Raise the Hammer is reporting the news that Jill Stephen, who was basically in charge of the LRT file at city hall is leaving for the Niagara region. The Raise the Hammer article pretty much spells everything out, but if she's leaving then the future of LRT is looking very poor indeed. I actually spoke to Jill at one of the city's public information sessions about LRT and it's sad where we have ended up now. I'm looking forward to Jason Farr's motion on reaffirming support for LRT that's coming up this month, especially how Bob Bratina votes.
A lot of the naysayers (CHML's Bill Kelly) on LRT complain about the cost of the city's component, beyond the federal and provincial contributions. Considering the $20 million the city has given for the Mac medical facility downtown, plus the $35 million in overpriced rent at the facility the city will be paying and whatever we have to come up for the velodrome in the end, one wonders if the city would be a lot better off using that money for the capital component of LRT.
If the city built LRT, the Board of Education land the medical centre is going on would soon become more valuable and somebody would do something with it without a huge city contribution and would pay significantly higher property taxes than the reduced ones Mac will pay.
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