“Bank Street O-Train Has to be Top of the Agenda” - Ward 10 Candidate Aria Alavi
“The city of Ottawa has to work with the federal and provincial levels of government on public transit for Bank Street O-Train. We have seen that in Toronto with improvements for the TTC and we have to do the same for our city” says Gloucester-Southgate candidate Aria Alavi.
Candidate Alavi says “Bank Street O-Train has to be top of the agenda on day 1 of the next city council. I’m 100% in support of the Bank Street O-Train. I don’t want to see it take 20 or 25 years to get built, it needs to be built now.”
“The city of Ottawa-Gatineau population has surpassed 1.4 million people this year and you know what we are going to hit 1.6 million people soon. The city needs to move forward on the plan now, not later.”
Alavi also believes “the public has to be part of the debate on deciding if it’s a surface line or tunnel. I prefer the tunnel. We have winter in Ottawa and heavy rain other times, and we can’t just make cars go away, the tunnel makes the most sense.”
“All of the residents and all of the businesses I’ve spoken with in the last month are in favour of the Bank Street O-Train project” says candidate Alavi. “It would help lots of the residents in Gloucester-Southgate who rely on public rail transit to get to work and for getting in and out of the city for other things in their lives, it would help make Confederation Line 1 a success.”
“We have low income workers in my district, they need this project and it’s good for the entire city, and it would be very good for Lansdowne 2.0 because it would stabilize it once and for all.”
When asked why the Bank Street O-Train Tunnel concept from Parliament Station to Billings Bridge has so many Ottawans excited, Alavi responds “it’s because the project would go where people want to be and where they want to visit and it would be good for tourism, residents are smart, they understand the issue very well.”
“This is a must do project, it has to be done. We have to fight climate change and this is an important way to achieve our goals as a city, we have to build Bank Street O-Train now.”
See more background on Bank Street O-Train at links below:
Clinton P. Desveaux is an accredited writer & contributor for Troy Media, Medium, The Hill Times, Centretown Buzz, and is a contributor to the City News Radio Network