Roads: Gardiner Expressway

[hawc]

An unwanted $919,000,000 rebuilding of an expressway.

Unwanted by you. Wanted by the majority of council democratically elected to represent the will of the people.

I love when UT can't accept the democratic process, "This isn't what people wanted!"

Uh... yeah it is.

 

[hawc]

Whats sad are these councillors long pass their expiry date are deciding

Term limits for councillors? Would get rid of just as many of lefties as righties. Wouldn't solve your problem.

 

[AlvinofDiaspar]

Unwanted by you. Wanted by the majority of council democratically elected to represent the will of the people.

I love when UT can't accept the democratic process, "This isn't what people wanted!"

Uh... yeah it is.

The will of which group of people? You have a decision made with no support by councillors from the area of the city where it will have the greatest impact. It is "democracy" only as far as it is defined under the rules of the game.

AoD

 

[LNahid2000]

That map's not even a good argument. Using that, you can say the portion of 427 south of 401 has light traffic.
And, can someone do the math of how much money will have to be spent on maintenance during the 90+ years after the "hybrid" plan's carried out?

Its actually very accurate. I've taken the 192 bus at rush hour and gotten from Kipling to the airport in 15 minutes on the 427.

 

[Dan416]

I wanted the Remove option to win, but you can't deny that this was the democratic decision, and the residents of Toronto got what they wanted (even though both sides were pretty close).

It seems to me that people on here like to cherry-pick when they believe in democracy. If democracy holds up something they want, it's bad. If it holds up something they don't want, it's bad. Kinda the same as the OMB.

As much as people pretend to be principled, most of the time, they continue to act out of self-interest (however you define it).

 

[hawc]

Let me take a slightly different take on this,

First, council actually had the balls to make a decision and that really surprised me. It could be the right or wrong decision but frankly council has not had the guts to make many decisions of this kind over the last few years.

Second, let me suggest that the city versus suburb model is not applicable here. It is more applicable to view the city as a three cities model. There are the Outer 401 suburbs, the Inner 401 Suburbs, and the Central City. I suggested this model when we were analyzing the previous mayoral election. Tory represents not the suburbs, but the Inner 401 suburbs. His tenure as Mayor should be viewed as timely precisely because the greatest city building endeavours of our time are concentrated not in the declining Outer 401 suburbs (as in Ford's Term as Mayor) or in the Central city (that is the primary area of ascendancy in terms of growth and development) but in the Inner 401 Suburban wards. Not only is this timely, it is right. The central city is not and should not be the focus of the greater city at this time. The future success of the city will not be determined by the central waterfront or central neighbourhood densification but by the urbanization of the areas of the Inner 401 suburbs. The hyrbrid option in this exercise is the preferred option from an Inner 401 suburb perspective.

From a central city perspective I think it is hard to swallow my analysis above (I live in Downtown West) because central city people tend to want to view the city through an international lense and wanted this vote to be congruent with international trends and standards. Fair enough; however, I would remind us that time and time again Toronto makes such "backward" and unfashionable decisions and yet remains one of the top cities in the world in liveability, a liveability that does not end at Eglington or the Don Valley in it's calculation. Cities around the world may be demolishing or burying highways as is fashionable at our time but it does nothing to help them become more liveable than Toronto.

I think TrickyRicky is my new favourite poster on UT. Very eloquently said.

 

[11th]

Its actually very accurate. I've taken the 192 bus at rush hour and gotten from Kipling to the airport in 15 minutes on the 427.

Yep, and that part of the 427 is actually well used, definitely not "light traffic". I'd say well-designed as well, given how great it functions during rush hour, as you've mentioned here.

 

[hawc]

It is "democracy" only as far as it is defined under the rules of the game.

AoD

Those are the rules Western Civilization plays by. What rules do you play by?

 

[AlvinofDiaspar]

Those are the rules the Western World plays by. What rules do you play by?

There are other rules in politics that can be played as well. Rules around how democracy is implemented isn't static; nor are decisions made on only on one level of democracy. In any case, I am quite willing to take the long view on this issue.

AoD

 

[RC8]

If the city was not an incoherently amalgamated mess the decision would have been different and everyone (including inner suburbanites) would have greatly benefited, as every single study on the subject showed.

 

[hawc]

Condo developer will still develop this area at the same rate and pace as they're developing everything else. The Gardiner is no barrier. It just means it won't be a CityPlace style condo development but rather more of a SouthCore style.

 

[aquateam]

As a former San Francisco resident, I definitely find this vote stunning. Not that this land is nearly as prime as the Embarcadero, but still a shocking turn of events.

Awesome, I'd love to move to SF. They have their share of crazy proposals though. Didn't they just almost ban *ALL* development in the mission district because they thought that would somehow help rental prices?

Now SF had some pretty ridiculous city council members, but I have to say listening to the live stream of the debate, Toronto definitely has council members that are just shockingly unqualified. Policy positions that are inconsistent (Colle wanting to both maintain and sell it), speeches that are just incoherent (DiGorgio), a ridiculous desire to just not want to believe data (many of them when given a fact just made up their own version), Karygiannis (tunnels, tunnels, tunnels...why not throw in a monorail). And Tory was willing to do whatever it took to get his way...so much political capital expended. Amazing, embarrassing.

I don't think that maintaining and selling are necessarily contradictory positions. I see it as "Maintaining" but tolling to pay for it. Only rather than do the politically unpopular thing and directly propose tolls, you outsource the tolling to a corporation that can be blamed for charging users the true cost/price of the road. In the short term, you can point to the fact that there are no municipal outlays and to the one-time purchase payment as being a win for the city. In the longer term, you get a financial incentive for drivers to switch to transit and extra budget room (from not having the city pay for maintenance). Of course you're still stuck with an elevated highway in the downtown, taking up valuable waterfront land.

 

[Rainforest]

Mark Grimes (represents Humber Bay and a streetcar suburb)...

How can the presence of a single streetcar line, with rather unreliable service, define the whole riding? Buses probably carry several times more riders than 501 / 508 in that area.

 

[BurlOak]

You're kidding me. Is there seriously a 6% tax increase? I've never heard of this.

I sincerely hope you're joking

I think the number of $1B is not a Present Value.

Thus, $1B / 100 years / 1M residences = $10 / household / year.

If the average tax is $3333 - this works out to 0.3%

 

[11th]

I think the number of $1B is not a Present Value.

Thus, $1B / 100 years / 1M residences = $10 / household / year.

If the average tax is $3333 - this works out to 0.3%

We weren't even given the present cost of the hybrid option. How much does it cost without including the future maintenance cost? I don't think it's 1 billion.