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You are forgiven for wanting to forget about Larry O’Brien’s term as mayor, which was, even by his own admission, something of a circus.
Dysfunctional council meetings dragged on and on for hours. Tax increases regularly came in at way more than the promised zero percent.
No one in their right mind would pine for those days. And yet, it’s clear a gaping hole has been punctured in our current municipal election.
We need more Larry.
On the surface, you couldn’t find two more diametrically opposed politicians than O’Brien and the man who is all but assured a second term during this October’s election, Jim Watson.
O’Brien’s first job in politics thrust him into the mayor’s chair of one of the largest cities in Canada. Watson, when he was elected in 2010, had spent a lifetime plugging away as a city councillor, member of provincial Parliament and even mayor of the old City of Ottawa.
But underneath the surface differences lurk some more fundamental similarities that have actually produced a remarkably productive combination for Ottawa residents.
O’Brien and Watson are, in many ways, the Lennon and McCartney of Ottawa politics: they may not always get along but when they come together, they can carry the city on their shoulders.
It’s easy to forget, when you look around Ottawa today, just how many of the current projects in this city stem from O’Brien’s term as mayor.
Take the currently under-construction light-rail transit system that was O’Brien’s brainchild. He scrapped an ill-advised plan and replaced it with the 12.5-kilometre spine that will serve as the basis for most every other transit project in this city for the next century.
What did Watson do? He cleaned it up and redesigned it, bringing the project in on budget. O’Brien’s plan for a station close to Confederation Square promised to be too expensive. Watson, with the coldness a forensic auditor could only dream of, ignored public clamouring about losing a centrally-located landmark and cut it out. Now he’s proposing adding to the initial spine of the light-rail by building in every direction of the city over the next few decades.
Lansdowne Park is another example. Watson has been such a big fan of Ottawa’s new CFL team, it’s easy to forget that during the last campaign he actually chastised O’Brien over the redevelopment, reluctantly promising to go through with it only because it was already in the works. Go back even further and you’ll find that Watson actually wanted to tear down the stadium during his first term as mayor.
Watson is correct that the situation at Lansdowne is far from perfect. It was only because of O’Brien’s willingness to kickstart the process, however, that Watson is now able to lead the parade as the RedBlacks’ number one fan.
Go down the list of signature accomplishments that people identify with Watson. Most of them started with O’Brien.
But it’s not just that O’Brien spurred many of the ideas that Watson has spent the past four years championing. The competition between the two also strengthened the debate in this city.
Four years ago, the mayoral race presented Ottawans with a clear set of choices. We looked the two candidates up and down before firmly pointing in Watson’s direction. This time? We might as well be collectively shrugging our shoulders as, given the dearth of other qualified candidates, we place the chain of office around Watson’s neck.
Watson has benefited greatly from the situation O’Brien left at city hall. But whether he can be as effective without the same well of ideas from which to draw is still an open question.
The current mayor’s plans for bike lanes and murals underneath highway overpasses are great. Will it be enough to keep Ottawans excited for another four years? Or will they, like so many of the other small ideas that dominate this city’s politics, slip away across the universe?
Mark Brownlee is a writer based in Ottawa who covered the 2010 municipal election for a journalism research project at Carleton University.
查看原文...
Dysfunctional council meetings dragged on and on for hours. Tax increases regularly came in at way more than the promised zero percent.
No one in their right mind would pine for those days. And yet, it’s clear a gaping hole has been punctured in our current municipal election.
We need more Larry.
On the surface, you couldn’t find two more diametrically opposed politicians than O’Brien and the man who is all but assured a second term during this October’s election, Jim Watson.
O’Brien’s first job in politics thrust him into the mayor’s chair of one of the largest cities in Canada. Watson, when he was elected in 2010, had spent a lifetime plugging away as a city councillor, member of provincial Parliament and even mayor of the old City of Ottawa.
But underneath the surface differences lurk some more fundamental similarities that have actually produced a remarkably productive combination for Ottawa residents.
O’Brien and Watson are, in many ways, the Lennon and McCartney of Ottawa politics: they may not always get along but when they come together, they can carry the city on their shoulders.
It’s easy to forget, when you look around Ottawa today, just how many of the current projects in this city stem from O’Brien’s term as mayor.
Take the currently under-construction light-rail transit system that was O’Brien’s brainchild. He scrapped an ill-advised plan and replaced it with the 12.5-kilometre spine that will serve as the basis for most every other transit project in this city for the next century.
What did Watson do? He cleaned it up and redesigned it, bringing the project in on budget. O’Brien’s plan for a station close to Confederation Square promised to be too expensive. Watson, with the coldness a forensic auditor could only dream of, ignored public clamouring about losing a centrally-located landmark and cut it out. Now he’s proposing adding to the initial spine of the light-rail by building in every direction of the city over the next few decades.
Lansdowne Park is another example. Watson has been such a big fan of Ottawa’s new CFL team, it’s easy to forget that during the last campaign he actually chastised O’Brien over the redevelopment, reluctantly promising to go through with it only because it was already in the works. Go back even further and you’ll find that Watson actually wanted to tear down the stadium during his first term as mayor.
Watson is correct that the situation at Lansdowne is far from perfect. It was only because of O’Brien’s willingness to kickstart the process, however, that Watson is now able to lead the parade as the RedBlacks’ number one fan.
Go down the list of signature accomplishments that people identify with Watson. Most of them started with O’Brien.
But it’s not just that O’Brien spurred many of the ideas that Watson has spent the past four years championing. The competition between the two also strengthened the debate in this city.
Four years ago, the mayoral race presented Ottawans with a clear set of choices. We looked the two candidates up and down before firmly pointing in Watson’s direction. This time? We might as well be collectively shrugging our shoulders as, given the dearth of other qualified candidates, we place the chain of office around Watson’s neck.
Watson has benefited greatly from the situation O’Brien left at city hall. But whether he can be as effective without the same well of ideas from which to draw is still an open question.
The current mayor’s plans for bike lanes and murals underneath highway overpasses are great. Will it be enough to keep Ottawans excited for another four years? Or will they, like so many of the other small ideas that dominate this city’s politics, slip away across the universe?
Mark Brownlee is a writer based in Ottawa who covered the 2010 municipal election for a journalism research project at Carleton University.
查看原文...
