GTHA Regional Transit Amalgamation Discussion: Superlinx/Subway Upload

[TJ O'Pootertoot]

A critical point. The critical problem with the system is money, not governance. [If there were enough funding to go around to build necessary projects and maintain existing infrastructure, nobody would be calling for an upload. Uploading the subway will not make the fundamental money issue go away.

I've seen this line a lot lately and find it utterly non-sensical. Money IS governance.
Oh, the system needs more funding and if there were enough of it, nobody would call for an upload?? What funding? If Toronto needs more money from the province, that's a governance issue. If Toronto needs more independent powers to raise money on its own, that's a governance issue too, because (obviously) Toronto does not have enough powers under its current governance structure. If you want Markham or York Region or Timbuktu to contribute to TTC operations, that's a governance issue. If you want regional revenue tools that pool funds for distribution to transit projects, that's governance. If you think Metrolinx should be more or less powerful or more less independent or have more or less funds allocated to it, those are all governance issues. And on and on and on.

Money comes from somewhere. Whoever controls the money has power.
It's really like some teenager telling their parents just to give them more allowance so they can be more independent. As long as the kid doesn't have money of his/her own, the parents still have the power and "governance" of what that money can go to remains out of the kid's hands. It's impossible to discuss how to improve or change anything - whether it's reducing TTC fares or uploading a subway or building a new line - without discussing who has the money, what it's going to and what conditions are attached to it.

Burda's smart and that Agenda discussion is well worth watching for anyone on this thread - I think she's dead on about revenue tools, but to say those are about money and not governance doesn't make any sense to me. (She even says politicians lacked the courage to implement the revenue tools. Politicians from the GOVERNMENT, you mean?)

 

[TheTigerMaster]

I've seen this line a lot lately and find it utterly non-sensical. Money IS governance.
Oh, the system needs more funding and if there were enough of it, nobody would call for an upload?? What funding? If Toronto needs more money from the province, that's a governance issue. If Toronto needs more independent powers to raise money on its own, that's a governance issue too, because (obviously) Toronto does not have enough powers under its current governance structure. If you want Markham or York Region or Timbuktu to contribute to TTC operations, that's a governance issue. If you want regional revenue tools that pool funds for distribution to transit projects, that's governance. If you think Metrolinx should be more or less powerful or more less independent or have more or less funds allocated to it, those are all governance issues. And on and on and on.

Money comes from somewhere. Whoever controls the money has power.
It's really like some teenager telling their parents just to give them more allowance so they can be more independent. As long as the kid doesn't have money of his/her own, the parents still have the power and "governance" of what that money can go to remains out of the kid's hands. It's impossible to discuss how to improve or change anything - whether it's reducing TTC fares or uploading a subway or building a new line - without discussing who has the money, what it's going to and what conditions are attached to it.

Burda's smart and that Agenda discussion is well worth watching for anyone on this thread - I think she's dead on about revenue tools, but to say those are about money and not governance doesn't make any sense to me. (She even says politicians lacked the courage to implement the revenue tools. Politicians from the GOVERNMENT, you mean?)

Sure. But uploading it to the province doesn't make more money magically appear.

If you believe the transport minister, a primary goal of upload the subways is to free up Toronto's finances to focus on other issues. So assuming Queen's Park is being genuine with it's intentions, we're going to go from the City and Province jointly funding maintenance/expansion, to just the Province overseeing those duties (after all, the point of this exercise is to free up Toronto's finances). That means that QP now has to cover the share of expenses that Toronto used to pay, just to maintain the status quo. On top of that, for, umm... reasons, uploading the subway is supposed to make Queen's Park suddenly more interested in spending even more more on transit (meaning a net increase in transit funds available), despite them now having to cover "Toronto's share" of the bill, and QP's decades long track record of underfunding TTC and GO Transit operations.

This all sounds like wishful thinking to me. Nothing about uploading the subway inherently indicates that they'll be more money funnelled to the system. If QP wasn't interested in spending $1 Billion on Project X, they're not suddenly going to be interested in doing that after the upload, particularly especially QP now has to pick up Toronto's part of the bill.

