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newearthling said:
Oh, and Mr. Tory? Best of luck. With Kouvalis running the show, you will need it.
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Nick Kouvalis isn't running Tory's campaign. Tom Allison is the campaign manager and he is calling the shots. It's he and Tory who make final decisions on the campaign. Kouvalis is just an adviser.
 
It's telling that Forum often release polls within a week of each other showing totally different results. Either their samples are total crap or Toronto has the world's most fickle voters.
 
TheTigerMaster said:
In all likelyhood these discussions about RL funding will be for nothing. In a few weeks the Provincial budget (including fully funded Relief Line) will be passed. The Relief Line is being built regardless of who wins the election. It seems to me that the candidates (particularly John Tory) are trying to score some easy political points over a provincial project that they have zero control or responsibility over.

It's a smart political strategy. Most people are oblivious the the fact that the Relief Line is a soon to be fully funded provincial project. Why not take credit for it?
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They're right to be oblivious. Without a deal with the NDP, there is little likelihood the next budget will be passed if it includes a DRL funded with revenue tools. And with the way they have deferred and delayed the issue of funding the Big Move, it hardly seems like the Liberals are willing to fight the next election over revenue tools.

Not sure how the city has zero control or responsibility over a DRL when it was solely because of the city that the DRL even became a priority for Metrolinx in the first place. And this idea that the DRL is a done-deal is just asking for trouble. I'm glad most of the candidates don't seem to be taking it for granted.

Solid Snake said:
We could have had our LRT in Scarborough. All city Council had to do was to humour Rob Ford with his private sector scheme for Sheppard (which would have failed) and let the Eglinton Crosstown LRT merge with the Scarborough LRT which was a superior project to begin with. It would have doubled the ridership on the line and get you from Weston Road to Sheppard East in 35 minutes or so. But, no they had to torpedo that one just because Ford made it happened (Yes he agreed with Scarborough having an LRT merged to the Crosstown) and now everyone is complaining about the LRT being gone. Why don't you blame Stinz, De Baermaker, Adam Vaughan and company for it? They killed it and now want it back???? Wow! and you wonder why senior government are getting fed up with us.
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Nice piece of revisionist history. Instead of properly blaming Ford for never sending the MOU to Council in 2011, you're actually blaming Council for voting down his cockamamie (and unrelated) Sheppard scheme in 2012.

Ford's incredible stupidity is the sole reason a merged Eglinton-Scarborough never happened.

denfromoakvillemilton said:
We could end up with Sheppard and Danforth Subway for all I know.
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We won't.

freshcutgrass said:
If they are so smart, why is Chow already $1 billion ahead of them on funding it? ha ha
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She's not. In another clarification of her "nuanced stance", she said she'd cancel Ford's tax increase.
 
Admiral Beez said:
Then the special tax increase specifically for the subway, voted on and approved by council should be canceled. Instead, I bet Chow will want to disregard this and keep that money.
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She has already made it clear that tax increases will be in line with inflation, with or without the tax that was added for the subway.
 
GenerationW said:
Nice piece of revisionist history. Instead of properly blaming Ford for never sending the MOU to Council in 2011, you're actually blaming Council for voting down his cockamamie (and unrelated) Sheppard scheme in 2012.
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The majority of the city was against Transit City. Like it or not he campaign on it and won while being clear that if he was elected, he would slash it. Like it or not, he had all the political legitimacy to work something else. Yeas, the Sheppard scheme was a pipe dream. All I said was that City Council could have just maintained the MOU since Sheppard was supposed to be paid by the private sector. Since there was no way in hell that would ever happen, Sheppard would have never been built but at least the SRT would have been an LRT and Eglinton Avenue would have had the proper mode of transit.

I blame Ford for not taking Metrolinx's compromise when they proposed to elevate Eglinton East to save money. He didn't want to hear about it due to his obsession with going underground. I think that was a crucial mistake. He could have saved face by using the saved money to extend Sheppard to Victoria Park although my preference for the saved money to go for Finch West.

GenerationW said:
Ford's incredible stupidity is the sole reason a merged Eglinton-Scarborough never happened.
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City Council has it's share of blame. They did everything in their power to kill the MOU instead of improving it just because it came from Rob Ford. Metrolinx numbers and recommendations as of February 2013 was that Scarborough-Eglinton LRT was the better project due to the higher ridership. The sheer hypocrisy in this is when city Councillors and UT bloggers alike makes TTC ridership projections in favor of a streetcar type LRT seems like a sacred chapter of the bible.

But when Metrolinx comes along with numbers of their own or recommendation of a higher mode of transit, then it's just wrong and they just don't get it right? By the way, Neptis reports used both TTC and Metrolinx's numbers to give their conclusion. Speaking of Neptis, have you even read the whole thing? They NEVER recommended a subway under Eglinton, Sheppard or in Scarborough. They recommended an LRT in it's own ROW...100% separated from traffic, like DLR in London.

Why didn't council pursue that instead of cancelling the whole thing and later flip flop on giving Scarborough a subway?
 
ttk77 said:
She has already made it clear that tax increases will be in line with inflation, with or without the tax that was added for the subway.
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That's good enough for future tax increases. I'm talking about canceling the subway tax, and then if taxes are needed for other transit projects (such as a new SRT) then put that to council for a vote.

If you start a special tax to cover a specific project, and that project doesn't happen, then cancel the tax.
 
Solid Snake said:
I blame Ford for not taking Metrolinx's compromise when they proposed to elevate Eglinton East to save money. He didn't want to hear about it due to his obsession with going underground. I think that was a crucial mistake. He could have saved face by using the saved money to extend Sheppard to Victoria Park although my preference for the saved money to go for Finch West.
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Do you have any evidence that Ford rejected a Metrolinx plan to elevate Eglinton?

here is the evidence I found:

The news articles I found on elevating Egliton (http://www.thestar.com/news/city_hall/2010/12/20/elevated_transit_among_metrolinxs_alternatives.html) showed no opposition to elevated transit from anyone - just Richard Soberman musing that it may not be accepted.

regarding elevation, the evidence that I found was the Ford was in favour of elevated transit at the the eastern waterfront (i.e. Monorail).(http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/201...ferris_wheel_monorail_and_a_boatin_hotel.html).

Maybe the inside story is that Ford rejected the elevated option, but I could find no public evidence to suggest that.

For me it seems more like Metrolinx refused to consider elevation because they (or the government that controls them) did not want any savings to be realized because the savings would be used on Sheppard. I think Ford would have gladly elevated Eglinton and used the money on Sheppard, but he was not smart enough to think of this.
 
Admiral Beez said:
That's good enough for future tax increases. I'm talking about canceling the subway tax, and then if taxes are needed for other transit projects (such as a new SRT) then put that to council for a vote.

If you start a special tax to cover a specific project, and that project doesn't happen, then cancel the tax.
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I believe she has since clarified that the subway tax will be cancelled, but at the time what I think she was getting at was that it's all semantics since tax hikes will be at inflationary levels anyway. This isn't 100% true since part of that tax increase would be going towards general revenue rather than a specific project. Anyway, the details are in here:

Olivia Chow clarifies comment about ‘fiscal room’ from subway cancellation

Chow said emphatically Monday afternoon that she would cancel the tax hike now intended for the Scarborough subway.
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