Thread by @AndersonBooz

1/ What they don't talk about when they start praising the #yeg #RogersPlace project is this: how it stalled projects in east downtown and contributed to the crises we have now. How the smart development plans were suddenly too expensive because landowners saw their chance to

2/ manifest a gold mine from their gravel surface parking lots. How all the air got sucked out of The Quarters and the Boyle Renaissance and how that benefited some folks, but not the locals so much. How university students saw parking rate hours extended and spaces reduced,

3/ adding more expenses to their education. But we don't talk about the thousands of people who pay extra over and over for an arena they can rarely afford to attend.
Or the community garden that was plowed over with a promise of replacement - but once the arena was announced,

4/ the replacement couldn't be had with the $350k budget. Land went up practically overnight. So the city reneged on their promise. But hey, who needs to grow food? Who cares that the garden had been running for 31 years? Just another impact people didn't see.

All that mess east

5/ of City Hall? There had been plans. But the City wanted to please the millionaires, so tough luck, eh? Oh, and they didn't even tell the gardeners the deal was off.

The fortress wall on the north side, giving the cold shoulder to the residents who don't live in condo

6/ skyscrapers. "We brought a casino" - well, you tore down a casino and built a less interesting one. And on the times I've been there, I observed it as the least safe casino in the city.

And so we'll use police to clear away the people who live in the area lest their

7/ presence offend the suburban fans who, by the end of the night, are a lot like the noisier version of the folks who've been shunted into those blocks north and east.

I hope Calgary is ready for the derailment of any plans they had for a sensible, sustainable downtown.

8/ because that's the tradeoff.

Am I anti-hockey? Dunno. Spent a fair amount of time with Pocklington in 1987. We got along really well. Met through a bottle of Kristall. He sang. Later asked if I wanted a job working for him in NYC.

I don't like how the arena affected the

9/ projects the city and various agencies had been working on for years. Some canceled, some delayed for years.

I have to pass the arena on my way to work.

I did in Toronto, too, going past Maple Leaf Gardens. The post-game belligerent drunks stumbling into the neighbourhood.

10/ But it was likely good for the 24-hr pancake house across the street. Strong coffee around the clock.
But I never went inside the Gardens. I avoided the area, although I once rescued a bellowing self-destructive drunk in one of the parks as I was walking past.
Arenas. So good

11/ Rescued = got a cab and took the raging drunk to the address in his wallet. Got him inside and safely tucked in bed. Turned out the lights and went home, hoping he would wake up without the desire for oblivion, without wanting to taunt strangers into hurting him.