What to do about the National Capital Commission (NCC)?

[Dado]

Over in the Rapid Transit thread, Uhuniau put forward this post in response to the NCC's positions in respect of the LRT plans:

http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/show...postcount=3907

Originally Posted by Uhuniau

Come on and abolish the NC bloody C already.

So what do we think? Abolish it? Reform it? Leave it as is? Emasculate it down to little more than Parliament's property manager? Make the entire national capital region into its own quasi-province or territory and fold the NCC into that?


Any move to abolish it would have to consider what to do with the NCC's numerous assets, primarily lands. Some lands, such as Gatineau Park, could reasonably be passed over to Parks Canada. Conservation areas, like the Mer Bleue Conservation Area in the Greenbelt, could be handed over to the appropriate provincial conservation authority. Lands being used by other federal agencies would go to them or PWGSC, as the case may be. Leased properties like that which the airport sits on could be turned over to whomever is leasing it after some appropriate buy-out. Road corridors like Island Park Drive and the Ottawa River Parkway could be handed to the municipality. But after such lands have been dealt with, we're still left with a lot of land with no particularly obvious recipient, including most of the Greenbelt. I'm sure lots of residents would fear those lands going into municipal hands, and even more so into private hands.

We also have to consider the fact that right now, as annoying as the NCC is at times, they are at least just one federal agency. With a lot of land turned over to other federal agencies, coordination becomes a lot more problematic.

Another fly in the ointment is that any federal land is nominally subject to an Algonquin land claim, so the creation of an extensive urban reserve, with all the attendant issues that raises, couldn't be ruled out (technically that applies even with no change in the NCC, but the chance of that occurring is remote, whereas a change to the NCC would be quite a different matter).


Personally, I lean towards keeping the NCC and working towards the creation of a quasi-province in the NCR that would simply absorb the NCC. In the meantime, look into reforming it.