Mayoral Race

Tuesday October 23, 2018

By Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Tuesday October 23, 2018

The Eisenberger train rolls on

Fred Eisenberger handily won the so-called “LRT referendum” election to become the city’s first repeat mayor since amalgamation.

But it is still unclear whether his signature project, a controversial $1-billion light rail transit line, will survive the election of a council that remains badly divided over LRT.

The veteran politician, 66, fought off a surprising challenge from Vito Sgro, a behind-the-scenes Liberal organizer who was not well known but ran a well-organized “Stop the Train” campaign hinging on the use of LRT cash for other infrastructure.

Eisenberger told jubilant supporters at his Upper James Street headquarters that there was a “fair number” of votes cast against LRT — “but we got more.”

“I see that as a mandate for us to move forward on LRT,” he said to a huge cheer from supporters squeezed into the room. 

The veteran politician, who has served two terms as mayor separated by a defeat, repeatedly rejected the notion that LRT was the defining campaign issue. But Monday night, he told The Spectator “for those who wanted to make it a referendum, well, I consider this a referendum.”

It’s possible the fraught debate helped push up voter turnout in 2018 to an unofficial 38 per cent — not fantastic, but an improvement from last election’s dismal showing of around 34 per cent.

The LRT is backed by an unprecedented coalition of politicians, businesses, developers, education and health institutions, unions and anti-poverty groups.

But that establishment support certainly did not translate into a unified council. (Source: Hamilton Spectator) 

Alternative Outcomes

As with most elections it’s never easy to fully prepare the perfect cartoon for the end result. Less complicated about the 2018 Mayoral election, compared with previous campaigns, was the fact that it was a two person race among a full slate of fringe candidates. Yesterday, I drew up three scenarios, all involving the proposed LRT. Full disclosure, two of the versions were revisions of cartoons drawn for the 2014 municipal vote which never went to print. The one which ran above, dubbed “happy Fred”, was the more celebratory version for Mayor Eisenberger – it was also the last cartoon I created, thinking it was the least likely cartoon to be used.  The version I put most effort into was “sad Fred”, showing him asleep at the levers as his train glided off a cliff.  If the numbers had been tighter between the Mayor and his main challenger Vito Sgro, I thought sad Fred would work best by reflecting his downplaying of LRT as a major issue in 2018. There was only one Sgro victory version, and as the first, and perhaps only depiction I ever draw of the man, it was the first cartoon I drew yesterday, showing him above the neck, and full-faced. Yesterday morning as people began casting ballots, Vito Sgro was viewed as a very possible candidate to topple Eisenberger and take Hamilton on a future course without LRT. While the project is by no means a for sure thing for this city, with several anti-LRT councillors returning or elected, it’ll take a Mayor with a mandate to champion it among council and the Doug Ford government. It has been more than 10 years since the offer of $1 billion was presented to Hamilton to upgrade its transit system, I think it’s time to get it moving once and for all.

…It has been a loooong conversation on making LRT and enhanced GO Transit a Billion dollar reality in this city.  Here’s a gallery of transit cartoons from the past 10 years or so…

October 23, 2018
August 14, 2018
February 3, 2015
October 25, 2013
September 25, 2008

Not to mention these from 2010 and before:

              

 

Tuesday October 28, 2014

By Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Tuesday October 28, 2014

Tuesday October 28, 2014

Fred Eisenberger elected mayor of Hamilton

The Spectator declared him the winner over mayoralty front-runners Brad Clark and Brian McHattie about an hour after the polls closed Monday.

Voting results posted on the City of Hamilton website showed Eisenberger with 41.54 per cent to Clark’s 30.21 per cent and McHattie with 19.76.

Hamilton Mayoral RaceSince Hamilton was amalgamated in 2001, the city has only experienced one-term mayors – Bob Wade, Larry Di Ianni, Eisenberger and Bob Bratina, who leaves office in January when the new mayor takes over.

This is Eisenberger’s fourth try at mayor: He won in 2006 but lost in 2000 and 2010.

A total of 366,000 Hamiltonians were eligible to vote but total voter turnout was not yet available about an hour after the polls closed. (Source: Hamilton Spectator)

TWO WINNING CARTOONS DEFEATED

Tuesday October 28, 2014Tuesday October 28, 2014

Saturday, October 25, 2014

Saturday, October 25, 2014Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Saturday, October 25, 2014

Rising to the challenge: Gondolas belong in Hamilton

(Written by Joseph Sneep) Gondolas, a form of cable-propelled transit perhaps more usually associated with ski resorts, are not a practical addition to every city’s public transportation arsenal. In Hamilton, however, they are an ideal solution to that particular obstacle to urban mobility with which our city has always had to contend: the escarpment.

