As usual, Barber's called it for what it is...
PUBLIC TRANSIT
Parking-lots plan paved with chutzpah
JOHN BARBER
February 19, 2009
How on God's good, formerly green earth can anyone spend $175-million on parking lots?
I understand all too well why Prime Minister Stephen Harper might aspire to do so - it's a long, sad story - and I understand why reed-in-the-wind Premier Dalton McGuinty might go along with him. What I don't understand is how one actually does it.
The asphalt order alone will strain local resources past the breaking point, likely requiring emergency infusions from Alberta. But where will we get all the extra bulldozers needed to spread it around? The mind boggles at such outlandish ambitions.
Would that the mind boggled at the chutzpah of politicians who claim to be promoting transit while in fact they subsidize free parking in the suburbs. But such absurdities are common coin in the Ruritanian backwater (Ottawa) that dreams them up.
It would be more reassuring if the leaders knew enough to suppress the parking news while focusing on sensible investments that will actually reduce rather than increase the number of cars on local roads. That way, they would at least appear to have acknowledged the arrival of the 21st century. Instead, they pushed all that transit stuff aside and staged a photo-op to announce $175-million worth of parking lots.
Without even blushing.
The easiest way to explain such behaviour is to consider the local political landscape. We have a prime minister who has given up hope of winning seats in Toronto and a premier who wins them all automatically. The big guy is vindictive and the little guy blandly impartial. Sound policy is not an option.
The federal government's sudden interest in GO Transit parking lots mirrors its concern for Union Station, where the GO lines converge, and which it promised to "revitalize" in its recent budget. While nominally based in Toronto, both projects are designed to serve the suburban constituency Mr. Harper is most keen to attract - especially after having botched his Quebec gambit - while offering nothing to transit-dependent Torontonians who will never vote for him.
It's so clever, so stupid, so Harper - a strategy to stimulate a national economy while systematically ignoring its nerve centre.
This week, Mr. Harper wasn't even able to spit out the name "David Miller" when asked why his government has yet to contribute a nickel to transit initiatives the mayor and council have identified as priorities.
"All mayors, with the exception of the one you mentioned, received our announcements positively," Mr. Harper answered, ignoring Mississauga Mayor Hazel McCallion, among other local leaders, who echoed Mayor Miller's criticism of the federal infrastructure program as overly bureaucratic and underperforming.
Their comments on that issue are virtually identical. And now Mr. Harper has proved them right.
Given the anti-Toronto antagonism that animates Ottawa, even favoured Union Station stands to suffer. All it needs is money to finance a thoroughly developed renovation plan. But that plan was made in Toronto, and cutting ribbons at Union Station will require sharing a stage with "the one you mentioned."
Union Station is sufficiently important to suburban voters that it will likely receive the promised support - if not in the form the city expects or prefers. But nothing is easy - or even sensible - in a world where free parking is called public transit.
jbarber@globeandmail.com
