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NEWS
metronews.ca Wednesday, May 28, 2014
Breaking down John Tory’s SmartTrack transit plan Electrified rail. Line has many similarities to provincial Liberals’ transit proposals jessica smith cross
jessica.smithcross@metronews.ca
Toronto votes 2014
John Tory’s $8-billion “SmartTrack” line announced Tuesday has a lot in common with plans proposed by the provincial Liberals and the work of a citizen’s transportation advocacy group. Almost the entire length of the rail in Tory’s SmartTrack plan — stretching from St. Dennis to Union to Scarborough to Unionville on the map released by the campaign — is on the current Kitchener, Lakeshore and Stouffville GO lines. Tory’s plan calls for electrifying the rail lines to allow for a 15-minute or better frequency, which is what the Liberal gov-
ernment announced it was intending to do before it was defeated and forced to call a provincial election. Tim Hudak’s Progressive Conservatives oppose electrification. Asked if that would be a problem for his plan if a PC government is elected, Tory said his plan makes too much sense for them to oppose it. Electrifying the GO lines was studied by Metrolinx in 2010 and was in a report released last year by citizens’ group Transport Action Ontario. The Liberals then vowed to electrify the entire GO network. Transport Action Ontario’s plan was large in scope and would have electrified 450 kilometres of rail, reaching far out of the city into the 905. The detailed proposal called for the use of “surface subways” on electrified existing GO Transit regional routes, with the addition of new stops — just like Tory’s plan does now. “We’re just happy that at least one of the mayoral candidates — one of the major mayoral candidates — has come out in favour of supporting electrification of the
Quoted
“We’re just happy that at least one of the mayoral candidates — one of the major mayoral candidates — has come out in favour of supporting electrification of the GO line.” Transit Action Ontario spokesperson Bruce Budd
John Tory rides the escalator en route to making his big transit announcement before the Canadian Club of Toronto luncheon at the Convention Centre on Tuesday. David Cooper/Tor star news service
GO line,” said Transit Action Ontario spokesperson Bruce Budd. A spokesperson for Tory’s campaign said they consulted with a very wide range of groups and experts, including Transit Action Ontario, and welcomed their support. Tory’s SmartTrack plan “is really identical to parts of the Liberal plan and parts of our plan,” Budd said. The new part of Tory’s plan is the addition of the a rail line between the Airport Corporate Centre and Mt. Dennis, a station Metrolinx is already planning to build, that will connect
to the Eglinton Crosstown LRT and the Kitchener GO line, which goes to Union Station. Tory’s plan calls for building new electrified rail line along the Richview Expressway rightof-way, a vacant stretch of land the city owns that was once reserved for an expressway project that was cancelled. South of Bloor, Tory’s plan calls for adding a stop on the Kitchener line at Liberty Village, which Coun. Mike Layton has lobbied Metrolinx for, along with an integrated payment system that will mean GO users don’t have to pay twice if they transfer to the
TTC. Metrolinx has written to Layton, expressing interest in both ideas. Tory is now proposing the same. Transportation Action Ontario had proposed a similar idea, but instead of stops at Liberty Village and Spadina, it proposed a Fort York stop. Moving west from Union Station, Tory plans to add a stop at the Unilever site to serve a proposed business hub development. Transport Action Ontario had suggested a stop in the distillery district. Tory’s plan calls for stops at Queen and Gerrard, while Transport
Action Ontario had suggested just a stop at Gerrard. The stretch of the SmartTrack line between Kennedy and Unionville was in both the Liberals’ and the Transport Action Ontario plans, said Budd. In the east, Tory plans to keep the current plans for the Scarborough Subway, but Transport Action Ontario opposes that. “It will take 10 years to build and it doesn’t serve as many people as the LRT,” said Budd. Transport Action Ontario had proposed using the LRT’s right-of-way to run a branch of the GO line. ‘A nice plan’
On the issue of funding, John Tory has said the city’s entire one-third share of the project can be paid for with Tax Increment Financing, and a property tax increase won’t be necessary • Transit Action Ontario spokesperson Bruce Budd said his organization supports funding the new construction with Tax Increment Financing, as Tory has suggested. • “It’s a nice plan,” he said. “But I don’t know it’s going to come up with as much money as they’re talking about.” This diagram, provided by John Tory’s campaign, shows his proposed “SmartTrack” line in green, alongside the TTC subway lines and the Eglinton Crosstown LRT. contributed