Toronto Union Park | 303.26m | 58s | Oxford Properties | Pelli Clarke Pelli

Passing up on it just means we'll get a better proposal that will likely retain most of the benefits and bring few of the complications.

Do you have no faith in the market? Do you know how valuable those lands are and why?

And yeah, let's apply Monaco solutions to Toronto... way to go... we should stop collecting taxes too.

Your whole analysis is superficial and dismissive of everyone who has actually put some effort analysing the situation. My post was just meant to show how easy it is to use that same style to argue in favour or against anything.

P.S. it's not the socially responsible thing to do, it's the politically responsible thing to do to make the most out of our city assets.
 
I get the sense, from Richard Florida, at least, that casinos are to be opposed because they are for cities that have run out of other options; that only second-rate cities like Detroit and Windsor consider putting casinos in their downtown and cities that we aspire to be, like New York and Vancouver, would abhor such a thing. This is cited as an actual reason for opposing casinos! Casinos aren't 'parochial'. You want parochial? Arguing that we shouldn't build casinos because "world class" cities that we aspire to be haven't built casinos, either. That's parochial!
 
Hipster,

In fact, I can buy Florida's argument more than I can buy the socially responsible argument. As for NYC, however, gambling was actually outright illegal in New York State, no? It simply wasn't an option.

... and Chicago is having a casino debate too right now, is it not? Then again, maybe Chicago's desperate?

Regardless, the Oxford Plan is more than just a casino. It offers up so much more in terms of development that to compare it to a Windsor or a Detroit-type scenario seems to be overlooking the bigger picture.
 
RC8 said:
Passing up on it just means we'll get a better proposal that will likely retain most of the benefits and bring few of the complications.
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A bird in hand?

RC8 said:
Do you have no faith in the market? Do you know how valuable those lands are and why?
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I do indeed, the Oxford Plan pretty much sums that up!


RC8 said:
P.S. it's not the socially responsible thing to do, it's the politically responsible thing to do to make the most out of our city assets.
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Yes, the Oxford Plan is so underwhelming I can see where this would be squandering assets? On the contrary, it is politically irresponsible to not support this proposal!
 
Not when you need to somehow internalise all the externalities of a mega casino. Anyone who really thinks a significant amount of the revenue will come from wealthy foreigners rather than from locals is tremendously gullible.
 
RC8 said:
Not when you need to somehow internalise all the externalities of a mega casino. Anyone who really thinks a significant amount of the revenue will come from wealthy foreigners rather than from locals is tremendously gullible.
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Might as well keep the money that locals are going to be gambling away within Toronto. People will gamble, regardless of whether there's a casino here or not. They'll just gamble elsewhere.

I mean, using the same logic, we could argue that at least having a casino in Toronto internalizes the social ills of gambling to the place where most gamblers originate from, rather than have those problems spill out into already economically-depressed communities (Windsor) or vulnerable Aboriginal communities (Rama).
 
RC8 said:
Passing up on it just means we'll get a better proposal that will likely retain most of the benefits and bring few of the complications.
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Not sure if you're being sarcastic, but that made me laugh. This is probably the single biggest proposal in the city's history, and we certainly won't get the opportunity to entertain such a massive proposal anytime soon. I'd maybe give some credibility to your argument if covering the train tracks or building beautiful supertalls (I don't care about the height - I'm using the term to denote how significant these buildings will be) designed by world class architects was commonplace in Toronto, but that combinations has not even occurred once in the city's entire history. The only reason it's being proposed now is because of the attached caveat for developers. To think that we'll get a similarly impressive proposal sans the negatives (caveats for the developer) if we turn this one down is incredibly naive.

Anyways, this isn't an argument of pro vs anti casino in the Toronto area, since you have to add the rest of the GTA into the picture. We're getting a casino. That's not up for debate. What is up for debate is whether the benefits of such a facility should be kept in our city or outsourced to Vaughn. It's not a hard decision. These benefits are immense, and to turn them down would be incredibly foolish.
 
