CBLCA submitted the following comments on the Ottawa Sports and Entertainment Group proposal for Lansdowne that will come before a joint meeting of the Finance and Corporate Services Committee and Planning and Housing Committee on November 2.
Can we just cut our losses and get out of the Lansdowne 2.0 / 2.1 deal?
The Crystal Beach Lakeview Community Association does not believe that the deal is making sense for the interests of our neighbourhood or of our city.
We appreciate that the City encouraged public engagement, but other elements of the process were concerning. It seemed strange that the City was paying consultants to present the developers’ case; that we were using our tax dollars to pay for developers to try to break our Official Plan, our Master Transportation Plan, and our Parks and Rec Plan–plans that our community had engaged in.
We’ve heard that we could update the stands ourselves for $25 million instead of giving $400 million or $600 million or whatever it is to developers to build towers, partly on parkland. This city should not be sacrificing one shred of parkland. We should be figuring out how to get more of it.
Apparently, this would be the third largest project Ottawa has ever had. We’ve heard that the Lansdowne money could give every ward in the city $20 million. Crystal Beach Lakeview (CBLCA) could get its bike path fixed, get more frequent bus service, and update its swimming pool, or the City could build some community housing or extend the LRT to the Palladium. We could do a lot with that money. It may be that tying professional sports to real estate deals is no longer what cities should be doing in the face of climate change, housing shortages, and transit shortfalls.
Can we, please, just cut our losses, take a step back from the Lansdowne 2.0 / 2.1 deal, and consider what other options we have?
For more information, see https://engage.ottawa.ca/lansdowne-2-0. See also Let’s Talk Lansdowne 2.1 at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7iS1fMxKPiY
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