Deachman: Let's get the information we need to do Lansdowne 2.0 right

It’s clear that many residents’ concerns are not being adequately addressed.

Published Jun 29, 2023 • 5 minute read

Community volunteers built a 3-D scaled model of the Lansdowne 2.0 proposal and had it on display Sunday, May 14 at Lansdowne Park. Photo by Ashley Fraser /Postmedia

“(T)here is very little public support for the current Lansdowne 2.0 proposal whether taken as a whole, or broken down to its constituent elements.”

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That is the main takeaway from a report on the results of a “city-wide” survey of nearly 2,000 residents conducted by Capital Coun. Shawn Menard, in whose ward Lansdowne Park sits.

The survey, the results of which Menard released on Wednesday, found that 65 per cent of people oppose the Lansdowne 2.0 Revitalization Proposal as it currently stands. At council on Wednesday, Menard asked city staff to provide councillors and the public with an update on the plan, including any proposed changes to it. He also asked that more public consultations be organized before council green lights the project and the backhoes are called in.

It makes sense. After all, we’ve seen what can happen when the city rushes into or hurries large projects. Why not slow things down and get Lansdowne right?

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There’s been no indication of whether the public’s concerns regarding the project, which include such issues as the sheer out-scaled size of it, parking and transportation issues, the continued dearth of such public-realm amenities as shade, seating and washrooms, and the absence of any deeply affordable housing on-site, will ultimately be incorporated into the plan.

That clearly needs to change.

You can certainly take exception to such online surveys as Menard’s; the results aren’t scientific or even representative of the entire city. All residents had the opportunity to participate, but nearly 80 per cent of the 1,886 people who did are urban dwellers. Almost 60 per cent, or more than 1,100 participants, live in the K1S postal code area consisting of Old Ottawa South, Old Ottawa East and the Glebe — neighbourhoods closest to Lansdowne. Only one-fifth of respondents live in the suburbs, and just 1.4 per cent, or 26 respondents, call Ottawa’s rural areas home. Of the roughly 10,000 in Greely’s K4P postal code area, for example, only two took part.

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So the results skew towards people who follow Menard and those he can reach through such means as his website, email bulletin, social media channels and the A Better Lansdowne website. Their concerns are certainly worth consideration, but let’s not pretend they necessarily reflect the views of Ottawans at large.

That said, Menard’s questionnaire was more comprehensive and allowed greater input from residents than does the terrible “Overall Concept Survey” the city launched online in March, which prompted Menard to conduct his own in the first place. Findings from the city’s survey, which is still active and has reportedly also attracted close to 2,000 respondents, have not yet been made public, but you can expect that it, too, will be skewed, in its case to people who get their municipal fix through the city’s website.

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Bearing that in mind, it’s nonetheless clear that many residents’ concerns are not being adequately addressed. Only nine per cent said they were in favour of the project as currently outlined — a plan that would see, among other changes, three high-rise towers (one of them 40 storeys tall) with 1,200 residential units erected as part of a rebuild of the north-side stands. The city hopes to recoup about $43.5 million of the expected $332 million cost by selling the air rights to build those units.

A new 5,500-seat hockey arena/event space is to be built where the toboggan hill currently is, replacing the Civic Centre underneath the north stands. The new arena will also eat into the Great Lawn, with 58,000 square feet of current public green space to be sacrificed.

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The city has pitched the plan as revenue-neutral, saying the debt incurred will be recovered through future taxes and ticket surcharges.

The city’s finance and economic development committee voted to approve the plan in May 2022, although it failed to heed the at-the-time city council’s instruction to seek public input. Our previous council, meanwhile, voted the following month to allow the plan to move to the design stage and complete public consultation, but left the final OK to the current council.

Janice Barresi, OSEG/Ottawa Sports and Entertainment Group vice-president of brand and social impact, offered something of a hopeful note on Monday when she said that OSEG is open to changing the housing plan for Lansdowne 2.0 if necessary.

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“If the city decides that they want less density on-site or more affordable housing, we’ll work with our partners on that,” she told the CBC.

It’s a complicated partnership. The city likely wouldn’t have redeveloped Lansdowne in the first place without a partner like OSEG, and the group is not a charity. It expects to make a profit from the arrangement, which so far hasn’t happened. And if OSEG was to default or walk away from Lansdowne, the city could be on the hook for any losses. So like it or not, we are partners with OSEG and need it to succeed. But we shouldn’t give the farm away.

Meanwhile, the north-side stands are falling apart, the rink there is decrepit and the city is in desperate need of all kinds of housing. Development of Lansdowne needs to go ahead. Yet the criticism of OSEG for its lack of transparency when it cites corporate confidentiality is a valid one.

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On Sunday, five prominent experts, including former Privy Council clerk Michael Wernick and Institute of Fiscal Studies and Democracy CEO Kevin Page, said as much in a letter to Ottawa Mayor Mark Sutcliffe asking for greater financial transparency, including new estimates of costs, revenues and cash-flow projections. The letter also questions the city’s justifications for the information disclosure exemptions enjoyed by OSEG, noting that such exemptions “cannot be used when the public interest in disclosing the information is greater than the reason for the exemption.”

“With other pressing priorities facing our city,” the letter states, “it is essential that Council and residents have a clear understanding of the financial plan for Lansdowne 2.0 and the ability to assess the proposal against other potential areas of investment.”

On such a large-scale civic project as Lansdowne, the public should have more information than the city and OSEG are parcelling out. After all, we’ll be paying for it for years to come — it would be nice to know what we’re buying.