Rob Ford's Toronto

[nfitz]

Was building the bloor street viaduct with space for a subway later impractical?

Grossly impractical. Especially for the span that they never used the extra space for! I bet if you told the designers that it wouldn't be used for 50 years, even they would have thought it was impractical! Economically, the current value of providing infrastructure half-a-century away is near $0.

As for LRT's vs subways, I don't care which. Just bury them. If you want to get people out of their car and take transit, they need to be underground. No one will give up their car to stand in the middle of Eglinton in the dead of winter waiting for an LRT. They'd be willing to leave their car if they could wait underground where it's warm.

No one? Not one? I don't believe it. The future demand doesn't support subways. And where do you get the extra money to do this - it would cost about an extra $6 billion.

What's the point of giving Scarborough a surface LRT, if there would be enough volume to justify a subway in 20 or 30 years?

But there isn't. They use the demand 20 years in the future, and it isn't enough for subway.

We'll be barely finished paying off the LRT and we'll have to start paying for the burying of it.

Only because you've said the demand will be there in 20 years, when the experts say it won't.

Build it properly the first time. It only gets more expensive every day.

Built what you need the first time. If you don't need it for 50 years, you'll have ended up paying the entire cost twice ... because you'll have spent the cost of building it, just maintaining it for 50 years.

 

[JayBeeGooner]

Rob Ford's official statement on the budget.

http://www1.toronto.ca/wps/portal/t...310VgnVCM1000003dd60f89RCRD&vgnextfmt=default

Key points:

The DRL is a priority because once built, it'll replace the streetcar network

The Finch LRT must be buried(!)

And completing the Sheppard Subway.

 

[nfitz]

Key points:

The DRL is a priority because once built, it'll replace the streetcar network

The Finch LRT must be buried(!)

And completing the Sheppard Subway.

You forgot his fourth priority: Waterfront Rapid Transit.

Is this an actual speech? He must have been on crack if he said that.

 

[historydude2012]

Rob Ford's official statement on the budget.

http://www1.toronto.ca/wps/portal/t...310VgnVCM1000003dd60f89RCRD&vgnextfmt=default

Key points:

The DRL is a priority because once built, it'll replace the streetcar network

The Finch LRT must be buried(!)

And completing the Sheppard Subway.

It capitalised the F in the word faster. I guess that means an underground LRT on Finch would go even "Faster" than expected!

But not surprisingly it doesn't contain a word on how any of this will be funded beyond the infrastructure portion of the federal governments budget.

 

[calimehtar]

Of course Ford would want to use the DRL as an excuse to remove streetcars. Depending on the alignment I can actually see the DRL replacing the King streetcar, not that I would condone it.

I believe, though, that it is very important to preserve the Queen streetcar, in particular, regardless of the DRL. For one thing it covers territory that no DRL plan I have seen would include (east to Victoria Park, west to Mississauga).

But also it is a tourist attraction. The Queen streetcar is the best illustration I know of the benefit to the city, in some circumstances, of having above ground rail. A person riding the streetcar can see the most vibrant street in the city in a way that is much more dignified than a bus would be. In fact I think the traffic calming effect of the streetcar has had a positive impact on the neighbourhood. The same is true of the College streetcar as well, to a lesser degree.

Queen Street is not a street car drivers take to get from A to B. If you're driving on Queen Street, your destination is Queen Street.

 

[Riverdale Rink Rat]

RRR, Matt knows little about how the budget works. Check out my post on page 653.

Glen, I'm such a dupe that I actually went and looked at your post. You do not refute anything Matt says, and you misrepresent what he is saying. Matt 1, Glen 0.

And, yes, I get that the gross operating budget includes spending that's paid for by other people. I think that Matt is correct in saying that when other people pay for my drinks at a social, that shouldn't count as me paying for drinks, even though I'm drinking them. I understand that you believe that when it's the ROM paying for those drinks, and I also pay a ROM membership fee each year, that I should count that as drinks I've paid to consume -- I just paid for them through a different channel. I disagree.

(Now, ain't THAT just an overtaxed analogy, eh?)

