Saturday, September 25, 2010

The Election is all About Transit

This election is all about Transit!!

O’Brien’s streetcar plan is a giant hoax.

There is no reset button needed! 
There is no need for further deliberations

What is the difference between a street car going though a tunnel with electricity from Ontario Hydro and a bus using battery electricity? 

The cost of electricity is increasing by 50% and in the peak periods will be three times the present cost

Visually BRT and streetcars are similar. 

You can tell the difference however!  One has ugly overhead wires that we got rid of in the 50’s and the other doesn’t.


The Executive Director, Erin Kelly of the Ottawa Chamber of Commerce, in respect of O’Brien’s 30 year Transit Plan said:

“The system needs to be available to where people live and our fear is, if we don’t accelerate the expansion east & west, the people won’t use the system.” 

She also said,  Ridership will go down because of having to transfer and, in fact, will take more traveling  time.  The first phase of the O’Brien – Watson Plan is going to take at least 10 years and use up all the money – and nothing for going East & West. 

Erin Kelly has it right!

The rail system just doesn’t work!
My plan requires only a bus tunnel and with the Provincial & Federal contribution, the cost to the taxpayers is a guaranteed zero.
Then the 60 million dollars  in gas tax each year can be immediately used for expansion!

Mr. Watson was initially vehemently opposed to the tunnel because it was too expensive, then after knocking on doors and sensing public support, he now supports it. 

I guess it’s great politics but it’s really disingenuous.

I was the first person to realize and identify the need for a downtown bus tunnel. 

Jim, you are making progress – you’re half way there!  Now realize it’s best to go buses.Last week, he spilled the beans – the truth !  He declared “ There is no money available for th  e outer ring road, as all the money is going to LRT

That means, no money for the arts, recreation, affordable housing or roads.

If O’Brien and McGuinty want streetcars, at a per household cost of over $15,000, who is Mr. Watson to disagree?

I again challenge Mr. Watson to a transit debate  - one on one, face to face.

How sad, that Mr. Watson is supporting someone else’s flawed plan rather than one based on fact and evidence.

The most renown economist in North America is Milton Friedman, who declared LRT today is hardly distinguishable from the steam engine of an earlier era.

Randal O’Toole, says ” LRT is a giant hoax that makes contractors rich and taxpayers poor.

Both these politicians will tell you what you want to hear,

I will tell you what you need to know.

If you want more of the same – go for either of them.

If you want spending controls and common sense – go with Haydon

1 comment:

  1. Randal O'Toole is a neo-con who writes articles for an extreme right-wing Conservative think-tank without proper sourcing and extreme bias. We've learned about him at school (the Faculty of Environment at the University of Waterloo). I would not quote him on anything.

    You also have several grammatical and spelling errors in your post, Andy. I would suggest doing a simple Spell Check before posting your next entry.

    Finally, you ignore the cons of BRT completely. It runs on polluting diesel fuel, has less permanence and attractiveness to riders, cannot run as coupled trains, cannot feasibly work in an underground tunnel due to air quality issues, has higher operating costs/passenger carried, cannot spark transit-oriented development and economic investment in the same way as LRT, and has lower capacity.

    Sorry Andy, but as an urban planning student, I cannot support you for Mayor based on these glaring omissions.

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