Mayoralty Candidate Graham MacDonald Wants Ottawa Bank Street O-Train Subway
Ottawa born and raised CEO & entrepreneur Graham MacDonald who has a successful private sector career in the province of Ontario employing more then 70 people wants to be Mayor of Ottawa.
His brings a unique set of skills giving him an understanding of crime issues, homelessness, and economic growth.
“I’m a supporter for the Bank Street O-Train Subway. We have all driven down Bank Street - it’s a nightmare, O-Train is a perfect solution for businesses on Bank, tourism, employees, and residents. It’s good for our carbon footprint and that’s good for everybody.”
When I ask Graham what the next steps should be for the subway concept running from Parliament Station to Billings Bridge he responds “I want us as a city to look into it, how much it will cost, and how we can get it done. My preference is a tunnel - it doesn’t matter if it’s pouring rain or freezing cold it will always have high ridership. We don’t have the space for a streetcar. The tunnel is beneficial, it won’t delay schedules for weather and traffic reasons. We want a system that is going to work properly. We have summer hotter then hell, and winter is really cold and piles of snow so the O-Train is the future for Bank Street.”
Graham also believes Bank will benefit the suburbs because “the different stages of rapid growth we see in the core when we build these big infrastructure projects always brings people back to the rail transit issue every time. It effects traffic flows and businesses in the area and more importantly residents who live in the core and the suburbs and how they plan to get around the city.”
“When we put everything together as a package now, today with the RedBlacks, the Senators, the new densification of towers being built, the existing congestion, the climate changing emissions, and the noise it makes sense now. It reinforces the need for transit in the core. In 5 years we are going to be 1.6 million people. We need to look into the future and prepare Ottawa. We shouldn’t be late to the game all of the time. We don’t want to be 8 years behind and we need to plan now. We have learned a lot along the way since the early days when we started with LRT and we have a clear mind of what we need to do.”
“We have to be open to hearing the experiences to the people who live in the Bank Street communities, it’s a recurring conversation, we have to keep moving forward as a city.”
“It connects everything and brings it all together. Take Bluesfest for example, Lansdowne could be another place to help expand Bluefest when it’s raining. Bank Street O-Train connects it all.”
“Lansdowne is a huge area with big things being planned. I support bringing workers back into the core from the South End of the city. A lot of people want to be downtown to access the Byward Market from Ottawa South and having Bank Street O-Train running from Billings Bridge to Confederation Line 1 makes that happen. The talk and plans of a revitalized Byward Market means we need to get the people to and from it. It’s become evidently more important as our city grows, it’s creating a chaos that Bank Street O-Train can solve.”
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