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alklay said:
The 250 faith leaders who came out against the casino were spurious and filled with lies and half-truths? And how exactly does a casino, which pulls in most of its income from those with low income and gambling problems, "maximize that revitalization"?
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Yes, the 250 religious leaders arguments are spurious....their basic point is that creating a casino in the downtown core would somehow corrupt the good citizens of Toronto - and that somehow the populace of our fair city exist in a state of innocence...this conveniently ignores the fact that we are inundated with gambling everywhere....Niagara Falls and Rama are a one hour drive away, and if you don't have a car, there are buses leaving every half an hour....there are 1000's of slots at Woodbine, and you can also bet on the ponies there - and also play off-track betting on other races. There are corner stores and gas stations selling lottery tickets on every street corner...and if you are really desperate, you can always blow your brains out playing online poker...

So to suggest, as they and others have, that by locating a casino downtown will somehow open the floodgates of vice and misery to the people or Toronto, is spurious, and is not even a half truth...people who want to gamble already have multiple options available to them right now...there is no "virginal" population waiting to be enticed by this new vice....the vice is already here, under full government sponsorship...

It's insulting that these "faith" leaders are so disingenuous and patronizing to suggest that the people of Toronto are 1.) sheltered from gambling unless a new casino opens downtown, and 2.) are too irresponsible to control themselves.

.....and what I meant by "maximizing" the revitalization has strictly to do with the redevelopment of the convention centre lands, with no moral judgement attached...
 
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I've been avoiding this thread because a close friend of mine is involved and I don't want to accidentally disclose anything confidential. What I can do is gather a lot of what is publicly available and summarize it for the benefit of this thread: the MTCC has to be revitalized for competitive reasons. The Front Street side is a massive loss of potential commercial revenue. It has to be redeveloped. The towers at Front/Simcoe alone finance this part of the proposal. The casino itself serves to finance the rest of the project. Take what you will from that.
 
So would the rail decking between simcoe and John be part of the non casino development? I fully expect that the portion west of John street to be cut if the casino doesn't get approved, but I am interested in what we will get instead on the eastern portion of the site.
 
Hipster Duck said:
Might as well keep the money that locals are going to be gambling away within Toronto. People will gamble, regardless of whether there's a casino here or not. They'll just gamble elsewhere.

I mean, using the same logic, we could argue that at least having a casino in Toronto internalizes the social ills of gambling to the place where most gamblers originate from, rather than have those problems spill out into already economically-depressed communities (Windsor) or vulnerable Aboriginal communities (Rama).
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I would entertain this argument if the casino was to be operated fully by a municipal-provincial partnership and its operations regulated by a board composed of planners, doctors, policemen, etc.

Even then, it assumes that the demographic the casino would be targeting is currently gambling - which is not the case. Affluent young urban professionals gamble significantly less than the OLG would like, and it's obvious they want this casino to change that.

What we would be getting instead would be an avenue for the province and a miscellaneous american corporation to extract funds out of the city's most vulnerable. Since the vast majority of large casinos owe most of their revenue to problem gamblers, it's safe to expect a similar outcome in Toronto. Meanwhile, local businesses would have to compete with heavily subsidised bars and restaurants in order to survive.

dtTO,

Yet 2 blocks North of this site Frank Gehry is proposing to build 3 enormous towers, etc.

If the OLG want a casino in Vaughan, they shouldn't have a problem settling for Woodbine.
 
RC8 said:
Even then, it assumes that the demographic the casino would be targeting is currently gambling - which is not the case. Affluent young urban professionals gamble significantly less than the OLG would like, and it's obvious they want this casino to change that.

What we would be getting instead would be an avenue for the province and a miscellaneous american corporation to extract funds out of the city's most vulnerable.
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That's not obvious at all. Where's your evidence that affluent young urban professionals are the target market for this casino? And even if they were, how is this group the most vulnerable? Yuppies are considered to be at the absolute top of the socioeconomic pyramid, being well-educated, affluent, young (thus healthy) and with no dependents.
 
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