Globe editorial

Rob Ford, Toronto’s new mayor, has an important mandate: to deliver
essential public services effectively and at lower cost, and to cancel
punitive fees like the vehicle registration charge. But he cannot both
preach fiscal rectitude and proceed with an expensive, wasteful and
unnecessary cancellation of the city’s public transit expansion plan.

Mr. Ford, who is meeting Wednesday morning with TTC general manager Gary
Webster, wants to scrap existing, provincially funded Transit City
streetcar projects and build new subway lines instead. He likes subways
because they are fast and convenient and dislikes streetcars because
they are slow and disrupt street traffic.

Fair enough. Different modes of transit provoke emotional reactions. But
three aspects of Transit City should give Mr. Ford pause.

Toronto’s current streetcars are small, overcrowded and tend to block
traffic. By buying longer streetcars for downtown lines, wait times will
go down. Suburban residents, meanwhile, will get new routes on separate
rights of way that promise speeds comparable to subways at a fraction
of the cost. The Transit City plan tames some of the public’s worst, and
legitimate, irritations around streetcars.

The city is getting a great deal. The province is footing almost all of the bill for billions of dollars in projects.

Read full Globe & Mail editorial here