Light Rail And The Last Angry Man
This missive below was in response to a comment by the Voter but your agent got a bit carried away on length but hopefully not on logic:
—
Yes Voter, we should have kept the old Transitway stations.
The new stations were for the vanity of the city types who wanted awards at our expense. They loved to spend money so they could get prizes from obscure organizations only a public servant could love. And somehow, they forgot to heat the stations.
The tunnel got an award from the Tunnelling Association of Canada. It had two giant sinkholes and a few little ones. I wonder how many sinkholes the one that finished second had? What a bunch of foolishness. They hand out awards for anything except the people who deserve them.
Those stations, that tunnel cost us a chance to get to Barrhaven and Kanata with light rail.
Vanity, sloth, incompetence, extravagance and stupidity. Absolutely no regard for the taxpayer, efficiency and frugality. They thought of everything except the taxpayer, the passenger and transportation. They’ve destroyed our mass transit system … buses and trains … and given us a million dollars a month in transit operating losses.
A big dumb arrogant series of horrendous mistakes by vain people who craved awards because it would salve their insecurities or give them a moment of glory in their insignificant careers. Maybe get some a few votes.
If you can’t get fired for wasting $6.4 billion, you can’t get fired at city hall. Almost everyone else who got fired in this world got fired for less.
And for all the climate activists at our incompetent prescriptive city hall, they’ve done more damage to the environment by destroying the transit system than by the billions of dollars spent on gas-charged e-buses and other follies. When it comes to the environment and most everything else, they have failed miserably. The climate activists at city hall have hurt the environment more than helped it through their insufficient oversight of this grandiose light-rail failure. Why? People have gone back to driving their cars to work.
Councillors can’t even get their misguided pet projects right.
Do I sound angry? Yes I am angry. City hall had a chance to so something very right and got it very wrong. On our tab.
And many of the culprits, if not most of the LRT culprits, are still working and screwing up transportation and the environment at city hall.
This bunch of dopes at the bylaw factory can’t even pick up garbage correctly without bathing it in the perfume of political correctness so that their words bring accolades from petty people who don’t have the faintest idea what they are talking about. By the way, there’s not enough perfume in the world to cover the stink of stupidity.
If we elected mannequins at city hall, they could do a better job than this bunch of failures. And the advantage of mannequins is that at least we wouldn’t have to listen to their misguided pious words. Just so they understand, I’ll say this slowly. Six … point … four … billion … dollars … is … a … lot … of … money … to … waste.
I bet there are a few people on Murray Street sleeping on sidewalks who wouldn’t mind a piece of that action. They would spend those billions better than our city types. They might buy some food or some booze to take away the pain of their existence. And those sad pathetic people do a lot less damage than our light-rail functionaries did.
Sorry, but screwing up $6.4 billion makes me angry. I don’t apologize for that.
I might be the last angry man. The last man who cares.
Ken Gray
—
—
RECOMMENDED FOR YOU
LRT: Ottawa Chose Esthetics Over Efficiency
Sutcliffe Must Resign Over Failed LRT Fix: GRAY
Don’t Let Jim Watson Near Public Policy Again
—
DON’T MISS OUR REGULAR FEATURES
Everything Ottawa Full Local Bulldog Canadian
Opinion Comments Breaking News Auto
Ontario World Get Cheap Gas Big Money
Pop Gossip Your Home Relax …
Bulldog Weather Full Local Sports
TV/Movies Travel
Page 2 Page 3 Page 4 Page 5 Page 6
Thanks for this. Hopefully your message will be read by someone at city hall and passed around, although likely it won’t. Not enough references to unicorns and rainbows in the text. By the way, I used to be an angry young man, however, as the years have passed I’ve morphed into a grumpy old man. This is what angry men have to look forward to.
Where is Walter Matthau (my hero and role model) when we need him?
Election 2022 came and went. Hubley was re elevted fair and square as were 11 incumbents. Had Watson run he too may have been re electef. The electorate compulsively vote by a criteria that does not include acvountability…consequently, go pound sand.
Ron:
He’s alive and well and living in Ken Gray.
cheers
kgray
Regarding pet projects, here is one from pre-amalgamation (1995) that is just getting done now. The Tunnel to Nowhere under Terry Fox drive at Centrum.
Only $20+M