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Serious question: If it's not your church, your library, or you daycare, are you likely to care?
Serious question: If it's not your church, your library, or you daycare, are you likely to care?
Serious question: If it's not your church, your library, or you daycare, are you likely to care?
I care about all areas of the city, but not everyone feels the same way. Many people vote for whoever will benefits themself the most.
So Olivia Chow is decidedly anti-GO RER now?
Why else is she trying to drum up NIMBY support against Stouffville RER and Union station?
Serious question: If it's not your church, your library, or you daycare, are you likely to care?
Serious question: If it's not your church, your library, or you daycare, are you likely to care?
I have long maintained that suburban residents have a strong desire for faster transport to the core. And that they'd rather focus on faster long-haul than faster local or medium-haul first. I get accused of speaking for suburbia (in particular the one I come from). Now we're seeing Tory pull ahead with Smart Track.
I really wish people would actually understand the suburban mentality. Contrary to popular belief, they don't want subways because LRTs disrupt traffic (though there is a sizeable element with that idea), the majority clamour for subways because subways represent speed. And that speed means access (to jobs, health care, etc.) and quality of life (more time with family). Our planners need to start wrapping their heads around the idea that suburban voters will keep electing populations who care about faster transit. That's not to say that most suburban voters won't support LRTs if they are built. I know lots of people that are quite excited about having the Sheppard LRT nearby. It's just that they prefer to see commute times actually get reduced noticeably.
The biggest mistake of "The Big Move" was simply rolling up all municipal plans into a provincial shopping list of transit infrastructure wants. No serious thought was actually given to regional mobility. Hopefully, with Smart Track on the table, we start discussing regional transport somewhat and have progress on a plan that will actually get cars off the road. Let's move beyond simply hoping that roads get congested enough to force drivers to take transit.
Not sure who you're arguing against... I would think that we all agree with you that reducing travel time is important, especially for longer distances.
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SmartTrack and Tory are popular downtown as well, it's not just the suburbs.
There's quiet a few people on here that think I was mistaken when I said that suburbanites care about faster transit. There's quite a few that even thought I was wrong when I said that Tory's popularity was largely due to Smart Track effectively targeting suburban frustration with mobility.
They see ignorant suburbanites who hate LRTs and just want to drive everywhere. And they can't imagine suburbanites actually want faster transit and feel shortchanged by the lack of subways because the alternatives lack speed.
I seriously hope Tory can deliver on some version of Smart Track. If he fails, many will give up and just accept the morass that is Toronto traffic.