We as a moderator group elected to move forward with a combined forum as many, if not most, announcements and related issues apply to the merged organization. We have elected to keep the legacy forums active as there are certain threads and topics that may be important in the short term but not a candidate for the combined forum. This will help us maintain a "clean" forum as much as possible, which is an incredibly difficult task given the number of posts under management.
Does this mean that some may not agree with our decision? Of course, but I can say that there was a considerable amount of discussion about timing and we as a group firmly believe that it is best to present a combined forum sooner rather than later.