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From: mart@utai.UUCP (Mart Molle)
Newsgroups: can.politics
Subject: Re: Eastern Myopia and the Crow Rate
Message-ID: <311@utai.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 7-Dec-84 10:51:11 EST
Article-I.D.: utai.311
Posted: Fri Dec  7 10:51:11 1984
Date-Received: Fri, 7-Dec-84 11:42:03 EST
References: <653@watcgl.UUCP>, <218@looking.UUCP> <106@winston.UUCP>
Organization: CSRI, University of Toronto
Lines: 17

> A: I am one inhabitant of the West who strongly believes the
>    Crow Rate had to go, however...
> 
> B: one must recall that large parts of Western Canada were given 
>    to the (Eastern) railways in return for the Crow Rate.
> 
>    Do you know how much of downtown Vancouver (for example) is
>    owned by CP and CN?  Put it this way, when the government
>    needed land for a) the rapid transit system, and b) expo 86
>    they dealt with Marathon Realty (the property arm of CP Rail)!

Large parts of downtown *Toronto* are owned by the railways too.
This problem is not unique to the west.  Right now Marathon Realty
is in the midst of a long fight to essentially double the size of
the downtown financial district (i.e., the infamous ``Bay Street''
where all the corporate headquarters are located) by ripping out
the freight and maintenance yards adjacent to Union station.