Now I'm not blind to the relationship between money and governance. I'd be all for uploading the subway to some kind of regional body that has the power to implement revenue tools to pay for transit. But this proposal from QP ain't it. Whenever the money question comes around, all I'm hearing a a whole lot of wishful thinking from QP. I'll be the first to listen when QP puts some solid numbers on the table, with guarantees on precisely how much they're going to spend on the system and what they're going to spend it on, and where they're going to get that money. They need to go through the SOGR backlog line-by-line, and tell us what they'll be spending on, and what they'll be letting rot away. I can only assume they're eager to produce these numbers, given how enthusiastic they are at the prospect of spending more money on Toronto's subways. Unfortunately, the only solid number I've heard from QP is $150 Million/yr, so they're not off to a good start.

 

[steveintoronto]

Likes to the above two posts are not contradictory, the point is actually coming to a head:

Money comes from somewhere. Whoever controls the money has power.
It's really like some teenager telling their parents just to give them more allowance so they can be more independent. As long as the kid doesn't have money of his/her own, the parents still have the power and "governance" of what that money can go to remains out of the kid's hands. It's impossible to discuss how to improve or change anything - whether it's reducing TTC fares or uploading a subway or building a new line - without discussing who has the money, what it's going to and what conditions are attached to it.

This all sounds like wishful thinking to me. Nothing about uploading the subway inherently indicates that they'll be more money funnelled to the system. If QP wasn't interested in spending $1 Billion on Project X, they're not suddenly going to be interested in doing that after the upload, particularly especially QP now has to pick up Toronto's part of the bill.

The bottom line is that the funding bottom line is going to be private, not government. No matter who has the purse, it's effectively empty, and the saviour is going to be Private Enterprise, like it or not.

I'll cross-link this to a discussion in another string I made earlier on this, and it involves by-passing the Province, as well as the Munis, by investors working through the Infrastructure Bank and asking for a federal charter granted to their consortium.

Cross posted from the Relief Line West (Speculative) string:

[...]

http://www.metrolinx.com/en/docs/pdf/board_agenda/20190207/20190207_BoardMtg_ReliefLineBusinessCaseDevelopment_EN.pdf

Where's the money? Perhaps you need some help on this: Metrolinx is hedging...and they're trying to deliver the news in as graceful a way as possible, both for the City's feeble attempt (in all fairness, knowing that there's no money to do it right) and that as presented, the City's plan has no hope in seeing the dark of day as presented, and QP isn't going to finance this. And Metrolinx to save their own sorry arses for getting this so wrong before, and still muffing it for the sake of political face-saving. (Can't upset the Subway Song sung by the Glorious Leader)

Again, in all fairness, this present QP regime isn't going to finance much of anything save for pork-barrel appointments.

The obvious truth is that it's going to have to be financed by Private Investment. You alluded to that yourself in a prior post. I quoted you, although you seem to believe that milk comes from the government. Damn the cows...

And Private Investment need a business case a hell of a lot stronger than "close to 1.0". Where we do agree is the necessity of the Infrastructure Bank to be involved in this. I wrote extensively on it prior, including legal context and reference, including Section 92 relevance and the various Acts, including Transportation, Railways, etc, and SCC citations of the legal status of federally chartered railways, (which includes "street railways and tramways", btw) which means if the InfraBank is involved in putting a consortium together, application can be made for federal status "For the general advantage of Canada" and QP will have little to no say over the project. Serves them right. What sensible investor would want to have anything to do with morons pretending to be grownups? And doing it horrendously...

The Province would be welcome, of course, to join the consortium. After they commit the money...

And if the foolish Ford foamed fist filled words of anger (gist) "You can't compete against Metrolinx!" he wouldn't have a shaky leg to stand on. Example of jurisdiction? Just ask VIA Rail...

Btw! This new forum software is buggy, just caught it mis-attributing quotes to the wrong authors. Others have noted same, and blamed themselves for the bug.

 

[TJ O'Pootertoot]

This all sounds like wishful thinking to me. Nothing about uploading the subway inherently indicates that they'll be more money funnelled to the system. If QP wasn't interested in spending $1 Billion on Project X, they're not suddenly going to be interested in doing that after the upload, particularly especially QP now has to pick up Toronto's part of the bill....
Now I'm not blind to the relationship between money and governance. I'd be all for uploading the subway to some kind of regional body that has the power to implement revenue tools to pay for transit. But this proposal from QP ain't it. Whenever the money question comes around, all I'm hearing a a whole lot of wishful thinking from QP.

