Hard Rock wants rail spur to new casino, files request for more games
Jon Willing, Ottawa Citizen
Published on: February 15, 2018 | Last Updated: February 15, 2018 4:33 PM EST
The new Hard Rock entertainment facility at the Rideau Carleton Raceway should get a rail spur from the O-Train Trillium Line, according to one partner in the joint venture.
Andrew Wright, director of the raceway, said if the city is building a spur from the Trillium Line to the Ottawa International Airport, now is the time to consider another offshoot to the casino facility.
However, Gloucester-Southgate Coun. Diane Deans said she looked into the idea of a spur with city staff but was told it’s not feasible.
Wright said the casino could easily run shuttle buses to the planned Trillium Line stop at Earl Armstrong Road but his ideal scenario is bringing trains right to the property.
“If we’re putting our city planning hats on, with the amount of property that we have and all of a sudden that could be a commuter site into downtown and it would be a big parking lot,” Wright said in an interview Thursday, after Hard Rock and the raceway announced it has filed a development application at city hall for the next two expansion phases.
The development application calls for land-use amendments to allow another 20 gaming tables (for a total of 55 tables), a nine-storey 200-room hotel and a 2,500-seat concert theatre. The required zoning changes will need city council’s approval.
Also included in the documents, but not part of the re-zoning requirement, is a plan to add 750 slot machines to the existing 1,250 machines. The number of slots is determined by the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corp.
A transportation analysis filed with the application says the expanded entertainment facility would have “minimal traffic impact” and that any problems with road capacity will be worked out with future intersection and road widening improvements. Traffic through Blossom Park will be relieved when an eastern extension for Earl Armstrong Road is built to Bank Street, the analysis says.
There is currently no OC Transpo bus service to the casino property.
The city would benefit from a rail spur to the site because it would encourage development and bring in property tax money, Wright said.
However, there haven’t been serious discussions with the city on such an idea.
“If they’re going to the airport anyway with this O-Train, then that’s the time to consider doing projects like what we’re talking about,” Wright said.
There has been talk in the past about creating a second, lengthy road entrance off Bank Street, reducing the strain on Albion Road.
“It’s not in the cards now. It may become so, to be perfectly honest,” Wright said.
“It’s a long road and it would be expensive to build. It’s been suggested. Nothing has been committed to, obviously, and the city hasn’t requested it as far as I know.”
Counillor Deans, whose ward is north of the site, sees warning flags in the transportation plan for the casino expansion.
Deans noted that the Earl Armstrong Road extension cited in the transportation analysis isn’t even planned until after 2031.
There’s “road rage at peak hours,” Deans said, and she fears a large entertainment facility will make things worse.
“I think you’re just layering on the problem,” Deans said.
The Hard Rock and raceway partnership says it will invest more than $318 million over six years on the expansion.
The province announced Hard Rock as the new operator for the Ottawa casino in May 2017. Hard Rock, which is the majority owner in the partnership with the raceway, assumed operations last fall. Horse racing will remain as part of the expanded facility.
The second phase starting in 2019 would include the addition of gaming tables, slot machines, restaurants and the concert theatre. The third phase starting in 2023 would include the hotel and parking garage.
In a written statement lauding the proposed development, Osgoode Coun. George Darouze, whose ward includes the site, said his community “cannot wait” for the expansion.
The city’s committee of adjustment approved 14 additional table games for the facility last November, a process that raised eyebrows at city hall since the application didn’t go through the political gauntlet. The committee of adjustment agreed it was a minor change to the current land regulations not requiring council’s endorsement.
Since then, the “Rocksino” partnership, as it’s become known, has hired Ottawa-based public relations experts to help usher the new development application through the planning process.
“In hindsight, we could have done things better,” Wright said of the last table game application. “Our goal is to be completely transparent. What we’re doing, I believe the community wants and will support. If we build something stupid, it won’t get supported and we’ll go bankrupt, so that’s not an ideal business model. We’re going take every precaution, which means transparency, to make sure what we’re building is what the community wants.”
The company is finalizing a time and location for a public consultation on March 7.
Deans said she wants a comprehensive consultation that also takes into account the public health impacts that come with gambling addictions.
“I don’t want it to be the Salvation Army,” Deans said, referring to the controversial planning file in Vanier. “It can’t be a failure of process. It’s too important.”
jwilling@postmedia.com
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