As mayoral front-runner Rob Ford proposes derailing some of Toronto’s iconic streetcars, several American cities are cashing in on a tram rebirth.
Ford came under fire from light rail transit and streetcar fans after announcing subways and buses would better boost TTC ridership and speed suburbanites to inner-city destinations.
His plans, key advisors said Friday, include dooming the Transit City LRTs — which suffered a major blow when the province announced this spring it would delay $4 billion in financing.
Campaign manager and brother, Doug Ford, and policy director Mark Towhey said their candidate proposes two subway lines, buying new buses and pulling slow-moving Red Rockets off routes clogged with exhaust-belching and curb-parked autos.
“In 10 years there could be no streetcars,†Ford deputy campaign manager Nick Kouvalis said in September. “It’s not the end...but we’re going to stop the streetcar plan from growing.â€
That raised red flags over a potential mega-billion-dollar lawsuit if the city cancels a TTC contract for 204 Bombardier low-floor, state-of-the-art LRT cars. The province’s Metrolinx agency ordered 182 slightly-different Bombardier cars.
The order would proceed under Ford — but with some short-turned, Towhey said.
“We’re not going to rip up the Spadina streetcar tracks,†nor those on Queen’s Quay and St. Clair Ave., which were installed on dedicated raised rights-of-way down the centre, he said.
Instead, systems Ford targets are those that compete directly with cars, trucks and buses, including the Queen and King lines.
Rather than cancel the deal with Bombardier, which Towhey said has not begun building the new sleek, longer and faster LRTs due for delivery starting in 2013, any unneeded streetcars could be offered before delivery to buyers considering placing future orders at higher prices.
“If the city is smart, we could make some money out of it,†he said.
The closest buyers are in the U.S., where several cities turned back the clock to the tram era most abandoned in the 1950s.
Ironically, Cincinnati — which sold part of its 1930-40s President’s Conference Committee fleet to Toronto — is one metropolis planning to enjoy the clang, clang, clang of the trolley.
Many other cities opted to buy surplus cars from Australia, Spain and Italy, others had museum relics refurbished. Several, including Houston, where 34,600 daily passengers ride 18 wide-door, wheelchair-accessible cars on a dedicated 12.1-km route, placed foreign orders.
President Barack Obama’s administration became the first in decades to support streetrail lobbyists.
In Washington D.C., the first new articulated streetcar built in the Czech Republic to manoeuvre in the capital’s narrow downtown streets, arrived in May.
The rest are due by 2012, when a $68 million, two-line system the District of Columbia financed is to be completed as the first two of possibly eight lines.
“We are reclaiming our past by rebuilding our future,†said Rep. Earl Blumenauer.
The Democrat from Portland, Oregon got the White House to invest almost $130 million for streetrail systems, promoting them as environmentally-friendly, longer-lasting and ultimately cheaper than buses.
Cities that accepted grants included Tucson, Ariz.; Charlotte, N.C.; Fort Worth, Tex.; Cincinnati; and St. Louis — which also sold surplus PCC cars to the TTC.
Supporters say starter streetcar and LRT systems cost far less than subways and attract housing units, plus retail and office development in almost-abandoned downtown cores, where cities such as Cincinnati razed empty or dilapidated buildings for new street-level rail routes.
Doug Ford, a businessman who travels extensively south of the border, does not foresee a major trolley rebirth, saying “it just won’t happen in the U.S.â€
He and Towhey predict developers would help finance new TTC subway stations with a projected $1 billion in exchange for building condo, office, and shopping complexes after negotiations they insist must involve consulting affected communities,
Buses, they said, are more flexible than streetcars and LRTs, which rely on rails and electrical systems.
Subways, built with giant tunnel-boring machines or in dig-and-fill trenches, are much faster people-movers, Towhey said, adding streetcars are much slower on busy streets — often crawling along at 14 km/h.
Finally, if Bombardier locks the city into itsLRT car deal, “we’ll phase them out within 20 years,†Doug Ford said.