Transportation minister won’t say if he pushed for GO station in his riding
$100 million Kirby station in Vaughan will encourage more people to drive, Metrolinx report says.
By
Ben SpurrTransportation Reporter
Tues., March 28, 2017
Transportation Minister Steven Del Duca wouldn’t declare whether he advocated for Metrolinx to approve a new $100-million GO Transit station in his riding, saying only that he has a “collaborative relationship” with the transit agency and that he believes the stop is justified by sound planning.
As the Star reported Monday,
last June the Metrolinx board approved a new station in Vaughan at Kirby Rd., despite a
government analysis that found adding the stop on the Barrie line would induce more people to drive than take transit and would have negative economic and environmental impacts.
Following his remarks at an
unrelated news conference Tuesday morning, a reporter asked Del Duca whether he played a role in advocating for Kirby station.
“As minister of transportation there’s a collaborative relationship that exists between my ministry and the agency responsible for delivering the transit that we need in this region,” said Del Duca, who has represented Vaughan for the Ontario Liberals since 2012.
Asked whether that meant he did advocate for the stop, Del Duca said “That’s the answer that it is. There’s a collaborative relationship.”[...]