Downtown Sudbury mayoral debate chock full of ideas

During a Sudbury's mayoral debate Thursday night, candidates threw around a lot of concepts on how to improve the city's downtown — but there was little mention of how to make them happen.

Sudbury has mused over how to revitalize the downtown for so long that the citizens have become armchair urban planners. And that's no different for the 10 mayoral candidates, who shared their ideas at the debate held downtown.

Here’s a sampling:

"[Close] streets on weekends to vehicular traffic," said Ron Dupuis.

"Really look at the parking meter issues and get rid of probably a lot of them,” said Jeanne Brohart.

"We need a parking garage and we need one desperately,” said Jeff Huska.

"We need a new art gallery," said John Rodriguez.

"Maybe we need to put a ferris wheel in," said Richard Majkot.

Almost all of the people running to be mayor of Sudbury think the city needs a new arena, but many don't think it has to be downtown.

The candidates were asked directly if they support replacing the 63-year-old Sudbury Arena, and if the new rink should be in the core.

"Yes and I'm pretty sure yes," Huska said.

"Yes and no," Dupuis said.

"Yes and not neccessarily so," Rodriguez said.

"Yes and maybe," Brian Bigger said.

Dan Melanson said he thinks moving the city's main arena out of the downtown would open up new opportunities for the area.

"If we're going to end up with a new arena someplace, I think it should be outside the downtown,” he said.

“Take the old arena and redevleop it into something that's going to be an attraction for downtown."

City staff are currently preparing a report on options for renovating Sudbury Arena, before they look further into how to build a new one.

Many also pointed to the recently completed downtown master plan as a blueprint for going forward when it comes to revitalizing the downtown core.

But as Dupuis pointed out, the real job for the next mayor — when it comes to the downtown — is convincing council to invest in one of those great ideas.

"We have all kinds of plans, but when it comes time to put the money, there's always hesitancy."

Early in the new term, city council will vote on the proposed Elgin Street Greenway, which is expected to come with a multimillion-dollar price tag.

Which one of the 10 candidates will be sitting in the mayor's seat when that decision is made will be decided by the voters in 11 days.