Raise the Hammer

So, a driver coming from King and Ottawa to get downtown for work is now going to be using Aberdeen? Or Main West? Or Cootes Dr? Or Queen?

This is one of the dumbest things to ever come out of city hall. And that's saying something.

If he really cared about solutions he would ask staff to report back on converting Main and Wilson to two-way traffic. They could both easily handle any overflow from King during construction. Furthermore, we should put bus lanes both ways on Main years before LRT in order to give people a more convenient option on transit and take even more cars off the road prior to LRT opening.

I'm pretty sure Hamilton is the first backwards, hillbilly city to ever get an LRT system. This is going to be a disaster to watch modern, 21st Century city-building practices butt up against 1970's Los Angeles style vision from councillors like this.

Being to Los Angeles twice a year for several years in the last ten years... Los Angeles has LRTs in freeway medians. That's a bit more backwards than ours; but they are compensating partially from the freeway binge era.

I missed something here. Maybe you do things a little differently in Hamilton, there is no time or date stamp on the motion itself, about what meeting (Council or a Committee) or vote it applies to. Is it a independent motion designed to start an issue or is part of an existing vote and or a known series of amendments to a vote? I am a little confused, the motion has no specifics of whether this vote has already occurred or not?. When did they vote on it or has the motion yet to be voted on? The next city council meeting? What is the date of the next meeting? At what point of the proceedings will this vote be done. Usually in Ottawa where I live, a motion has to have what point or vote its referring too. There is usually a reference number of a report or explanation/history of which issue this is regarding and when the vote will be on the schedule of the next committee/council meeting in advance.

It was a notice of motion - a councillor can ask council to "waive the rules" to immediately bring a notice of motion to the floor as a motion (often in cases where the motion is time-sensitive). Whitehead decided not to ask for the rules to be waived, so likely it'll be back at the next council meeting in two weeks.

oh trust me, we do things differently here. You don't end up as the depressed donut hole in the middle of Canada's most prosperous region by accident.

Call him on his bluff. Conversions don't actually reduce capacity, just the perception of capacity ie. speed.

A bit crass but I get your point.

So if you don't like it, get a group going and bug your alderman. You're just lazy and unhappy that some active people are getting their way.

How is it that the 'democratic process' gets the press 'on your side'? Ever? What a bizarre twist of logic...

As for those you refer to as 'You people', I am personally glad they are here fighting and advocating for a better city. I support them and I think Hamiltonians are fortunate to have people in this city who care enough to take time out of their personal lives towards this effort.

Many of these changes WERE voted on in Participatory budgeting in wards 1 and 2, specifically the two-way conversions of Bold and Duke and traffic calming on Aberdeen. These were exactly referendums, with plenty of advance discussion and information.

If you are asking that every change in every street in every ward get its own referendum voted on by the entire city, that would be crazy! Should the entire city have voted on Wilson Street in Ancaster? Street calming on the Mountain? A new stop sign Dundas?

Regarding LRT, there was a Provincial election and a local election. Pro-LRT candidates won Mayoralty contest, the ward contests in the wards with the LRT and the anti-LRT Provincial candidates lost. The previous Mayor ran on a pro-LRT platform, and Eisenberger was pro-LRT in his first term. How many more votes do you need? Why does this particular project need a city-wide referendum? We don't have referenda for every big project (Red Hill, the Stadium, The Linc, ...) and we certainly don't have referenda for every change in street design. Should we have had a city-wide referendum on the Queen Street hill re-build? The Cannon bike lanes? A new rec centre on the Mountain?

The vision for LRT has always included complete streets renovations of the streets along the corridor: Metrolinx and the City have been clear about this for the past seven years!

Comment edited by kevlahan on 2015-11-26 15:14:59

you're missing the main point Nicholas. It doesn't matter what % of the population votes for a specific issue. As long as they do so at Westcliffe Mall. That's the only place where public participation matters.

Comment edited by JasonL on 2015-11-26 16:37:48

Maybe more of us need to attend the Westcliffe sessions more often.

They're not public meetings, Whitehead prefers to meet people one at a time so they can't get organized and he can tell them whatever he wants.

Have you been to one of those? All the people complain about the same things. Things like people hijacking the democratic process to get their agendas pushed, like RTD

So long as your referendum includes expanding the one way street network across the entire city - including the mountain. Voting to keep it in place in the lower city only while excluding its expansion to all areas is disingenuous at best.

did you ever see that Simpson's episode where Homer met his rich car company owning long lost brother and after much slapstick hilariosity ended up designing a car for him? If you let everyone vote on everything, that will be your car...

A true democracy elects decision makers. Let the various interest groups try to persuade and influence, that's fine by me. Funny though how the majority wants wider streets and no bike lanes and faster one way traffic but there isn't a single community organization representing that view. No blog or website (well I think there was one started by an angry basement dweller but it seems to have fizzled). I've never heard of there being a Mac lecture by someone advocating narrower sidewalks and heavier trucks. Lots of armchair experts tho. TONS of those. hm.

I agree fully with your first point. If we had neighborhood associations running the city we would have no through streets.

I like your second point at first.

