Electrical inventor Nikola Tesla is poised to gift the lower city with the expressway it never actually built. Well, sort of.

Fans of the father of alternating current will ask councillors Oct. 6 to rename the elevated east end of Burlington Street the "Nikola Tesla Expressway."

No, the speed limit won't change, nor will the raised bypass be extended west to Highway 403, as industry boosters planned decades ago.

The name change is meant to highlight a local link to the world-famous inventor.

If you don't see it, Vic Djurdjevic will illuminate you.

"Nikola Tesla is basically the reason we became known as the Electric City," said the president of the new charity named for the famously eccentric inventor. "He helped spark our industrial coming of age."

The argument, in short, is that Tesla's 1888 invention of a practical system to generate and transmit alternating current sparked the long-distance transmission of electrical power a decade later to Hamilton, a first for a large Canadian city.

That's a big reason Djurdjevic's group, the Nikola Tesla Educational Corporation, chose Burlington Street East.

"It's an expressway right into the industrial heart of the city," said the retired tax manager, who also points enthusiastically to transmission towers on the corridor. "Each one is like a monument to Tesla."

He emphasized only the four-kilometre, mostly raised portion of the street would be renamed — from the QEW to close to Ottawa Street.

"You're not losing the Burlington Street name."

Even still, renaming a street that exits off the QEW won't be cheap. Djurdjevic said he's been told as many as seven large provincial highway signs must be replaced, at a cost of more than $100,000. That includes the price of highway closures.

Swapping local signage will costs tens of thousands more. But every penny, he said, will be raised by the Tesla charity.

"We have pledged to do this. This isn't about asking the city for help. This is about us helping the city," said Djurdjevic, who expects donations from his 150-member group and some of the 673 people who have so far signed an online petition.

While the Serbian scientist has a growing international fan club — and an popular electric car company named after him — many local supporters are members of Hamilton's Serbian community. Another fan favourite in the Balkan nation, retired Canadian Major-Gen. Lewis MacKenzie, was convinced to sign the online petition last week.

"I say do it. Any recognition for (Tesla) is richly deserved and more people should realize that Canadian connection," said the well-known soldier, author and commentator Friday, adding he has also attended events in honour of the scientist in Niagara Falls, where there is a statue.

Cultural or ethnic affiliations are "irrelevant," said Djurdjevic, who is also hoping to erect a local statue of the scientist and create Tesla-related curriculum for local school boards. "Tesla is an inspiration for our children, for everyone around the world."

He has city staff convinced, based on a public notice this month announcing the name change as a recommendation to council.

Coun. Sam Merulla, whose ward includes the elevated portion of Burlington Street, said he doesn't oppose honouring Tesla — especially if the city is off the hook for costs.

But he's "a bit concerned" about giving an expressway label to a street that eventually peters off into local traffic in the west end. "I don't know if I want a visitor zooming off the highway and assuming they can take an expressway through the lower city — because you can't."

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Ironically, city planners once pushed to connect the QEW with Highway 403 through the lower city with a fast-moving "perimeter road." The elevated portion of Burlington Street was envisioned as the first leg of that never-built expressway.

The public and councillors can have their say at the Oct. 6 planning meeting.

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