Raise the Hammer

Do we want a $200 million bus maintenance facility or do we want a $800 million B-line LRT, with all the economic developments benefits it will bring?

Have you seen your city council??

Hpow about dependable service, for all areas????

Are you ready to pay for it? Scrap Area Rating.

I think we should examine more area rating, not less.

Watch how fast the suburbs stop asking for cloverleaf highway ramps to Walmart and 5 lane roads across farmland when the cost structure to pay for it is area rated.

Want better ambulance response times in the middle of nowhere Flamborough. No probs. Pony up.

Oppose the 4 storey condo/townhome projects in your sprawl hood all you want....just prepare to pay higher taxes per household when the same street becomes home to 5 housing units instead of 25.

Area rate everything, and don't allow those not paying for said projects to have a vote on them....ie, urban transit etc....

I agree. Let’s go for true area rating in which suburban households pick up their true costs. A study in Halifax showed that the City’s annual cost per household was $3,462 for suburban households and $1,416 for urban households. Suburban households cost over twice as much!

So let’s go for a City of Hamilton in which suburban households are paying their fair share. Here is my prediction: When suburban households are paying their fair share of over twice as much property tax as urban households, there will be a lot less sprawl.

The fix is in, and has been in since the day Bob Bratina was elected. There's no going back now.

Everyone's forgotten about the requirement to connect Hamilton rapid transit to the new regional GO terminal. That in itself disqualifies the Eastgate - Mac line from being considered. Running the route on a 'spur' to the GO means it's no longer rapid transit to cross the city. Add to that the likelihood that 8 or more members of Hamilton council are now publicly drumming up opposition to rapid transit at all, it's looking increasingly like modernizing HSR is about as far as the city's going to get in the next 10-15 years.

That doesn't mean Hamilton should settle for what's on the table. $200 million for a bus garage is beyond the ridiculous, and I don't understand how anyone can consider that a judicious use of taxpayer funds. Also the issue of spending $16 million on branding before delivering any service improvements whatsoever is out there.

IMHO the plan needs to be clear on how bus service eventually gets the city to the BLAST network. The network as a whole is something that most Hamiltonians will get behind, unlike a Mac to Eastgate line that much of the city technically will benefit from, but they do not have any emotional connection to. Invest 180 million in bringing real service - every 15 minutes or less at rush hour, along all 5 of the BLAST lines. Then work on marketing the new HSR. Turn that overbuilt road network from an albatross to an asset.

IMHO the plan needs to be clear on how bus service eventually gets the city to the BLAST network. The network as a whole is something that most Hamiltonians will get behind, unlike a Mac to Eastgate line that much of the city technically will benefit from, but they do not have any emotional connection to. Invest 180 million in bringing real service - every 15 minutes or less at rush hour, along all 5 of the BLAST lines. Then work on marketing the new HSR. Turn that overbuilt road network from an albatross to an asset.

Isn't this one of the main proposals in the Transit Plan --- to establish the BLAST network as high-frequency express bus with accompanied branding, in order to spread the benefits of transit investment accross the city and not have all the money spent on the core?

I'm also confused about the debate over whether to spend money on branding or spend it on improvements. Are we saying that the HSR shouldn't spend money on developing branding for its express-bus network until it has demonstrated ridership improvements, or are we saying they shouldn't rebrand until they implement the new service? To me the branding is integral to establishing new services. If we are building the BLAST network out of express bus + LRT, it needs to be marketed as such to maximize the ridership gain. If we are proposing to spend a bunch of money on express bus service, the branding should be done to coincide with the launching of that service. Maybe $16 million is an inappropriate amount but clear branding of a high-ridership express bus network is an integral part of building that service.

Comment edited by AnjoMan on 2015-03-06 10:52:38

From what I read, the money for branding was an immediate ask, the improved service was to be started to roll out in 2017.

Better to underpromise and over-deliver than the reverse. Every year come budget time there will be more pressure to cut stuff from transit to pay for road repairs.

I wouldn't trust this Council with a future promise to deliver anything worth being marketed. Get good service running first, and once it's good, marketing it will be so much easier.

Screw marketing/ branding. People don't use public transit based on the freaking color of the bus! Make it cheap, frequent, accessible, and far reaching, and that will grow ridership. Screw this council.

Anybody know who voted for the HSR Ten Year Transit Strategy?