The trouble with groups are, that the squeaky wheel gets the grease.

LRT, one way streets, major arterial roads and cross town traffic are City wide issues.

You don't have groups advocating wider roads because people are largely happy with what they have. You start plugging up and delaying people from getting to work or school, I expect you will hear from them.

Ask Whitehead or any other counselor if they have heard from people who oppose the LRT. I expect they have.

Do you think the LRT would survive a referendum?

We can't afford what the suburban voters want. We just can't. No referendum will change that. We have absolutely no choice but to densify the downtown and make it livable, and the suburban dwellers simply have to find another route if they don't want to slow down. It's math. You can argue with 2+2=4 all you want. But even a 100% vote that says it's 5 won't make it so.

It's not uncommon for individuals to vote against their own self interest.

The city is going broke supporting a civic model of limitless sprawl. It is not sustainable. Do you think the masses lapping it up would vote against continuing the model that currently subsidizes their own selfish behaviour?

Urban sprawl is a blight. The road systems we have in the suburbs is nauseating. A complete moratorium on development outside current boundaries for almost all municipalities would force us to re-think what we are doing.

That said.

The GTA has increase almost 6x in size since I was child. Yet the road networks, subways and train systems have not kept up. Most municipalities that froze the planning projects proposed in the late 1970's used the money for pensions. We lost our ski hills in Hamilton not because people weren't using them, but because closed shop unions prevented affordable operations. We are going broke for a lot of reasons and that is too big an issue to discuss here - but it is a valid question.

If an overall plan was presented to the population in a concise and understandable way, people would do the right thing most of the time.

More roads. Less unions.

Got it.

Exactly. Less closed shop union/government theft. More subways, LRT's etc.

Less unions more let.

Less unions more skiing.

less sprawl, more roads

less other people, more space for me

less reality more referendums

terry whitehead is larry david. one rule for every situation: "me first"

"LRT, one way streets, major arterial roads and cross town traffic are City wide issues."

Why is it that so many people from the mountain come down the hill and traverse the city from below the escarpment vs. staying up top for their cross town trip? Think about it for a minute.

Wards aren't at the street level. In past polling, the electorate adjacent to Alberdeen is near unamious, even those not attending.

We don't do that sort of gerrymandering, but at the same time, it's noteworthy the street CAN still function as a minor arterial after becoming more "complete street", and still move pratically the same number of cars (albiet at a defacto lower speed limit, by the virtue of street taming, which improves safety).

I think you miss my point completely.

This is not about Aberdeen or the KNA. This is about a City wide road diet designed to implement a LRT inspired vision of major traffic changes.

I think the core point of your initial comment was to offend. It started with the first word. A nice drippingly sarcastic 'Congratulations'.

No. Not to offend.

This is well done. I don;t agree with it obviously. But it is well done.

I politely point out that semantics matter here. Usually, a "Congratulations" is an agreement / happy / pleasant / genuine. Even if it is not meant as sarcastic, it is out-of-etiquette of the use of the word in many peer groups / families / cultures.

I politely point out you said "I don't agree with it obviously" which is counter to expected norms of the non-offensive (by the POV of the recipient) use of the word "Congratulations" by all possible groups of people.

Just politely pointing these semantics out.

Comment edited by mdrejhon on 2015-11-27 04:34:15

the only people making terry whitehead look like an ass are past terry, present terry and future terry.

don't forget to slow clap while you claim 'well done'...

Yeah, ChuckBall, it totally was the Spec article that made Whitehead look like an ass, not the amateur-hour motion. It is a killjoy that the lower-City councillors are too mature to fight fire with fire and introduce emotions calling for a moratorium on new side-walks on the mountain or something equally childish. I guess only some residents are worthy of safe streets, and us lower-City dwellers just don't cut it.

What a creepy, back handed comment, do you have some reason to think Clr Johnson and the KNA are not representing what people living around Aberdeen want? Also Whitehead doesn't need the Spec's help to look like an ass.

Nuisance motion designed to polarize as LRT consultation gets underway ... where was the LRT citizens' panel meeting last night?

On substance: To get full value from the province's LRT investment the design and function of all lower-city streets will need to be reviewed to both encourage and facilitate a modal shift toward transit. The LRT could be a boon for SoBi too. But only if more streets are given a "complete streets" makeover and a "real" bike network is created, so more people feel safe on two wheels.

For the streets upon which the LRT will travel it is essential to make the design changes as part of the overall design and implementation of LRT. Why would you want to go through the disruption of the construction process without addressing all the needs of the street for the foreseeable future ... We do want people to want to go downtown and spend time and money there right?

Of course, those of us that live on or near one-way streets should avoid wanting them converted and tamed ... so that people can continue to drive fast through our neighbourhoods. Nice.

Comment edited by RobF on 2015-11-26 11:32:25

The LRT citizen panel was at Mohawk College watching a Calgary Transit presentation. It was an open-to-public presentation, so several of us went there, myself included. Some of this was livetweeted in our advocacy's @ham_LRT account amongst others (including the Citizen Jury's @HamCitzJury account.)

I saw some of the tweets. I'd have attended, but had a scheduling conflict. Sounded like an interesting presentation.

