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Miller will not be running for Mayor, How will this affect Public Transit?

Ansem

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http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/article/700915

Sep 25, 2009 10:24 AM
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Vanessa Lu
City Hall Bureau Chief

Citing the importance of family life and his record of accomplishments in office, David Miller said this morning that he will not seek re-election as Toronto's mayor next year.

Miller noted that his son and daughter were born after he was first elected to Metro Council in 1994, and said pressure on his personal life intensified after his election as mayor in 2003.

If he ran next year for a third term, his daughter Julia would be in university and son Simon graduating from high school, the mayor told supporters and media gathered at his city hall office.

"This would not have allowed me to be there for them in the way that they deserve," Miller said.

The outer lounge in the mayor's office was jam-packed with media and supporters from both his 2003 and 2006 campaigns.

Miller's campaign manager in 2006, John Laschinger, showed up along with Miller stalwarts on council including Janet Davis, Kyle Rae and Gord Perks.

Miller has been recently battered in the polls and in the media over his handling of this summer's 39-day civic strike.

A savvy lawyer, he was swept into office in 2003 after a hard-fought campaign against Barbara Hall and John Tory, using a broom as a symbol of his promise to clean up the city — from the influence of lobbyists to revitalizing the waterfront. He also vowed to kill a bridge to the island airport, a decision he said would ensure it remain a sleepy commuter airport.

Miller enjoyed widespread popularity in his first term, easily winning re-election in 2006 against Jane Pitfield, the only politician willing to throw her hat into the ring since he seemed invincible.

Fast forward three years, and the landscape has changed.

Tory, who had a stint as leader of the provincial Tories, is said to be seriously considering a second run. Just this week, he was picked to host the afternoon drive-home radio show on Newstalk 1010, a move viewed as a perfect perch from which to launch a campaign.

And George Smitherman, the feisty deputy premier, has also publicly said he is mulling his own bid. That's a change from earlier insistence that he wasn't interested in the job. During the strike, Smitherman even picked up his own broom to lead a citizen cleanup effort, declaring he was a man who knows how to operate a broom.

Miller had always insisted he wanted to be a three-term mayor, in part because that was the amount of time needed to bring about change to the city.

And he is certainly not one who shies away from a fight.

Earlier this month, when asked about what kind of candidate Smitherman would make, he refused to take the bait. "I'm sure in the next election I'll have an opponent, and look forward to debating the issues with whoever it is.

"There have been lots of people floated," he said, before going into what sounded like a stump speech, touting his record on environmental and transit issues.

Although Miller has been playing a bigger role on the international stage, in recent weeks he has also been sounding like a local candidate in election mode, ready to take on any challengers.

Last weekend, he had a jam-packed schedule, from opening a new section of the Martin Goodman Trail to the Bloor West Ukrainian festival to Eid festivities and the Urban Film Festival awards.

And the mayor, who has undergone a vigorous diet and exercise regimen, shedding 50 pounds and going below 200 pounds for the first time in 20 years, is eager to run his first half-marathon Sunday.
 
Maybe we'll get somebody who has better vision than Transit City!
Or maybe we'll get someone who focuses on tax cuts and guts transit service. I hope that we're past that possibility but it does worry me.
 
He's got another year - I think he'll try to get shovels in the ground anywhere he can. It's a lot harder to cancel a project once the work's started. (That's not to say it's impossible, though.)
 
Those are the project I think will be put on the spotlight:

Sheppard subway vs Sheppard LRT
-Without Miller, this is the perfect time to put pressure for a subway.

-The Willowdale councillor (better late than never) opposed the project and gave his support to complete the Sheppard Line. Other Scarborough and North York councillors might follow.


Bloor-Danforth Extension to STC
-Without Miller, maybe more councillors will step up and fight the RT renovations



DRL
-Although they started to see the light, too little too late. Miller should have put this as his #1 priority and the next mayor (I hope) will put this before Miller's #1...Sheppard East LRT

-Could this mean a more ambitious DRL that could go north on both side to Eglinton?



Eglinton Subway Vs Eglinton Crosstown LRT?


Miller was very efficient about pushing his transit plan. The way I see it, Miller had a huge influence over the council on public transit. With his departure, Giambrone's time is pretty much...up.

Without him, this leaves an opportunity to rethinks public Transit for Toronto. A first class city like Toronto (in the top 10 of Mclean's Magazine) needs a 1st class transit system.
I hope the next mayor sees that. Toronto needs ''much more'' rapid transit within the city.

People might think I'm anti-Transit city...No I really like the project but it should be use as an ''addition'' to a complete and efficient Rapid transit network and not as a substitute.
 
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He's got another year - I think he'll try to get shovels in the ground anywhere he can. It's a lot harder to cancel a project once the work's started. (That's not to say it's impossible, though.)
Remember that these are Metrolinx projects, so that gives them a greater degree of persistance from changes at the municipal level. The real danger will be cuts to the remainder of TC, plus TTC day to day operations (service levels, fleet renewal, maintenance, etc).

As for him having another year, does he? I suspect he may have a very long lame duck phase. No one is going to be looking to him for long term career advancement.
 
I hope the next mayor sees that. Toronto needs ''much more'' rapid transit within the city.
I agree. LRT (in the TC version, at least) has its place but we need better coverage for middle-distance trips across the city. But keep in mind that a new Mayor can only push Metrolinx to amend its plan.

EDIT: Just realized that the question should not be "how will Miller's retirement affect transit", because that is impossible to answer without knowing who the candidates will be. The question should be "How do we as transit advocates use Miller's retirement, and the interest it will engender in the next election, to push the cause of improved transit further"? The answer to that needs to include real world concerns about transit capital cost funding (e.g. the lack of a long term Metrolinx investment strategy, the city poor financial state, the province's recent deficit).
 