 

[Glen]

At least you got being a dupe correct. Glen 2 RRR 0 Matt 0.

Did you know that Miller's net buget hides his use of ~400 million of reserves. I sure if he used them all in one year both you and Matt would applaud his ability to concurrently raise spending and lower taxes.

 

[nfitz]

Did you know that Miller's net buget hides his use of ~400 million of reserves. I sure if he used them all in one year both you and Matt would applaud his ability to concurrently raise spending and lower taxes.

How does the use of reserves or surpluses that both have been using, have any effect on a table of spending?

I'm not sure about the motive here on trying to redirect this elsewhere.

 

[Riverdale Rink Rat]

At least you got being a dupe correct. Glen 2 RRR 0 Matt 0.

Did you know that Miller's net buget hides his use of ~400 million of reserves. I sure if he used them all in one year both you and Matt would applaud his ability to concurrently raise spending and lower taxes.

It doesn't 'hide' anything. That's why it's the 'net' budget -- it's after everything has been taken into account. I get the ideological issue -- you want to have less money spent, as does Ford. You don't care where the money came from, because you don't want it spent. IMHO, pounding away at that issue is Ford's only issue that makes any sense at all, so I see why he does it. It doesn't mean I have to buy it.

Given the huge giveaway to the police, Ford needs to raise revenue or cut services elsewhere every year. Since he refuses to raise revenue, he needs to cut services. Luckily for him, the LTT gave him a cushion that he will now lose (as the market cools and he wilfully cuts it.) What's the next step, Glen? If you cut the LTT and it goes down anyway, how much will anti-tax Ford have to raise? Do you think his supporters are going to understand that it's the 'gross operating budget that matters' when the revenue gap has to come from higher property taxes? The mix of revenue sources will suddenly matter a lot whant it's LTT down 20% and property taxes up 5% (or whatever it will have to be to balance the budget.) Or Ford will take money from the reserves, make sure the net budget is lower than last year's, and switch charts!

 

[Glen]

That is not the issue. Matt pointed to the changes in the net budget as opposed to the gross as indication of control of spending. This is incorrect.

In the year that the LTT and VRT were introduced if Miller had increased spending by the same amount as they raised, the gross would change but not the net. Matt et al. Would have you belive that Spending remained the same.

 

[taal]

It capitalised the F in the word faster. I guess that means an underground LRT on Finch would go even "Faster" than expected!

But not surprisingly it doesn't contain a word on how any of this will be funded beyond the infrastructure portion of the federal governments budget.

Wow that's impressive and surprising !


Don't get caught up with the "removing street car lines" ... I mean lets be honest, if the DRL gets build, ridership on some of the various street car lines will obviously decrease. I think realistically only the east part will be built at the start, so I imagine ridership on King East / Queen East would decline.


Here's another thing ... don't get to excited ... the amount of money allocated for all Canadian cities is still a joke ...

 

[Riverdale Rink Rat]

That is not the issue. Matt pointed to the changes in the net budget as opposed to the gross as indication of control of spending. This is incorrect.

In the year that the LTT and VRT were introduced if Miller had increased spending by the same amount as they raised, the gross would change but not the net. Matt et al. Would have you belive that Spending remained the same.

One last try, then I'll stop. You have not read Matt's argument, or you're misrepresenting it on purpose. Matt said, "Since amalgamation, the part of the budget paid for with property taxes has increased from $2.5 billion to $3.7 billion. That represents an increase of about 2.6 per cent per year, which is pretty darn close to matching the rate of inflation.

Under Miller, the average increase was about 3.1 per cent per year. Under Ford, that increase has been a bit smaller. He’s closely kept to the pattern set by Mayor Mel Lastman in his first term, with below-inflation increases that will probably have to be made up for with larger increases over the next decade. You can’t fight inflation for long.

But that’s just nerdy detail. The larger point of this graph should be clear. Increases to the net operating budget have been kept small for all of amalgamated Toronto’s history. And since the gross operating budget is at best a misleading metric, the whole narrative of out-of-control spending at City Hall starts to fall apart."

