Give Your Head A Shake On Lansdowne

Published 02/18/2025 · Updated 02/18/2025

People need to think hard on this. And wake up.

What money is the city ever about to get from Lansdowne? Nothing or less. Much, much less. We are spending close to a $1 billion on a project which will never ever recoup a significant fraction of that money. That’s an investment? An investment in the community? Come on.

And the attendance for the Redblacks continues to decline as it has many times before in many versions of the Rough Riders and Renegades et al. We are building an edifice to a CFL that is quickly diminishing in public attention. Name four CFL players? Name four NHL players. The defence rests.

The city went with the CFL over Major League Soccer whose franchises are now worth hundreds of millions of dollars. Smooth move there city types. Buying the past rather than the future. Meanwhile, you might get a couple of bucks for the Redblacks at the Great Glebe Garage Sale. Or you might not. History has shown that owning football in Ottawa is a gamble. That two bucks for the Redblacks could turn into a whole bunch of losses.

Someone is making a buck out of all of this Lansdowne smoke-and mirrors and it isn’t the City of Ottawa. The money is accumulating from apartments and condos which the city should have asked for a part of as one condition (not all) of rebuilding the football stadium. Or not rebuild the football stadium at all … a better option.

Lansdowne 2.0 will be a disaster for the city just as Lansdowne 1.0 has been. How is new Lansdowne different from the first reincarnation of Lansdowne? Hard to know. Where does the money come from to offset $1 billion of costs? That money doesn’t exist. The city can’t possibly recoup its investment in Lansdowne. The municipality would have been better to build it into a park or just sell it like any astute businessperson would have. Who needs the current troubles? Light rail has been enough trouble for two or three cities. We don’t need more trouble and Lansdowne is more trouble. Count on it. Who needs to buy troubles? You can get troubles for free. We’ve over-paid.

And why is the stadium not being built along the light-rail line? Because you can get more money for condos, apartments and retail outlets in the Glebe than near the scrubland of LeBreton Flats.

Lansdowne makes no sense whatsoever to the public. None. It makes great sense for developers. Any dope can see that, even the dopes who are pushing Lansdowne at Ottawa City Hall. So why are they ignoring the obvious?

The public purse is the public purse … not the private purse. Unless you think it is in the interest of Ottawans to put tax money into a financially challenged football league and hardly get any rent for the stadium from the gaggle of small teams that use it.

A waterfall, you say? Who knew the definition of a waterfall is a distraction.

Lansdowne is not in the public interest so why are people at city hall supporting it so vehemently? Those supporters don’t look stupid so what’s in it for them? I mean … shake your head … what’s in it for them? Goodwill? Mighty expensive niceness.

Lansdowne is an immense expense for the city and the big money there is being made outside the municipal domain … if there is any money to be made at all.

Off-ramp please, professor Leiper. Off-ramp.

Ken Gray