City
Metrolinx promises Downtown Relief Line by 2028
Metrolinx plans to break ground on a relief valve for the overcrowded Yonge subway line in the next 15 years, the transit agency's CEO Bruce McCuaig told the Toronto Board of Trade in a keynote speech this afternoon. The next phase of a $34-billion provincial project dubbed the "Big Move" will also see the Yonge line extended beyond Finch into Richmond Hill.
The elephant in the room, as always, is funding. McCuaig encouraged GTA municipalities and the province to "start the conversation" on ways to pay for the new projects, which also include bus rapid transit lines on Dundas West into Mississauga and Halton, and an LRT on Hurontario-Main from Port Credit to downtown Brampton, but offered no little solid advice on how Metrolinx plans to pay for the work.
"There's an expectation there's going to be use of both what are normally considered to be provincial funding tools and municipal funding tools," McCuaig told the media. "What those tools are, the spread between them, and the rates, we'll have to see when we come up with our final advice in June."
"It's important to provide more capacity, not just for the downtown area but more broadly in the region so we can support other projects. It's as important to bring suburban people ... as it is to move people within downtown Toronto."
When the TTC release its own plan for the relief line, city manager Joe Pennachetti proffered several fees, taxes, and tolls as a way of bridging the gaping funding gap. The items that promised to generate the most cash were a 1 cent a kilometre highway toll ( $1.5 billion), a 1 per cent personal income tax ($1.4 billion), or a 1 per cent sales tax ($1.3 billion). Including the broader GTA in these fees would be a good way to kick-start the fund raising.
Specifics on the line could still be some way off. Brad Ross at the TTC confirmed moving the project forward ties in with the Commission's own idea for the connector line most recently discussed in October. "We will work closely with Metrolinx," he said. "There is a financing strategy that Metrolinx is undertaking, the City of Toronto is doing public consultations on funding mechanisms for public transit ... obviously a DRL would require several billion dollars so the funding needs to be in place."
"The first thing we need to do is step back from the lines on a map that we're sometimes so quick on drawing and just think about what's the best project," McCuaig continued, mentioning that a Queen/King to Pape route or an alignment that uses existing rail corridors is on the table.
The whopping $34 billion funding target for the DRL and all of Metrolinx's other transit projects is positively eye-watering, but it's certainly achievable. A report on just how they plan to get that money is due on June 1st 2013 and a firm decision will (ideally) be made soon after. They'll need to hurry up if they're to keep to the 15 year time frame.
Does this announcement make you anymore hopeful for the DRL? Is this a sign Metrolinx, the TTC, Toronto, and the province are getting serious about finding funding? Sound off.
Chris Bateman is a staff writer at blogTO. Follow him on Twitter at @chrisbateman.
Images: Metrolinx and TTC.
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my question is how they can set a date when the main issue of funding still hasn't been resolved yet.
Correction, they plan to have it completed in 15 years. Not started.
Also, on the same point, there should be a couple of more stops on each branch. For example, on the "western" branch, it should be Spadina, Bathurst, Liberty Village (or Strachan), Dufferin, etc. Stations are expensive - but they are the whole point of generating ridership sufficient to sustain the operation of the subway line. Cheaping out by skipping necessary stops is just shooting ourselves in the collective and proverbial foot.
I really wonder what things would be like the if the GO lines were re-imagined as part of the TTC, with more service and more stops.
I think the divide between the two is worse for everyone.
If there is a rationale for this (beside politics) I'd like to hear it.
http://www.laht.com/article.asp?ArticleId=623736&;CategoryId=14091
The Bloor Danforth line took about 8 years for 26km. One could argue that in the 50's, there wasn't as much "stuff" to work around (or under, or through) as the City wasn't as developed. One could also argue that there was less of a premium placed on worker safety - I believe 10 men died in the process.
But you can't deny that technology now is also much more advanced. Still, you raise a valid point.
The answer is probably as simple as "red tape".
That's 16 years full of opportunities for human wrecking balls like Ford to sabotage the whole thing.
Something like this needs to be set in stone, with zero ability to sabotage it.
The City needs to make Laws that make Developers give money to infrastructure if they are creating residents in an area that originally did not... or if the increase is quite large. For example, the Mirvish plan on King, they are adding hundreds of people to an area that did not have that many residents. They should be forced to give money to Metrolinx to help fund infrastructure.
There are so many condo's and Developers that they probably would not even care that much. Demand is high now, so capitalize on it.
Not a good idea. There aren't enough workers to get it all done at once. There would be *massive* decades long disruptions, much worse than what we currently undergo with Union, Weston, YUS -> Vaughan extension. There would be a big spike in materials prices, as Metrolinx would compete with condo developers (and everyone else) for concrete, steel, workers, etc.
Plus, the whole thing would have to be planned and carried out by Metrolinx in 15 years. It's taken them 3 to come up with a plan for how to pay for it, and that's assuming they don't ask for an extension as we approach June 2013.
And 15 years to build this short bit if subway??? There is no way it should take that long.
Jay, you are a parody of an idiot, right?
Of course not, it's Scarborough and they're all drug dealing Gangbangers.
Agree with you about what the LRT lines should be-in fact, as I've already said, we should have a line down Victoria Park, Finch (all the way to Old Finch and Morningside if possible) and one line down Pharmacy, to revitalize that area (or, we could build another streetcar line down Pharmacy and get rid of the bus.)
It will be fun to see all the new transit plans that are sure to come our way over the coming decades. I'm really looking forward to 2035 as that will be the 50th anniversary of the first DRL plan. Oh boy! I bet they make a super-cool fantasy map for that one!
GO is not a DRL. Due to track congestion and sharing with CN it could never run often enough. Some of the lines only run a few times in the morning rush hour and the evening rush hour, and that's it. GO will never be a DRL, sorry.
You'd want to work things out right?
LOVE T.O. - it's my home forever, but I'm not coming back until they at least break ground on a DRL.