Raise the Hammer

@HamiltonFan

How many of the other CFL stadiums have thousands upon thousands of parking spaces?

I don't buy the "people don't want to go there" argument.

People will go to a CFL football game because that is what they want to do.

If Hamilton's core has that problem, then shouldn't we change that?

Shouldn't we want to make downtown Hamilton a place where people WANT to go?

That change is already underway. People ARE starting to go there. I've just made plans to attend my first art crawl on Sept. 10th, and those plans include dinner at one of the many terrific restaurants on James st. N. Four of us are going, three of which have never been.

Putting a stadium, with the Tiger-Cats as a tenant, will draw at least a quarter million people downtown every year.

Sure some will go straight to the game, and straight home. But others won't. Some will hang out before and after a game. Others still might return to the area when there is no game going on.

I wonder about Bob Young's experts? Is their expertise an American perspective that just mihght not apply to the unique CFL dynamic in Canada? One thing is for certain, football in the U.S. and football in Canada are very different animals.

Should he not (if he hasn't) enlist some strictly Canadian/CFL stadium experts if there are such experts?

I can't shake the feeling that he's getting bad advice. I truly believe that Bob Young has an oppurtunity to do something very special here. Another persistent thought is that I don't think enough attention is being paid to what downtown Hamilton will be like in the future 10, 20 years down the line. In that time, the stadium will still be relatively new, and downtown WILL be more vibrant and more affluent. Initiatives like MIP will bring much needed high paying jobs to our city and along with that comes the young urban professional who will populate our core. They are the future.

Add to that the LRT and all of its associated urban intensification.

MIP and LRT are just two initiatives that should have a significant impact on our core, and that resulting impact is something that Bob Young can readily take adavtange of to further enhance that momentum by contributing in the same way, thereby making both the core and the Tiger-Cats/stadium a "must be place". Everyone wins here.

Today's papaer has further indication of this trend with Harry Stinson set to begin contruction on the Stinson School Lofts, and, perhaps more significant, his creation of a "war chest" to finance more condo projects downtown.

It's started folks. Time to climb aboard is now!

http://www.thespec.com/news/local/article/251519--all-systems-go-for-condos-at-stinson-school