Totally agree. I'd only say that I think there are people in Toronto who are averse to any change and who think that everything would be fine if only they had more money. To them I say, the province basically gave you an $8b-blank cheque and you wasted it. So, this upload is likely to be done poorly and has already "poisoned the well" for more fruitful discussions of what a proper regional governance (and funding!) model for GTA transit could look like. Instead we get eye-rolling articles like that one in Spacing last week, about something that happened in London 30 years ago. It's not at all dissimilar to how the Fords made it impossible for people to see LRT as something "less than a subway," a transit insult.

Likes to the above two posts are not contradictory, the point is actually coming to a head:

The bottom line is that the funding bottom line is going to be private, not government. No matter who has the purse, it's effectively empty, and the saviour is going to be Private Enterprise, like it or not.

I agree - our POVs were not all contradictory. I'd only say to you that the choice to have a P3 or otherwise harvest private funding, that's also a governance choice. And, as such, if you allow a private company to contribute $5B to build the DRL (for example) you are accepting they will have a say in some respects, in how it is run, potentially up to and including tweaking the routes to go through this property or have an underground connection to a condo site at that one.

Whether this model is a solution, I'm not sure but in the meantime I'll take issue with the Toronto urbanites who think the solution is to maintain the existing governance model but just keep writing City Council cheques. Been there, done that.

 

[AlvinofDiaspar]

Whether this model is a solution, I'm not sure but in the meantime I'll take issue with the Toronto urbanites who think the solution is to maintain the existing governance model but just keep writing City Council cheques. Been there, done that.

Actually nope - the province didn't give the city a "blank cheque" to spend however way the city wished to spend it - but however way it will win votes provincially (there is a reason why it more or less resembled the NDP promoted expansions in the early 90s). Besides, you can't say money is governance when it is governance that failed time and again to raise it. New revenue tools? Nope; raise taxes? Nope. Real regional governance? Nope. This outcome is a self-inflicted failure of governance - and the lack of money is the result, not the cause. The fact is - you couldn't even build the line when there was money to be had during the good times. What's the failure? Governance - the need to buy votes with line extensions. To come back now and say that we don't have the money for priority #1 while still pushing through extensions with public money is high BS.

Also, there is the principle of subsidiarity to consider - and moving a system that is at best regional in scale and subject it solely to provincial dictates does not make for good governance. Why would anyone think that moving decision-making power to the provincial level (nevermind Metrolinx being an "independent" regional authority yadda yadda, because it simply isn't) will make for a less politically loaded process is beyond me.

AoD

 

[TJ O'Pootertoot]

Actually nope - the province didn't give the city a "blank cheque" to spend however way the city wished to spend it - but however way it will win votes provincially (there is a reason why it more or less resembled the NDP promoted expansions in the early 90s).

I should have been more literal (though I never said BLANK cheques):
-the province gave the city complete funding for Transit City (and then, yes, rescinded some of it)
-to date, the City has moved forward with construction on Eglinton Crosstown and otherwise, let's say "changed course" as to what to do with the rest of it

Besides, you can't say money is governance when it is governance that failed time and again to raise it. New revenue tools? Nope; raise taxes? Nope. Real regional governance? Nope.

But that's just proving what I'm saying. Not instituting revenue tools is a governance choice about where the money for transit comes from. I'm not giving the province a free pass, if that's what you think. These are all FAILURES of governance, no doubt.

This outcome is a self-inflicted failure of governance - and the lack of money is the result, not the cause. The fact is - you couldn't even build the line when there was money to be had during the good times. What's the failure? Governance - the need to buy votes with line extensions. To come back now and say that we don't have the money for priority #1 while still pushing through extensions with public money is high BS.

I think you were mis-reading what I saying since, one way or another, I agree.
As I see it, these are the facts:
-The City, on its own, does not have adequate governance (e.g. taxation) tools to fund its own lines so even when it has an idea (SmartTrack! Transit City! Scarborugh subway with 1-3 stops!) it needs upper levels of government for $.
-Even when it has been given $, it has a tendency to change its mind; a second failure of governance.
-Metrolinx, were it an independent government authority, could tell Toronto it can't change its mind with allocated funds but, of course, Metrolinx is in thrall to the province as much as anyone else and if the province needs (for example) seats in Scarborough, they blow with the wind. Another failure of governance.
-Metrolinx technically answers to cabinet and the good news is City council technically answers to "the people," but given the long timelines to build and fund transit, we've seen neither can hold the line, as a general rule.
-If there is "enough money," it's not clear any of these problems would go away. There's still a lack of accountability and consistency, to say nothing of "fact-based" decision making.

