Danforth Line 2 Scarborough Subway Extension

[steveintoronto]

^ I would too, most on these boards would, but we're not Average Joes and Josies. It's a losing battle. The only way to win this is to work with private investors, and make sure that the skinflints also pay for roads via tolls. Think how much that will offer them tax breaks!

 

[pstogios]

If a new transit sales tax means more funds that inept/craven politicians can hijack and direct to areas of the city that don’t have the density, ridership, built-form or established on-going development, then we should resist said tax with all of our being.

 

[Rainforest]

Some people stubbornly refuse to fund transit in the suburbs.

And then, those same people are genuinely surprised that suburbanites are not eager to fund the Relief Line

 

[pstogios]

Some people stubbornly refuse to fund transit in the suburbs.

And then, those same people are genuinely surprised that suburbanites are not eager to fund the Relief Line

Nobody said the suburbs shouldn’t get more transit.

 

[OneCity]

Some people stubbornly refuse to fund transit in the suburbs.

And then, those same people are genuinely surprised that suburbanites are not eager to fund the Relief Line

Given money traditionally flows from the inside out and a small number of metro politicians are sadly still campaigning their far away wards seats directly with "we know what best for others" style campaigns this is exactly what we should expect to get in terms of tax appetite from our inner suburban areas.

The biggest complainers of our leaders like Tory and the Fords ironically are the ones doing the most work to help get them elected and keep taxes low.

 

[lenaitch]

I don't know how it would work municipally but the idea of taxes being 'dedicated' is a bit of a shell game at the federal or provincial level. All government income, with the exception I believe of grants from other governments, goes into a single consolidated revenue account ('the big pot'). Politicians might say that certain revenue opportunities will go direct to service 'x', and there might be a corresponding line account showing a similar amount, but there is nothing that says it has to, or has to forever.

 

[W. K. Lis]

Just use New York City as an example of what happens when things go wrong using upper levels of government as a source of revenue. See link.

...Lawmakers in Albany trimmed funding for subway maintenance throughout the 1990s, records show, even as the state budget grew from $45 billion to $80 billion. Then they kept funding mostly flat for years, despite the surge in ridership.

Under Mr. Pataki, the state eliminated subsidies for the M.T.A., opting to make the authority rely entirely on fares, tolls and revenue from taxes and fees earmarked for transit. It also ended state funding for capital work.

The move rankled the state comptroller at the time, H. Carl McCall, who warned that taxes and fees were unstable.

Mr. Pataki also started a trend of redirecting revenues from taxes. In 1995, he pushed through a state income tax cut and helped pay for it by taking more than $200 million in tax revenues that had been set aside for transit. His three successors followed suit. At least $850 million has been diverted in the past two decades, records show.

Richard Ravitch, the former lieutenant governor and M.T.A. chairman who came up with the idea for many of the dedicated taxes as part of his plan to save the subways in the 1980s, said it never occurred to him that the state would redirect the revenue.

“It’s very disappointing,” Mr. Ravitch said, adding that the diversions were just another in a long list of examples of politicians taking the subway for granted and neglecting to invest in its health...

 

[BurlOak]

Some people stubbornly refuse to fund transit in the suburbs.

And then, those same people are genuinely surprised that suburbanites are not eager to fund the Relief Line

It's not the funding - it's the projects. I am convinced that suburanites wanted improved rapid transit for longer distances. (For local traffic, buses worked fine). What they got was an improved local Transit City. What was the realistic cost of Transit City - maybe $20B. And that was all in the suburbs. And not a single transit line between front street and St. Clair, and Don river and Keele - maybe an area of 32 km2. It did add transit to the suburbs, but it did not improve the system 1 bit.
Let's say Spadina subway extension went ahead no matter what.
Instead of all those LRT lines - what people in the suburbs would have wanted was.
DRL East to Seneca.
Eglinton connected to SRT to Malvern.
Some type of TTC fare service on the UPE.

 

[asher__jo]

It's really only a matter of when, not if when it comes to a dedicated tax to fund transit. Vancouver has it, and of course nearly every other city around the world.

 

[Bureaucromancer]

It's not the funding - it's the projects. I am convinced that suburanites wanted improved rapid transit for longer distances. (For local traffic, buses worked fine). What they got was an improved local Transit City.

The core of this is ultimately what's made things so damn vitriolic around transit here (aside from politics in general going that way). Frankly David Miller was intentionally tone deaf to demands for long distance service, and while there were real reason for it in part there was very much a refusal by the people behind Transit City to even acknowledge the possibility that it was less than the be all and end all for all demand. Perfect approach is you want to remove all nuance and compromise.

 

[syn]

Nobody said the suburbs shouldn’t get more transit.

Strange how that narrative is continually pushed when it isn't remotely true.

 

[rbt]

Some people stubbornly refuse to fund transit in the suburbs.

Would those be suburbanites?

I recall the transit specific tax proposals having fairly high approval ratings in the core and not as high in the suburbs (particularly 905 portions) early in Wynne's term. Are there newer polls? The recently eliminated Carbon tax seemed to have similarly spread support; relatively high support in the core and less so in the suburbs (I'm basing this assertion on election results).

At this time we have nearly 3x in spending plans as we have in money allotted to transit to spend; and 1/3rd of that spending is maintenance.

 

[11th]

It's not the funding - it's the projects. I am convinced that suburanites wanted improved rapid transit for longer distances. (For local traffic, buses worked fine). What they got was an improved local Transit City. What was the realistic cost of Transit City - maybe $20B. And that was all in the suburbs. And not a single transit line between front street and St. Clair, and Don river and Keele - maybe an area of 32 km2. It did add transit to the suburbs, but it did not improve the system 1 bit.
Let's say Spadina subway extension went ahead no matter what.
Instead of all those LRT lines - what people in the suburbs would have wanted was.
DRL East to Seneca.
Eglinton connected to SRT to Malvern.
Some type of TTC fare service on the UPE.

Those plus a Finch West and a complete line 4. That's all the lines the 416 will be needing for a long time.

 

[TheTigerMaster]

It’s simple. We all want subways, but nobody wants to pay for them. So we elect politicians that promise heaven and earth for free, and then pretend to be surprised when we get nothing. Rinse and repeat.

 

[pstogios]

It's not the funding - it's the projects.

This.