[URBAN NOTE] "Why Toronto Should Further Explore a Bid for Expo 2025"

[rfmcdonald]

Torontoist hosts a guest opinion by former mayor David Crombie that, frankly, leaves me unconvinced.

The Waterfront/Port Lands site, unique among proposed World Expo sites, would be reborn, transformed by the catalyst of the Expo project, with hard and fast deadlines for needed infrastructure, housing, transit, and flood protection. We can agree that these things must be accomplished before any major re-development can occur in this area regardless of what or how we build.

Note that flood proofing alone is critical to the mayor’s SmartTrack initiative and for the premier’s Regional Express Rail station; it is needed for the future Port Lands re-development that Council wants implemented and that it unanimously supported in 2012.

The benefits of an Expo 2025 Canada go well beyond infrastructure and development.

A few years ago, former provincial Finance Minister Greg Sorbara completed a comprehensive report on tourism in the province titled “Discovering Ontario: A report on the future of tourism,” calling for a doubling of the tourism revenues by the early 2020s.

[. . .]

We also do not have to re-invent the wheel: much prior work has already been done for our Expo 2015 bid, including studies, financial analyses, budgeting, revenue projections, attendance, site issues, community consultation, organizational framework, and budgeting. The economic studies showed clearly that an Expo 2025 would be a key economic driver. Expo 2025 is winnable. There is no single leading contender. There has been no Expo in North America since Expo ’86 in Vancouver, and the Bureau International des Expositions would like to return to North America.