Mayor John Tory's Toronto

[SunriseChampion]

I know, I've had to drive through there for work more times than I'd like to remember. It's a bit of a wasteland...well, a nice park on the one side, sure...but the built up part? BIA, my eye.

 

[justindw]

Not only making this up, but 100% wrong. The 90's recession dramatically lowered riding on TTC.

I'm happy to provide cites.

 

[JGHali]

Sorry, what? Is there? Ha, could have fooled me.

Perhaps representing the Arby's-turned-St-Louis-Bar-and-Grill?

That was a sketchy Arby's back in the day, as only an Arby's at Dufferin and Finch can be.

 

[junctionist]

What crisis?

There was only Ford's rhetoric attempting to present a false dilemma to justify cutting taxes. He froze taxes and removed revenue sources (VRT) without that magic "gravy" he promised to find to pay for it, creating his own fiscal "crisis".

Good thing Miller's last budget surplus was there to pay for it.

Budget time was a crisis towards the end of Miller's time in office. It meant the invention of new taxes, going to the province for money and of course, property tax increases. There was a surplus the last year, but that wasn't an administration people trusted to be prudent with surpluses. In the end, few people liked Miller, even though he brought forward many progressive policies for Toronto and showed great leadership on transit. How you handle budgets is important.

 

[freshcutgrass]

Ridership goes up in a recession down during boom times and thus has very little to do with mayors.

There are many factors that effect ridership, but service levels and fare increases is what effects ridership most. This is pretty common knowledge.

Ridership peaked in 1989 and dropped year-over-year because of massive service cuts and fare increases. It didn't start it's year-over-year increases until the Ridership Growth Strategy started making service improvements. And budget/service cuts and fare increases both have everything to do with mayors.

But according to you, we were simply in a "boom" period from 1989-2003, and in a recession since then.

 

[freshcutgrass]

Budget time was a crisis towards the end of Miller's time in office.

There was never a "crisis". Every budget must be balanced, and every budget faces an opening shortfall....Miller or Ford. This is normal.

It meant the invention of new taxes, going to the province for money and of course, property tax increases.

When you are city-building, improving services and just keeping up with inflation, it requires increased revenue. This is normal.

There was a surplus the last year

There's a surplus every year. This is normal

In the end, few people liked Miller

An Ipsos Reid poll conducted during the 2010 election, showed that were Miller running for a third term, he would win handily.

How you handle budgets is important.

Of course it is.

Which is why your assertion that Ford's utter incompetency at the budget process as good is laughable. His opening solution to a budget shortfall, is to decrease revenue. This is not normal. And then balance the budget by gutting services. Forget that it goes against how he said he was going to do it...it's just utterly irresponsible.

 

[Riverdale Rink Rat]

Budget time was a crisis towards the end of Miller's time in office. It meant the invention of new taxes, going to the province for money and of course, property tax increases. There was a surplus the last year, but that wasn't an administration people trusted to be prudent with surpluses. In the end, few people liked Miller, even though he brought forward many progressive policies for Toronto and showed great leadership on transit. How you handle budgets is important.

Miller has been painted well by the Fordites. It was Miller that brought in the rolling budgets. Take a look through Matt the Metro city columnist / ex-blogger's archives. You've taken the bait.

 

[AlbertHWagstaff]

What TTC culture? When Miller took office he faced declining ridership and service, obsolete vehicle fleet and infrastructure, and no new subway/LRT lines planned or funded. This is not a problem you solve with "smart cards".

No...Miller launched the Ridership Growth Strategy, and improved service increasing ridership by 100 million.
He replaced the aging bus, streetcar and subway train fleet and invested in state of good repair.
He went out and got $12 billion in upper level govt transit funding for Toronto, which is why we have the Spadina subway extention, the Eglinton subway/LRT and whatever it is that actually ever gets built in Scarborough.

What do we have to thank Ford for....less transit services and an $85 million bill for the pleasure of building nothing in Scarborough?

To be fair, Paul Martin re-announced and re-promised the same $1B about 12 times. How much did we actually get from the Feds?

 

[Videodrome]

So, no one wants to talk about Tory's announcement today?

 

[r937]

So, no one wants to talk about Tory's announcement today?

traffic blitz on out-of-town plates?

'scuse me while i go check to see if i care... nope

it's great to see existing laws enforced, but towing a few more cars isn't really going to make as much of a diffference as, say, road tolls

 

[Videodrome]

Tory needs to do something interesting, like getting tipsy at a wine and cheese event.

 

[James]

Tory needs to something interesting, like getting tipsy at a wine and cheese event.

Haha! As most of us predicted, Tory is going to run the city quietly, calmly, smoothly and efficiently. It will be so mundane that media outlets like the Toronto Sun will be stretching to get some juicy headline story on him...but they won't and they'll default back to a tired story about Rob or Doug.

 

[pw20]

There are many factors that effect ridership, but service levels and fare increases is what effects ridership most. This is pretty common knowledge.

Ridership peaked in 1989 and dropped year-over-year because of massive service cuts and fare increases. It didn't start it's year-over-year increases until the Ridership Growth Strategy started making service improvements. And budget/service cuts and fare increases both have everything to do with mayors.

But according to you, we were simply in a "boom" period from 1989-2003, and in a recession since then.

There are also correlations between employment levels and higher ridership... i.e. if you're emplyoed you need the TTC to get you to your job. Combined with more and more offices relocating downtown, the hub of our transit system, in the last decade, it makes sense to see ridership growth related to an economic uptick.

 

[nfitz]

Ridership goes up in a recession down during boom times and thus has very little to do with mayors.

Ridership goes up during higher employment and down during lower employment.

This means that ridership goes down during a recession and up during boom times. There's a lesser correlation to gas prices.

Look at this http://fordfortoronto.mattelliott.ca/ graphic:

 

[Tuscani01]

Ridership goes up during higher employment and down during lower employment.

This means that ridership goes down during a recession and up during boom times. There's a lesser correlation to gas prices.

Look at this http://fordfortoronto.mattelliott.ca/ graphic:

The graph ends at 2006 though. 2008 was the start of the crash, and employment decreased in the City, while transit continued to get record ridership numbers year after year (at a time when gas prices were increasing to record highs). Gas prices are much more of a factor in ridership these days than it was during the period shown on the graph above.