[Beedok]

For a long while it simply wasn't economical to build much in downtown Hamilton. It reminds me of those people saying that Hamilton should have been doing modern new urbanism in the 70s. If they'd done that they would have failed. Almost no one wanted to set up shop in brownfields or whatnot. If Vranich had tried to build all these hotels and condos in Hamilton 10 years ago they'd have probably failed and put the city of the whole concept for years. By waiting until the market was showing signs of existing he's instead helped to spearhead confidence and development. I'm not saying he's perfect, but in reality "build it and they will come" only works for a few specific things (otherwise White Elephants wouldn't exist). So he isn't really evil for waiting until there was a market for downtown hotels and condos. Well no more evil than any other developper.