Also, there is the principle of subsidiarity to consider - and moving a system that is at best regional in scale and subject it solely to provincial dictates does not make for good governance. Why would anyone think that moving decision-making power to the provincial level (nevermind Metrolinx being an "independent" regional authority yadda yadda, because it simply isn't) will make for a less politically loaded process is beyond me.

If there were revenue tools and if the funding were directed specifically to Metrolinx and if the board was insulated from cabinet (presumably with a board that includes representation from local municipalities), you could solve many of these problems.

A regional government isn't inherently a "better" government than a local one, nor vice versa. The current system, top to bottom, isn't functioning very well, I think most people would agree. And yet, as a general rule, major metros do have some form of regional transit authority. A regional government DONE PROPERLY will be better than what we have now. But "done properly" is where the rubber hits the road - if it is subject to "provincial dictates,' it doesn't qualify - and it seems awful unlikely that this upload is even a step in the right direction. A proper regional government body would, legally speaking, need to be created by the province but a regional government is most definitely NOT the same thing (hence, 2 different words) as moving decision-making power to the provincial level; it is establishing a new level in between the municipal and provincial. That's not what Ford is proposing, equally obviously, but don't confuse his upload with "regional governance" and slam it on that basis.

 

[steveintoronto]

'Governance and money' is a case of the 'chicken or the egg'...with exceptions like:

The fact is - you couldn't even build the line when there was money to be had during the good times.

That was certainly the case with the Scarborough LRT.

I see a lot of our points are discussed here:
Regional transit governance makes sense — but it requires care and caution, not grandstanding
By ROYSON JAMESStar Columnist
Mon., Feb. 25, 2019

Royson James: Regional transit governance makes sense — but it requires care and caution, not grandstanding

Premier Doug Ford’s subway takeover plan is doomed by political dogma, electoral ambitions and personal animus, writes Royson James.

www.thestar.com

What makes discussion difficult in defining if the car got stuck before running out of gas, or ran out of gas because it was left running after getting stuck, is that we apparently have no options at this point. And that's the 'vacuum' I think Private Enterprise will dive into. Unfortunately, only the really ripe long-hanging fruit will be picked. But I'm resigned to that, and to thinking "Thank God it won't be the Ford prop-shafts in control". Fortunately also that the Fed Libs need a vote-getter at this time, and hopefully will step-up to the plate in terms of pushing funding through InfraBank.

We'll see. Royson's column is indication of a change of thinking gathering momentum. Whether the 'car is stuck' still remains to be seen.

Addendum:
To approach this from a different angle, here's how popular at the time of this poll that REM was/is in Montreal:

POLL RESULTS: 82% OF THE GREATER MONTREAL POPULATION SUPPORTS THE REM PROJECT
Posted 01 Mar 2017

Leger (The Research Intelligence Group) has been mandated by Équiterre and the David Suzuki Foundation to conduct a survey to assess residents of the greater Montreal area their knowledge and opinion regarding the Réseau Électrique Métropolitain (REM), a new integrated electric driverless train network linking downtown Montreal, the South Shore, the West Island, the North Shore and the airport, a project led by the Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec.
The results showed that 45% heard of the REM project during the past 6 months, 48% didn’t and 7% refused to answer.
In total, 82% were in favour of the project, combining results of the respondents answering “very much in favour” (38%) and “in favour” (44%).
[...]

Poll Results: 82% of the greater Montreal population supports the REM project | equiterre.org - For socially and environmentally responsible choices

equiterre.org

I'll try to decipher later as to what bearing that would have in the GTHA, and if it's gone sour since in Montreal, but the appetite for this kind of project and funding methodology appears very high, much higher than I was expecting when looking for poll results. The similarity of this to the Relief Line is striking.

More later on this...

 

[thettctransitfanatic]

'Governance and money' is a case of the 'chicken or the egg'...with exceptions like:
That was certainly the case with the Scarborough LRT.

