[Chad]

Via Hamilton Spec:

HAMILTON—Hamilton city council has voted in favour of building a new stadium for the 2015 Pan Am Games at a downtown site.

The vote follows months of negotiations that saw stadium project supporters divided between two sites — downtown’s West Harbour and the East Mountain location favoured by the owner of the Hamilton Tiger-Cats.

City councillor Bob Bratina says the vote, which came after a marathon council meeting, was 12 to 3 in favour of the West Harbour location.

The vote comes on the heels of a bombshell announcement by Tiger-Cats owner Bob Young on Monday that he was withdrawing from negotiations.

An amendment was made before voting that required city council to approach the Tiger-Cats to try to find a solution to the impasse.


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W00T. hells yea

Step 1: West Harbour stadium
Step 2: Get TiCats OR another long-term tenant (soccer?)

But it was an important (and surprisingly overwhelming) victory, considering that some of these councilors were on the fence before.

http://thespec.com/News/Local/article/823818

Does that come off as douchebag-ish to anyone else?

Originally Posted by Kathy2

http://thespec.com/News/Local/article/823818

Does that come off as douchebag-ish to anyone else?

Yup.

Meh, I would have preferred to see Buble as well. Especially since it was clear what the decision would be from pretty early on in the meeting.

So does this mean that we can get rid of the TiCats now?

Originally Posted by aaront

Step 1: West Harbour stadium
Step 2: Get TiCats OR another long-term tenant (soccer?)

Agreed! Much more interesting.

What was the point of this vote? The TiCats owner has said in very clear terms he will NOT play at a West Harbour site, no matter what, and nothing is going to change his mind.

All the losers downtown are pissed and I'm loving it... god I hate Hamilton.

I'm calling the the TiCats' bluff. Do they honestly believe Quebec city is going to be a bigger football market than Hamilton, no matter where the stadium is located? Im thankful city council has some cojones and picked West Harbour. Lets just wait for the Ti-Cats to come crawling back.

Originally Posted by J-Met

I'm calling the the TiCats' bluff. Do they honestly believe Quebec city is going to be a bigger football market than Hamilton, no matter where the stadium is located? Im thankful city council has some cojones and picked West Harbour. Lets just wait for the Ti-Cats to come crawling back.

I agree, same with the other proposed cities: Moncton, Halifax, Saskatoon...

I hope that the Ti-Cats leave. They brought in heaps of experts and consultants from all over the place to evaluate 10 different sites, and they all expressed how terrible the West Harbour site would be for the team. The site they were fighting for wasn't even their first choice, but the one that an arbitrator advised.

I really don't understand why the city would do this. They're trying to build a stadium for the Pan Am games, but they need federal and provincial funding to do so, and the only way they'll get that is if they have a 'main tenant' (basically the Ti-Cats). If the Ti-Cats do pull out then they'll end up losing the football team which brings a bunch of money into the city, and the games. I know that the city wants to revitalize the downtown, but Copps was meant to do the same, and now it just drains money. Can someone explain this to me?

Originally Posted by SC04

I hope that the Ti-Cats leave. They brought in heaps of experts and consultants from all over the place to evaluate 10 different sites, and they all expressed how terrible the West Harbour site would be for the team. The site they were fighting for wasn't even their first choice, but the one that an arbitrator advised.

I really don't understand why the city would do this. They're trying to build a stadium for the Pan Am games, but they need federal and provincial funding to do so, and the only way they'll get that is if they have a 'main tenant' (basically the Ti-Cats). If the Ti-Cats do pull out then they'll end up losing the football team which brings a bunch of money into the city, and the games. I know that the city wants to revitalize the downtown, but Copps was meant to do the same, and now it just drains money. Can someone explain this to me?

There is nothing to explain. The city council is smoking something real fierce and is making them completely blind to there stupid decisions. The city will lose the Pan Am games if they decide on the West Harbour location. With no future tenant the stadium after the games will never be used. And just drain money to maintain. Federal and Provincial government has already said they will not fund a West Harbour location and the Pan Am officials will not allow the stadium to be made with no future tenant as that was part of the deal. With this requirements to fulfill the East Mountain location is by far the best.

I don't know how many of you are actually from Hamilton. I've been born and raised in Hamilton mostly the west end down the mountain. And I can say the west harbour location is no place for a stadium. Especially a stadium for 18,000+ seats. Not happening. Think of the congestion in the downtown area with no highway access near the stadium site. It would be a complete nightmare and that isn't taking into consideration of where people will park there cars. In front homes?

The city is fighting a losing fight and in the end Hamilton will be left with nothing and the city will continue its downward fall.

I don't support the construction; regardless of where it is built.

Where is the West Harbour location precisely? Is it replacing one of the parks, or that industrial-ish district?

Hamilton's politicians are continuously shooting themselves in their own asses. They've been doing this for ages, and the city has continued on its path to self made failure year after year.

The political environment here is very much driven by ego, local and personal motives, and is very unionesque in nature. This decision with the stadium could potentially mean no CFL team, and no federal funding, and a hell of a lot of pissed off voters. For what? Some pathetic attempt to revitalize downtown? Wasn't Copps supposed to do the same thing? Building a bloody stadium in a logistically poor and uninviting area isn't going to help anything, it's just more money down the drain. A stadium doesn't fix social issues or poverty. It does however bring in revenue, if implemented correctly.

This has parallels to the entire spectacle with the the Ontario government's advanced rapid transit system project in the 1980's. The government by way of the UTDC had just developed a new rapid transit light rail system, similar to the C Train in Calgary and Sky Train in Vancouver. It needed a region to pilot the project and offered massive, I believe even complete, funding to Hamilton to be the project's pilot city. Hamilton and its politicians f'ed it up, refused the provinces money, voted against it, and that was that. Hamilton could have had a local rail system similar to a subway today if it were not for this.. forever biting the hand that feeds them.

This nonsense is apparent everywhere. Even in simple matters of zoning and creating an inviting atmosphere for businesses to choose Hamilton as a place to set up shop, or allowing new and attractive residential structures to be erected. A permit process that takes a week elsewhere takes months or years here, and requires one to jump through an uncountable number of hoops and spend an insane amount of money.

Look at how places like Mississauga have grown tremendously since the 80's, and look at how Hamilton has continued to fail, time and time again. It's not that the city is trapped in some sort of inescapable situation, but rather that its government are politics are mindblowingly counterproductive.

I've come to realize that there is no reason to care for Hamilton's success anymore. Let it fail and rot away, it's seemingly what they want. I hate this city.

haha amazing post Viktor, couldn't have said it better, especially the last paragraph.