Raise the Hammer
So all the time, effort and wrangling by local citizens, politicians and McMaster faculty to urge the university to take a more prominent role in downtown Hamilton was missing one small component: a check for $50 million!
If only we'd thought of this sooner.
Congratulations to Mr. Braley and maximum kudos for seeing the potential impact McMaster will have in our downtown. All great cities have great downtown university campuses.
Thank goodness Mr Braley is a man of vision and has clearly seen enough of the world to understand this.
Hamilton will be much better off for his generosity.
By Bob Bratina (anonymous) | Posted July 01, 2007 at 11:57:03
This plan has been under development for some time. Part of it involves Mr. Braley's intent to see Hamilton's downtown revitalized and dove-tails nicely with the Civic Centre concept involving a new City Hall/Board of Education/YMCA co-operative development on the site of City Hall. Among the synergies are simple things like sharing the Council Chambers, meeting rooms, building costs, etc. Commercial development on the Board site would provide significant revenue from assessment to underwrite a large part of the Civic Centre construction costs.
Meetings were held as long ago as 18 months to engage the Board and the City, and we should see some results one way or another before the end of the month if all goes well. In addition to this there is promise of significant development at Jackson Square with regard to the market, the plaza, and in the best of my worlds a redesign of the King and James entrance to Jackson Square. If so this would mean significant new players in the downtown development scene which should dispel the lethargy demonstrated by the old guard over the past decade and more. Obviously there needs to be sound business cases for any development,but also visionary principles, which I can assure you is the case with the "new" group.
Bob Bratina.
By NorthEndRules (anonymous) | Posted July 03, 2007 at 00:17:21
Keep up the momentum! Just don't compromise on quality though. If Hamilton is to build something like this, it should be done right and last a long time. Keep up the good work everyone
By Councilwatch (anonymous) | Posted July 06, 2007 at 23:41:21
Good for Mr.Braley and I agree with Bob Bratina. The curmedgeons like Henry Merling and Dave Wilson are out to pasture, thank goodness,but their are others who should be asked to follow.
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