No topic sees Ken Gray’s “Bulldog” blog on the Citizen site live up to its name better than his dog-with-a-bone stubbornly relentless critique of the planned tunnel for a downtown LRT. Ken hates the idea of the tunnel; it’s too expensive, he says, and the product of a dishonest decision-making process that started with Larry O’Brien’s duplicity in canceling the previous plan for a much cheaper LRT – the O-Train. On weeks when other issues are on the back burner, it’s usually a fair bet that Gray will return to the tunnel theme in his blogging. And of course, as is the case when any critique becomes serialized, we can call it “predictable” if we disagree or “reliable” if we see it Ken’s way.
But for the tunnel champions at City Hall to succeed in winning the battle for public opinion, it seem likely that sooner or later they’re going to have meet objections like Gray’s head-on, instead of stalling behind narrow and petty actions like stalling his FOI request for full disclosure of the independent consultant’s bore sampling report – the report that should shed light on whether the bedrock under Ottawa’s downtown is suitable for boring a subway tunnel through.
In contrast to Gray’s point of view, Eric Darwin, the community activist behind the West Side Action blog, has made no secret of his support for the LRT tunnel. Eric is an inveterate walker though, never happier than when he is exploring the urban landscape on foot, and he has his own way of finding out what’s below the streets of downtown Ottawa. “Just ask”, he says. The answer so far, from the bore-sampling crews he meets on his travels? “Pure limestone” — ideal for boring a tunnel through. He also has a pictures of the bore sample drill in action under Nanny Goat Hill on his recent blog update.
photo by Luis Argerich