Raise the Hammer

Mr. Young,

I also appreciate your participation in this forum and your investment in Hamilton thus far. While I am grateful for your contributions to the community I share the frustration felt by the other participants in this discussion. Many of us were very excited about what looked like a win-win-win scenario for the West Harbour, the Tiger Cats and the City as a whole, so it is very disappointing to be where we are today.

I believe the East Mountain site is a terrible location in terms of access from the rest of the city. While the RHVP and LINC serve local residents well in terms of day-to-day travel, neither of these two-lane roads was designed for the kind of traffic surge that will happen on game day. By relocating to the East Mountain you are asking your fans to expend unnecessary time and fuel while they plod through traffic jams. Once fans are on the parkway heading to the stadium there's no way out. They will be stuck behind the car in front of them.

In a downtown setting there are always options to avoid traffic, side streets, alternative arterial streets, or just simply parking and walking a few minutes on foot. A West Harbour stadium would immediately be well-served by the convergence of over 20 city bus routes, several inter-city buses, a future GO/VIA train station and possibly an LRT line, all within a comfortable walking distance or a short shuttle ride away. While bus routes will no doubt be extended into the East Mountain, citizens will instead be left with 2 or 3 options instead of 20+.

In terms of funding, who's going to pay for all that extra pavement in the parking lot? I find it troublesome that nobody has mentioned whether all this new parking will be free for fans or whether that's another added cost.

Also, Who's going to pay for the new highway access ramps? Who's going to pay to move the hydro corridor and sub-surface gas lines that exist at the proposed site? Who's going to pay for the extra environmental assessment of the new site that will be required before approval? Who's going to pay for the land itself? It's worth far too much to just be given away, even from province to city.

That $15million is shrinking very quickly and unless you have a last-minute surprise announcement coming I'm not sure I have any idea how you're going to pull this off. Private funding or no private funding I don't think the East Mountain location is worth a dime of our Future Fund and I sincerely hope our Councilors recognize that and opt for the West Harbour option.

Again, I appreciate your efforts thus far, and I know you need to consider the wellbeing of the team, but please trust the growing number of Hamiltonians who would love to see the stadium in the West Harbour. It will work if you give it a chance.