Last August, at a forum hosted at the Art Gallery of Hamilton called People First City Building: Focus on Sustainable Mobility, this idea received plenty of attention, and with good reason. Since then, interest seems to have waned.

However, with the beginning of the mayoral race in January, public transit will once again become a hot topic in municipal election debates, so I now want to present the case for gondolas as a valuable component worth integrating into any proposed future developments in Hamilton’s transit infrastructure. Whether our considerations be economic, environmental or even cultural, gondolas belong in Hamilton.

Michael McDaniel from Frog (an international innovation and design firm), the man behind a proposal for installing a system of gondolas in Austin, Texas, has calculated construction costs of gondola lines to be around $3 million to $12 million US per mile; this versus $36 million for light rail lines, and $400 million for subways

Considering Hamilton’s escarpment is about 100 metres tall at the three proposed light rail lines going up the escarpment (i.e., the A, S, and T lines of Hamilton’s LRT plan), the math reveals an estimated savings of at least $4.9 million. That alone should get everyone in the city thinking more seriously about cable propelled transit.

A gondola line travels at about 16 km/h, and can move between 6,000 and 8,000 people per hour per direction. According to projected 2031 ridership numbers from Hamilton’s LRT plan, this is more than enough capacity for lots of growth, which means gondola lines will not require any major expensive overhauls to accommodate future increase in usage: they would be a one-time cost.

And, unlike buses and trains, gondolas do not require an operator for every vehicle in service: the city would basically only have to pay one operator per gondola line running. Considering how many people a gondola line can move in a day, that’s great bang for our buck.

Hamilton Mayoral RaceGondolas would also significantly reduce day-to-day maintenance costs of Hamilton’s public transit system. Trains and buses were originally designed for use in flat environments where most of their work would be horizontal transportation, and that’s where they remain most effective. So it’s easy to see how the presence of the escarpment implies costly increases in the upkeep of these conventional forms of transportation: hauling all those passengers up and down so many times every day means that engine and braking systems of any light rail train or conventional city bus will fatigue much faster than those of vehicles travelling in flatter cities.

(Continued: Hamilton Spectator)

Freelance writer Joseph Sneep is working on a collection of short stories inspired by his upbringing in Hamilton. He prides himself more on this urban apprenticeship than his recently acquired MA in philosophy.

Tuesday October 21, 2014

Tuesday October 21, 2014

Illustration by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Tuesday October 21, 2014

Election promises candidates should not make

Election candidates say the darndest things. For the most part, it’s all motherhood. But sometimes they overpromise. Sometimes they promise — or semi-promise — things that just aren’t going to happen. Here are some examples. We’re not saying they all do this, but we know some do.

“If elected, I will stop school closures.” Candidates who say this, or even hint at it, are either naive or misleading. The province holds the purse strings and the decision-making over all education policy, in particular around closures and matching funding. A more accurate way to say this is: “I oppose school closures, but sometimes they are inevitable. When that happens I will work with my colleagues and with city hall to ensure unused schools remain community hubs so neighbourhoods don’t suffer.”

Hamilton Mayoral RaceHere’s another one. “If elected, I will revisit amalgamation.” If a candidate says this to you, here’s a suggested response: “No, you won’t.” Only the province could revisit amalgamation, and it has no interest. That egg cannot be unscrambled. The Harris Conservatives forced amalgamation on Hamilton and its suburbs. A more honest pledge is: “If elected, I will work tirelessly to ensure my constituents and all citizens get a fair shake in the City of Hamilton.” Outgoing Mayor Bob Bratina got a fair bit of traction with his pledge to revisit amalgamation. Don’t get taken in again.

Here’s a classic. “If elected, I will work to put term limits in place.” If a candidate says this, it’s either untrue or it suggests the candidate is unwise, because any work invested in this project is a waste of time. Term limits would require provincial legislation to be changed, and there is no indication this or any provincial government is interested. Why? In part, because there’s a good chance that legislated term limits would not survive a constitutional or legal challenge. And in part, because if a provincial government indicated it supported term limits, it wouldn’t take very long for people to suggest they be applied provincially.

Municipal survey

Municipal survey

If you’re a person who believes that term limits are a good thing, the best thing you can do is ask your candidate if he or she will agree to voluntarily limit their time in office. If someone makes that commitment, take it for what it’s worth.

This one is less black and white. “If elected, I will make sure tax increases are never more than the rate of inflation.” This one isn’t untrue, necessarily. All three leading mayoral candidates say they will aim for tax hikes 2 per cent or lower. But that’s only half the story, because inflationary increases don’t get at the infrastructure deficit. And city departments are getting less than 1 per cent funding increases, which is less than inflation. Economic development wins will make a dent in this, but the bottom line is that in the medium and long term, tax hikes that low are not sustainable. (Source: Hamilton Spectator)