I see a lot of our points are discussed here:
Regional transit governance makes sense — but it requires care and caution, not grandstanding
By ROYSON JAMESStar Columnist
Mon., Feb. 25, 2019

Royson James: Regional transit governance makes sense — but it requires care and caution, not grandstanding

Premier Doug Ford’s subway takeover plan is doomed by political dogma, electoral ambitions and personal animus, writes Royson James.

www.thestar.com

What makes discussion difficult in defining if the car got stuck before running out of gas, or ran out of gas because it was left running after getting stuck, is that we apparently have no options at this point. And that's the 'vacuum' I think Private Enterprise will dive into. Unfortunately, only the really ripe long-hanging fruit will be picked. But I'm resigned to that, and to thinking "Thank God it won't be the Ford prop-shafts in control". Fortunately also that the Fed Libs need a vote-getter at this time, and hopefully will step-up to the plate in terms of pushing funding through InfraBank.

We'll see. Royson's column is indication of a change of thinking gathering momentum. Whether the 'car is stuck' still remains to be seen.

Are you sure Deco Labels won't make labels for the Scarbrough Subway Extention?

 

[steveintoronto]

Not surprisingly, there's a massive amount on REM on-line, but finding the operating model (fares integrated or not, etc) is elusive. I'll keep digging. But this is the closest I've found so far, and obviously self-referenced, but man...this must be honey to the flies at Queen's Park:

The model
Launched in July 2015, the model allows CDPQ Infra to act as the owner-operator of certain infrastructure projects while assuming responsibility for the planning and financing phases, execution and operation.

An exclusive subsidiary of Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec, CDPQ Infra will generate commercial returns for la Caisse and its partners while limiting the financial impact of infrastructure projects on the government’s balance sheet.

More information
[...]

[...]

CDPQ Infra | Building sustainable transport infrastructure for communities

CDPQ Infra acts as a principal contractor for major public infrastructure projects. Planning, financing, execution, operation.

www.cdpqinfra.com

If that isn't a promotional spiel to the likes of the Fords, I don't know what is. Will dig further later, I'm intrigued to find third party analysis of this, but must run now.

PS: In case it's not clear, this would leave the subway and all prior discussion on up-loading as static. Ford didn't have a clue of what he was nattering about prior, but his minions might. The last thing they need to do, and even morons should understand this, even of their own dogma eat dogma approach, is that their diatribe so far is nothing but trouble for all concerned. They should step back and let intelligent grown-ups handle this.

That chart is musical to me. I especially like the Fed brass section (administered by the InfraBank) and the provincial chorus all playing their part in the CDPQ's band.

And the band leaders? Quebec pensioners. One has to wonder, why isn't this being promoted in Ontario? Ontarians can't dance...

 

[steveintoronto]

Ontario's Transit Blueprint for Toronto

The Agenda with Steve Paikin

Published on Apr 2, 2019

 

[hw621]

Any summary of what he said?

 

[sixrings]

Miller is also on the show with a piece called who should own Toronto's subways. Guess who sounds more genuine?

 

[sixrings]

Miller advocates for the drl and the network of Transit city. But hey Miller is all about lrts.

 

[steveintoronto]

Any summary of what he said?

Not much more than you'd hope, but Paikin, in his exquisite way, asked some damn frank questions. He did pry a bit more out of him than we knew previously. Unfortunately I had to watch it in three spurts due to interruptions, but Relief Line is to be built first, Yurek was adamant. And 'new technology, etc, etc'. I think the 'fix' is in. Someone BIG has made an offer to do it privately. Yurek is very assured on things, but not committal on how much funding will be in the budget. But that's an old trick in politics, honed by the UK's Brown regime in 'keeping it off the books' by using P3. In Brown's case, it exploded. I won't go into details, but I do give the Cons some due in probably deferring that to the Infrastructure Bank to configure. That also guarantees Federal participation.

The safety wall for Yurek was "Wait for the Budget". He did commit to a few other questions, but not having notes, I'm loathe to repeat. I might watch it again later, it's valuable more for what's written between the lines. It IS a worthwhile watch.

 

[salsa]

Any summary of what he said?

