Toronto’s transit woes continue.
On Wednesday, city council voted to once again pare down another key project. SmartTrack, the transit proposal John Tory rode to victory in his 2014 mayoral campaign, is shrinking from five stations to three because of costs — and Liberty Village and Scarborough residents are on the losing end.
Tory’s original pitch for a new GTA-wide transit network included 13 new stations and 22 stops, spanning 53 kilometres. It’s been slashed several times over the past decade.
In November, Ontario Transportation Minister Prabmeet Sarkaria warned the city that costs had ballooned past the $1.7-billion budget and tough choices needed to be made. City staff then met with the province and drafted a report recommending keeping only three stations at East Harbour, Bloor-Lansdowne and St. Clair-Old Weston.
At Wednesday’s vote, council chose to go along with the staff recommendation to cut two stations from the plan. Finch-Kennedy and King-Liberty are now on the chopping block, unless the province steps in to fully fund them.
But that won’t be happening, according to Sarkaria.
“Ultimately, this is a City of Toronto project,” Sarkaria’s spokesperson said in a statement to TorontoToday, adding that the government is “pleased” the city is moving forward on the remaining three stations.
Coun. Josh Matlow, a frequent Tory critic during the latter’s tenure at city hall, lamented what the project has become.
“SmartTrack has proven itself to be nothing more than an expensive branding exercise for John Tory's 2014 mayoral campaign, that has cost Toronto taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars and has resulted in little to no transit,” he said on Wednesday.
Emotions ran high during the debate.
Coun. Mike Colle put forward a motion to scrap the plan entirely, drawing some strong rebukes from fellow councillors.
“The time for appeasement is over. Appeasement doesn't work with Metrolinx," he said.
Colle eventually withdrew the motion and agreed to support one from Coun. Jennifer McKelvie, calling on the province to increase its share of the funding from $226 million, to match the city’s portion of $878 million.
McKelvie’s motion also called on the province to release an explanation of the rising cost of the project, and to do an audit of Metrolinx’s cost estimates for the stations.
Coun. Gord Perks, another frequent Tory critic, introduced a motion to change the five station names to Tory’s Folly, Boondoogle Station, Too Good To Be True, Won’t Get Fooled Again and Ever Get The Feeling You’ve Been Cheated.
Speaker Frances Nuntizata ruled it out of order, but not before Coun. James Pasternak chided Perks for bringing city council into “disrepute.”
Staff recommended keeping East Harbour, because the station is “critical to the transit network,” as well as keeping Bloor-Lansdowne, because construction has already started — and cancelling would incur a financial penalty.
But had the vote gone differently, the Finch-Kennedy station could have been funded, instead of St. Clair-Old Weston.
In the report, staff said the city could swap St. Clair-Old Weston for Finch-Kennedy as the third station, but recommended against it because the west end area “has significant development, housing … and employment growth potential.”
Staff also said Finch-Kennedy and King-Liberty should be cut from the budget because they’ll “benefit the province through increased ridership on the GO system” — so if the Ford government wants those stations to go ahead, they should pay for them “at no cost to the city.”
Construction contracts for the other four stations, aside from Bloor-Lansdowne, are planned to go out early in 2025.
The three stations have a $1.7-billion budget, split between three levels of government. The city promised $878 million, while the federal and provincial governments chipped in $585 million and $225 million, respectively. The report has a confidential section showing a station-by-station cost breakdown but it was not released to the public.