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I just hope people understand that this isn't some sort of dumb LRT vs subway ideological war. The other alternative to what we have now is literally nothing being built at all.
 
I just hope people understand that this isn't some sort of dumb LRT vs subway ideological war. The other alternative to what we have now is literally nothing being built at all.
In terms of current construction, yes; stopping Sheppard East or Finch or Eglinton is NOT going to happen.

However, there are future plans where adjustments can be made.
 
In terms of current construction, yes; stopping Sheppard East or Finch or Eglinton is NOT going to happen.

However, there are future plans where adjustments can be made.

You're right. The money is there, something will be built for sure.

How will it be built?
Without Miller, many changes are still to come.
 
I just hope people understand that this isn't some sort of dumb LRT vs subway ideological war. The other alternative to what we have now is literally nothing being built at all.

That's an ideological statement. Why is the choice always portrayed as Transit City or nothing? In the era of Metrolinx, why would an alternate vision of transit be seen as resulting in nothing being built? It might result in a delay. But that's not the same as nothing getting built.

I would add to that the significant growth of population in the GTHA and in other urban areas in Ontario and Canada is starting to change the mindset of higher levels of government. It's happened at the provincial level with McGuinty. And I am willing to bet that once the planned addition and reallocation of parliamentary seats happen (mostly focusing on urban areas), it will have the same effect at the national level. We just went through a provincial Conservative nomination process where the outlier candidate (Randy Hillier) proposed building the DRL and other subways. It won't be long before transit building is seen as less of a politically ideological (left vs. right) issue and more like a utility.
 
Randy Hillier probably had to be told that a subway wasn't just a place city-folk go to get sandwiches when their uppity wives won't make them for them.

I might be alone in this, but my gut instinct is that no serious candidate for mayor (i.e. no candidate that actually worries about delivering on their promises) is going to run the sort of full-bore referendum-on-Transit-City that a lot of people seem to have in mind.

Sheppard East will, in all likelihood, be a substantially-underway construction site on election day. I can't see "pave-it-back-over-and-start-tunnelling-instead" being the slogan to bring hordes to the polls. I certainly can't see "pave-it-back-over-and-start-tunnelling-instead" being the slogan to bring smiles to faces in Queens Park or at Metrolinx.

The DRL might be able to leapfrog up the priority list on the basis of a municipal champion, but I agree with those that say that the presence of Metrolinx (and to a lesser extent the timing of decision-making) has probably meant that changes to transit projects won't be the centrepiece of any platform.

What could plausibly crop up, though, are commitments from serious candidates to "end the War on the Car" or "Save the Gardiner-plus-Lakeshore." I could also see "upload that money-wasting TTC to Metrolinx" as a runner.
 
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That's an ideological statement. Why is the choice always portrayed as Transit City or nothing? In the era of Metrolinx, why would an alternate vision of transit be seen as resulting in nothing being built? It might result in a delay. But that's not the same as nothing getting built.

It's definitely not Transit City or nothing, but I do think people have to be careful about championing new candidates because they might be more pro-subway on TC routes. Having little-to-no transit development was the reality in this city for a very long time, and it could easily go back to that.

It's definitely en vogue these days for politicians to pay lip service to public transit, but getting things built is a different matter entirely.
 
Most people don't and won't know why Sheppard's under construction...they certainly won't make an election issue of it.

If any kind of serious review takes place, hopefully we'll end with something like a Jane Rocket overlaid onto the Jane bus route and the LRT built on Dufferin instead, which makes infinitely more sense. It wouldn't bring an LRT interchange to a priority neighbourhood like Jane & Finch, though, which Miller would have considered a dealbreaker.

I just hope people understand that this isn't some sort of dumb LRT vs subway ideological war. The other alternative to what we have now is literally nothing being built at all.

You can significantly improve transit without "building" anything - increase frequency on suburban routes, add POP, add express routes, etc. - but these actions tend to arise only when concern for actual transit users is greater than concern for empire building and ideology. Instead of running billions of dollars of LRT out to, for instance, raccoon country at Sheppard & Morningside, we can "do nothing" and greatly improve service by bringing stuff like express bus service to the area. Save the multi-billion dollar infrastructure for transit corridors and areas that can't be improved without multi-billion dollar infrastructure investments...the intersection of Sheppard & Morningside is not and will never be one.
 
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That's an ideological statement. Why is the choice always portrayed as Transit City or nothing? In the era of Metrolinx, why would an alternate vision of transit be seen as resulting in nothing being built? It might result in a delay. But that's not the same as nothing getting built.

I would add to that the significant growth of population in the GTHA and in other urban areas in Ontario and Canada is starting to change the mindset of higher levels of government. It's happened at the provincial level with McGuinty. And I am willing to bet that once the planned addition and reallocation of parliamentary seats happen (mostly focusing on urban areas), it will have the same effect at the national level. We just went through a provincial Conservative nomination process where the outlier candidate (Randy Hillier) proposed building the DRL and other subways. It won't be long before transit building is seen as less of a politically ideological (left vs. right) issue and more like a utility.

you're a 100% right. Done the road, public transit will have to be consider as an utility rather than left vs. right issues.

Besides, every big cities of the industrialized world are massively investing in public transit. Europe rapid transit is pretty much built that's why they are investing in LRT and streetcars.

Here in Canada, we're kind of late and we have to make up for the decades where neglected our rapid transit network. LRT have it's place in Toronto but not as an alternative to rapid transit but as a complement.

Governments have neglected this for far too long and if they want their cities to perform at an international scale, it's their reponsibility to find ways to fund public transit.
 

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