Steve Munro wrote a pretty good summary on Twitter, which I've copied below:


TVO's The Agenda featured three interviews on the subject of Toronto's transit and the proposed subway "upload". In the first, Minister @JeffYurekMPP sounds ever so reasonable, but @spaikin let him get away with some howlers about the system.

2. Shortly into the interview, Yurek claims that any rider today will agree that "the system isn't working", but that's the existing system, and provincial plans are silent on how that will be improved.

3. Yurek claims that if you look over the past 15 years, the Crosstown is the only project that is near to completion. He ignores the Vaughan subway opened in late 2017. This error has been pointed out before, and Yurek wounds his credibility by repeating it.

4. As @iamdavidmiller would later point out, an LRT network plan was cancelled by the Fords, not by some mythic dysfunctional city council over which they had no control. Their problem was that Rob Ford hated streetcars and anything with Miller's name on it.

5. Yurek was evasive on many issues under the guise of budget confidentiality, but was happy to slag Toronto/TTC for cost overruns on projects without acknowledging that the Province has a goodly share of those too. He was not challenged on these claims.

6. Notably absent through the discussion was the fate of the existing system. Everything was about building new lines. But DoFo ran on uploading "the subway", not just new builds, and taking the cost of both construction and maintenance off of the city's hands.

7. Miller and others made the point about the importance of a network of lines. This speaks to existing rapid transit, new builds like Waterfront that are not part of Ford's plan, and to routes overall that serve more than a few corridors of interest.

8. People ride many bus and streetcar lines that will not be helped one bit by the big ticket rapid transit projects, and all riders depend on the existing system staying at least as good as is and improving their ride, their transit experience.

9. @spaikin mentioned the APTA Transit System of the Year award for the TTC back in 2017. That was for Byford's management plan, not for quality of service as it is so often misconstrued. Byford seemed to pursue this award as part of his "audition" for his NYC job.

10. It was good to hear @JeffYurekMPP say that the province does not intend to download costs on Toronto, but this could be sophistry if the costs and revenues left in city hands worsen the city's ability to fund and operate the TTC.

11. The contribution by @iamdavidmiller in the second segment was the most focused and it was refreshing to hear David back on the Toronto political scene.

12. Paikin made an amusing error when he referred to the boundaries of the City of Toronto as the Don and Humber Rivers. Try the Rouge and Etobicoke Creek.

13. Miller emphasized the "network" issue, but even here, there is a problem of terminology that most people thinks this means the rapid transit network, not the entire system of buses, streetcars and subways, and GO for that matter. Nothing in the provincial plan addresses this.

14. Moreover, cross-border travel 905-416 is a sore point that building new subways won't fix. Whether it's the Yonge extension or a much-improved GO corridor, Richmond Hill riders face the question of what should be an appropriate fare for their travel.

15. Possibly because this is a Toronto-centric debate about subways, nobody talked about the relatively poor quality of service on 905's transit systems. A truly regional system will require much better service "out there" and on routes that don't just exist as subway feeders.

16. The third segment https://www.tvo.org/video/debating-transit-planning-in-toronto … features the @TorontoRBOT 's @stateofthecity and @CodeRedTO 's @pkbwood . With a debate rather than a one-on-one, we see the do sides of "do we trust DoFo" question.

17. The Board of Trade wants more uploading to the province, although it is unclear that Queen's Park wants anything beyond a few subway lines and GO, and particularly not the cost of maintaining and improving local systems.

18. CodeRedTO fears that a governance model debate will avoid the basic question of what Toronto needs and how "who's in charge" will affect the transit riders see day to day. Both sides were bogged down in the debate about the new subway proposals.

19. @spaikin erred in a reference to the Waterfront LRT line as something @SidewalkToronto would "pay for". This is not correct. Sidewalk offers to finance the line, and then only the portion of it that directly serves their development (although this may have changed).

20. Financing the line is lending money to the city, which is not the same as "paying for" it. This is an important distinction. Back in @JeffYurekMPP 's piece, there was reference to how Woodbine GO Station will be built by developers of a nearby entertainment complex.

21. The cost of a GO station on an existing line is a fraction of the cost of a subway station on a new one, and this financing/funding model does not scale up to subway construction. Moreover, there's a lot of "in between" space on any line that will not attract developer $$$.

22/22 It was an interesting program to watch if only to see the positions each party takes, but there are many unanswered questions, and a better-informed interview might have brought out more details.