What a minute, it is not even clear what "REDUCE MOTOR VEHICULAR CAPACITY" actually means.

A two-way conversion doesn't reduce motor-vehicular capacity, and neither does narrower lanes or adding bike lanes (provided they don't remove traffic lanes). In fact most traffic calming doesn't reduce capacity, if by capacity you mean km-lanes dedicated to vehicles,

If Whitehead means maximum through-put (at below the legal speed limit) it would actually require traffic modelling of the proposed change to determine whether it would actually reduce traffic flow, which is pretty complex as it depends on desired service level, and demand. And does he mean "maximum capacity" at rush hour, or capacity averaged over the day or week? So, maybe he is really just asking for traffic modelling of proposed changes.

Thank you for raising this point, Nicholas.

Converting our one-way streets back to two-way will not reduce lanes for car travel.

Two-way opponents need to remember two-way streets are more efficient. How many times do you have to drive out of your way to get where you are going in this city? We do it without thinking about it, but try thinking about it each and every time. It's hugely inconvenient.

Think of how much easier life would be as a car driver if you could drive east OR west on Main, south OR north on Queen, etc.

At a recent function at the Lincoln Alexander Centre (King and Mary) the out of town guest speaker drove in on Main St from the 403. Unfortunately, he went was far as the Delta before he got turned around. Not a nice introduction.

The endless looping around the one-ways is disorienting for new people (from Toronto), and it adds all kinds of speed and distance to what should often be a direct trip.

this point needs to be hammered in to the short cutters.

and in fact, the light timing could change based on rush direction so that both king AND main have friendly timing for drivers at given times of day...

That's a good point. He should have a study done to determine if the capacity of the road would be limited based on the speed limit. By that measure none of roads in the core would be subject to his moratorium.

Exactly. Call his bluff, I say.

I think you're giving him too much credit. I don't think he's given it any more thought beyond his own conflation of speed with capacity.

Oh please, please, please can Johnson/ Farr/ Green motion for a "moratorium on road widenings in the upper city/ Red Hill Valley corridor" until LRT construction is finished?

Perhaps someone could put together a leaflet explaining how improving lower City conditions would benefit Ward 8 residents as well (improved tax base, etc.) and distribute it there widely. Terry only plays this card because he scores points with a vocal few there who see themselves as separate from the folks below the escarpment. There are many in his ward who might take exception to his antics if the full ramifications of them were brought to their attention.

Could it be argued that a 5, 10 or 26 storey condo development with less than 1 parking spot per unit would fall under "ANY NEW PROJECT, ... THAT REDUCEs MOTOR VEHICULAR CAPACITY ON ANY ROADWAY WITHIN THE LRT CORRIDOR"?

Terry Whitehead has become a caricature of himself:

https://twitter.com/terrywhitehead/statu...

I think that's one of the parody accounts

It really isn't.

Twitter users should stop "engaging" with Terry Whitehead. I know I'm one of the worst culprits for replying when he says something ridiculous -- it's very hard to stay silent. But I'm beginning to think he gets some kind of thrill from poking at us and then repeating the same talking points over and over again. We believe if we can just show him some facts, some evidence from multitudes of studies, he will have to be reasonable. That's a false hope.

He's like the little brother who annoys you and your parents said, "Just ignore him". I think we should go with that advice. It will be better for our stress levels if we just accept the fact TW is stuck in his current mode of thinking and will only see the light when he is old and decrepit, living downtown and trying to get around with his walker while avoiding a collision with a speeding car.

I'm with Ryan on this one. He is unable to put together a cogent argument on Twitter and responds to well-reasoned points-of-view with verbal attacks and even subtle threats at times, not to mention that he shows himself unable to understand the proposals he is arguing against. The more he debates engaged, thoughtful and knowledgeable citizens on twitter, the more people are going to see that he has no idea what he is doing.

it's definitely time to stop being respectful and civilized to that bigot

The proposed moratorium has completely shocked everyone that I have shown it too. It has shocked them almost as much as the "wards versus bus lane map." I really think it is time to silent treatment the TW troll. Spend your time and energy convincing councilors that can listen, and possibly vote against his circular twiddle twaddle.

Agreed. I think it's time to organize a message to every other councillor that basically says "is this the moron you want to align yourself with?"

He's an embarrassment.

There are 3-lane (center turning lane) roads elsewhere in North America that is already doing 25,000 cars per day. It should be within the abilities of an Alberdeen Road Diet.

Hamilton sidewalks are a gd nightmare. Any motion to keep them from being made safer is unacceptable. Terry's decision making is like his golf swing.. Lacking good form.

We should have a drive Terry day. All wards under review should drive a parade through every residential street on our way to the Linc.

And now Andrew Dreschel has jumped into the fray with his usual support of downtown neighbourhoods (not).

Ryan, can you submit this article to the Spec? I think they'll want 650 words.

Terry Whitehead is Hamilton's Rob Ford, minus the drug scandals.

Having read through a number of TWs recent twitter "exchanges" (in disbelief) I have to say that there seems no reason to further engage him. His views are political - full stop. He is only one vote.