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The next Mussolini?
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Fire GO bosses if trains late: Tories
Jun 11, 2007 04:30 AM
Rob Ferguson
Queen's Park Bureau
There's one way to deal with GO trains that run too late, too often – fire the people in charge if the service can't regularly meet acceptable standards, Progressive Conservative Leader John Tory said yesterday.
GO trains will also have to serve more southern Ontario cities, perhaps as far away as Brantford and Niagara Region, to tackle gridlock in the GTA and beyond, Tory added yesterday in discussing plans to improve transportation if his party wins the Oct. 10 provincial election.
A wide range of fixes, including more buses on city streets and potentially more toll highways, would be funded by spending "every penny" of provincial gasoline and fuel taxes, about $3 billion a year, on better roads and transit within five years, Tory said.
He accused the Liberals of putting just $2 billion from those taxes into transportation.
Service delays at GO Transit over the winter and into the spring show a need for more accountability at the commuter rail line, he told the Toronto Star in an interview a day after releasing his party's 58-page election platform.
"I'd like to start by setting a standard and I'd like to start by saying the first consequence will be for people in the management of GO Transit," said the former chief executive of Rogers Cable.
"If they don't meet their own standard they'll suffer the same fate that other people suffer in business, which is you lose your job."
When GO celebrated its 40th anniversary in late May, managing director Gary McNeil called the past six months the most challenging he's had in seven years on the job because of delays caused by aging equipment, cold winter weather and labour troubles.
In terms of expansion, GO is already looking to restore service to Barrie by year's end and has long-term plans for new lines into Kitchener and Niagara, along with new locomotives and more double-decker buses due next spring to improve reliability.
The Liberals called Tory's plan to spend all fuel tax money on roads and transportation within five years "hardly ambitious" because, they say, the government has spent an average of $2.8 billion each year on those items.
Deputy Premier George Smitherman questioned how the Conservatives will pay for their transportation plans, which include a new east-west inter-regional transit line through the GTA for longer-distance commuters who don't need to stop downtown at congested Union Station.
"It's a wish list," said Smitherman, whose government's transit initiatives include extending the subway to York University and Vaughan. "He doesn't show us how he's going to get any of this done."
Tory said an accounting for his transportation and other promises will come after Ontario Auditor-General Jim McCarter releases his audit of the province's finances in the coming days.
A Conservative government would also look at options including bond issues to fund specific transportation projects and partnerships with private-sector companies to make the necessary investments, he added.
"We are really suffering in the Toronto area because we've sat around and been wringing our hands for 25 years about how we can't do things because we can't find the money. We've simply got to find the money from innovative sources," Tory said.
"I'm willing to look at any model that gets it done and that allows people to actually be putting their behind in a seat on a train or a streetcar because right now I think people are saying, `You guys talk about transit ... but nothing gets built.' I don't think we can carry on that way."
Link to article
Fire GO bosses if trains late: Tories
Jun 11, 2007 04:30 AM
Rob Ferguson
Queen's Park Bureau
There's one way to deal with GO trains that run too late, too often – fire the people in charge if the service can't regularly meet acceptable standards, Progressive Conservative Leader John Tory said yesterday.
GO trains will also have to serve more southern Ontario cities, perhaps as far away as Brantford and Niagara Region, to tackle gridlock in the GTA and beyond, Tory added yesterday in discussing plans to improve transportation if his party wins the Oct. 10 provincial election.
A wide range of fixes, including more buses on city streets and potentially more toll highways, would be funded by spending "every penny" of provincial gasoline and fuel taxes, about $3 billion a year, on better roads and transit within five years, Tory said.
He accused the Liberals of putting just $2 billion from those taxes into transportation.
Service delays at GO Transit over the winter and into the spring show a need for more accountability at the commuter rail line, he told the Toronto Star in an interview a day after releasing his party's 58-page election platform.
"I'd like to start by setting a standard and I'd like to start by saying the first consequence will be for people in the management of GO Transit," said the former chief executive of Rogers Cable.
"If they don't meet their own standard they'll suffer the same fate that other people suffer in business, which is you lose your job."
When GO celebrated its 40th anniversary in late May, managing director Gary McNeil called the past six months the most challenging he's had in seven years on the job because of delays caused by aging equipment, cold winter weather and labour troubles.
In terms of expansion, GO is already looking to restore service to Barrie by year's end and has long-term plans for new lines into Kitchener and Niagara, along with new locomotives and more double-decker buses due next spring to improve reliability.
The Liberals called Tory's plan to spend all fuel tax money on roads and transportation within five years "hardly ambitious" because, they say, the government has spent an average of $2.8 billion each year on those items.
Deputy Premier George Smitherman questioned how the Conservatives will pay for their transportation plans, which include a new east-west inter-regional transit line through the GTA for longer-distance commuters who don't need to stop downtown at congested Union Station.
"It's a wish list," said Smitherman, whose government's transit initiatives include extending the subway to York University and Vaughan. "He doesn't show us how he's going to get any of this done."
Tory said an accounting for his transportation and other promises will come after Ontario Auditor-General Jim McCarter releases his audit of the province's finances in the coming days.
A Conservative government would also look at options including bond issues to fund specific transportation projects and partnerships with private-sector companies to make the necessary investments, he added.
"We are really suffering in the Toronto area because we've sat around and been wringing our hands for 25 years about how we can't do things because we can't find the money. We've simply got to find the money from innovative sources," Tory said.
"I'm willing to look at any model that gets it done and that allows people to actually be putting their behind in a seat on a train or a streetcar because right now I think people are saying, `You guys talk about transit ... but nothing gets built.' I don't think we can carry on that way."
