Dear Premier,

On Thursday, August 6, approximately 200 individuals gathered in the Red Hill Valley to celebrate the talents of local writers and musicians and to support a neighbourhood fighting to protect its park. By all accounts, the Red Hill Valley Literary Festival was a successful community event.

That same day, you were in Stoney Creek, where you told the media that your government is committed to constructing the Red Hill Creek Expressway. You stated, "We believe we have had a full environmental assessment and we believe it is in the public interest to proceed."

To be clear: the environmental assessment is not, in fact, over. An environmental assessment begins when a project is proposed and it does not end until well after a project has been completed and its impacts have been monitored and documented.

In 1929, the City of Hamilton purchased the Red Hill Valley, declaring the valley would be, "parkland that would be outstanding on this continent."

Three quarters of a century later, the Red Hill Valley is Hamilton's largest park. It is the only natural area in the city's east end, and the creek running through it is the last of fourteen streams that once flowed through the city into Lake Ontario.

In the last year, construction began on the Red Hill Creek Expressway - a 7.5 kilometre link that will join Highway 403 with the Queen Elizabeth Way. 40,000 trees must be cut down to make way for the expressway. According to Friends of the Red Hill Valley, the roads and associated interchanges will carve the Red Hill Valley into at least 30 separate pieces.