Matt et al. do not want you to believe that spending remained the same. They believe other revenue tools should be used to raise revenue and that revenue should be used to fund things (mostly transit and infrastructure, but we both know specific funding bleeds to general funding.) They want you to believe that the difference between Miller and Ford is mostly rhetoric, because under Miller spending on essentials was not really out of control. I want you to believe that those other revenues, spent on infrastructure and transit, are good things we should do to make our city better.

But, enough. I don't think I can persuade you, so I'll stop.

Cheers,
RRR

 

[Electrify]

Was building the bloor street viaduct with space for a subway later impractical? Was building RC Harris for double the original volume at the time impractical? Was building the subway all the way out to Warden impractical in the sixties? Warden was farm pasture back then.....

They can be called one of two things, impractical or forward thinking.

As for LRT's vs subways, I don't care which. Just bury them. If you want to get people out of their car and take transit, they need to be underground. No one will give up their car to stand in the middle of Eglinton in the dead of winter waiting for an LRT. They'd be willing to leave their car if they could wait underground where it's warm.

What's the point of giving Scarborough a surface LRT, if there would be enough volume to justify a subway in 20 or 30 years? We'll be barely finished paying off the LRT and we'll have to start paying for the burying of it. Build it properly the first time. It only gets more expensive every day.

1. People in Los Angeles, Calgary, Portland, Dallas choose to take LRT over driving all the time. And these cities are far more car oriented than Toronto. In Europe, LRT has provided rapid transit for cities like Frankfurt, Hanover, and Amsterdam.

2. That said, I am hesitant to refer to these new lines as LRTs. While they are certainly a step above the current streetcar network, they are currently planned with too many stops to be considered rapid transit. They are more like European tramways like those found in London and Paris, than true rapid transit LRT lines. Unfortunately thanks to people like Ford, the debate has devolved into a strawman of subways versus light rail, rather than what KIND of light rail we should be building.

3. The problem with subways is not only are they too expensive to build unless there is enough density, but that they are getting too expensive to build PERIOD! The only places which are constructing new subways are in Asian cities with poor labour conditions. Everywhere else cities are building light rail or are expanding on their current network at or above grade. Besides the current subway projects in Toronto, the Vaughan extension and the Eglinton tunnel, I am willing to bet that most rapid transit expansion will not occur underground. This includes the Yonge north extension and the Downtown Relief Line.

 

[Glen]

I have read it. What Matt offers is a red herring. Which you, and others are glad to follow. The net budget can be changed with no change in spending.

Ford said look at the gross budget and see how spending has been controled. Matt says spending has risen nearly the same as under Miller. Pointing to the net budget. Ignoring how the change in the net budget did not reflect revenue from resreves, garbage fees, LTT and the VRT. Matt missed the point, as you have.

 

[RC8]

Rob Ford did not campaign on that, though. I understand that right-wingers immaturely and dogmatically like to celebrate less government spending even when it's clearly for the worse (much like many left-wingers celebrate the nationalisation of everything and anything), but during all of Rob Ford's campaign he insisted there would be no service cuts, and that he would use taxpayer's money more efficiently.

“services will not be cut, guaranteed.”

Ford Nation's 'favourite graph' does not show in any way that he has made a more efficient use of taxpayers' money. It merely shows that the city has turned down funding alternatives from various sources and for various projects.

At the end of the day, what has Ford done to improve the life of Toronto's poor in the past few years? What has he done to increase the standard of living? What has he done to solve the real problems facing our city?

Are drivers better off? Are cyclists better off? Pedestrians? Homeless people? Businessmen? Start-ups? Seniors?

Ford has spent all his time and energy pursuing impossible to fund fiscally irresponsible projects like the Scarborough subway, and trying to cut costs for the sake of it. In a few years' time people will continue to pay the same amount of tax that they were paying before Ford came along, but won't be able to enjoy an array of services and infrastructure that he has blocked or delayed.

Only someone profoundly disconnected with the reality of Torontonians and incredibly ignorant of basic economics could arrive at the conclusion that the past term under Ford has been well-spent.