the 67’s are already a top draw there, and something like a new central library (a la Vancouver, perhaps) would be the kind of thing that will add value to the city while still being super-functional. In contrast, we’ve had two kicks at the football over the past decade, and both have failed pretty miserably. Part of that might be the stadium; Montreal certainly re-established itself when they moved to a smaller stadium (matched with better on-field product).
I guess my point is that I think focusing the redevelopment of the site around a very large, and very expensive, stadium that may sit empty 10, heck maybe even 3, years from now. I also am reluctant to cede much of the rest of the property so that someone will build that stadium for us; and am similarly apprehensive to make the biggest remaining, and one in which the city has almost total control, developed around a stadium used 5 months a year exclusively for paying customers.
Fellow Travellers 
October 27th, 2007 
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