Mayor John Tory accused of ‘political posturing’ as Scarborough transit plans balloon by $1 billion

Updated cost estimates for a modified subway and LRT plan leave city $1 billion short on funding and councillors with unanswered questions about the justification for a subway

Thestar.com
June 17, 2016
By Jennifer Pagliaro

Plans for transit in Scarborough are now estimated to cost $1 billion more than promised, meaning residents may see just a single subway stop built for $2.9 billion.

Mayor John Tory’s continued support for that plan, despite the ballooning costs, raises questions about how to pay for the added cost of a $1.6 billion LRT line along Eglinton Ave. E. - part of a political compromise he championed just months ago as controversy mounted over whether a subway was justified.

Tory now faces increased pressure at council where his colleagues are calling the ongoing defence for a one-stop extension “political posturing.”

“Backing the Scarborough subway a year ago showed bad judgment. Backing it today shows incompetence,” said Councillor Gord Perks. “Council has never been asked to spend this much money to move these few people.”

With an updated transit report due out early next week, Tory’s office pre-empted the bad news by announcing the increased costs at a news conference Friday.

“My support for a subway connection to Scarborough has not changed,” said Tory. “We have the available funding to pay for this new optimized eastward extension of the Bloor-Danforth subway line.”

Tory said he’s also “determined” to move ahead with plans to extend the Eglinton Crosstown LRT out to the University of Toronto Scarborough campus. But now it’s not clear how the city would pay for it.

There is $3.56 billion committed from three levels of government to build transit in Scarborough. Now that the one-stop subway extension is estimated at $2.9 billion, only $660 million remains to pay for the proposed LRT line, which leaves the city about $1 billion short.

There no wiggle room in the existing budget for the city to raise that kind of money. Already, the city has $29 billion in approved but completely unfunded capital projects on its books, including a downtown relief subway line transit experts say is desperately needed to reduce congestion on the Yonge subway line.

With the Scarborough RT reaching the end of its life, the city signed an agreement with the province last term to build a seven-stop light-rail line. That LRT would have run in the same RT corridor, separated from traffic. The province promised to fund the entire $1.48 billion cost - half of the expense of the one-stop subway.

But in 2013, under former mayor Rob Ford, council scrapped those plans in favour of a three-stop subway from Kennedy Station to Sheppard Ave., estimated then to cost $3.56 billion.

This January, amid criticism that the cost of the subway was not justified when an LRT could better serve transit needs in the area, city officials and Tory announced a revamped plan. The “express subway,” as it was pitched, would cut costs by reducing the extension to just a single stop at the Scarborough Town Centre.

Chief planner Jennifer Keesmaat, praised by Tory for coming up with the plan, said the savings from fewer stations and tunnelling would allow the city to build an 18-stop LRT to the University of Toronto Scarborough campus. Tory called that sound planning, saying it made “huge strides” by providing more transit for the same money.

Since then, officials have released ridership numbers that show the number of future riders who would use the subway at rush hour, 7,300, would not only leave a subway 80 per cent empty but would be only half the capacity of an LRT.

Now, the costs have increased after engineering analysis revealed “technical complications,” according to information provided by the mayor’s office. Tunnelling would need to be deeper than expected in some areas and stations would need to be 45 to 95 per cent deeper than estimated, accounting for much of the extra cost for the subway.

In defending the one-stop plan Friday, Tory argued the three-stop subway that he adamantly endorsed during his 2014 campaign and fiercely defended until earlier this year was never justified.

“The original three-stop subway was approved by city council without the support of any planning or design work actually having been done. In fact, it was based on a sketch on a piece of paper given to the TTC,” Tory said.

While Scarborough councillors who have advocated for a subway at any cost flanked Tory on Friday, others said the new numbers only raise more questions.

“It’s time for city council to get real,” said Councillor Josh Matlow. “The facts have been kept underground for far too long and it’s nice to see the truth finally surface. If there’s an admission that there was no rationale for the three-stop subway proposal, then it’s hard to believe that spending almost $3 billion on one stop makes any sense at all.”

Councillor Paul Ainslie, the lone Scarborough councillor to vote against building the subway last term, said he didn’t support the plan then because of increasing costs.

“The cash register, I guess you could say, kept ringing,” he said. “The cash register’s still ringing.”

Councillor Anthony Perruzza, who backed the subway in 2013, says he would change his vote in favour of the LRT today.

“We should have stuck to that. It made eminent sense - fully-funded, paid for by the province, moved riders,” he said. “I think that the Scarborough subway just simply morphed into political posturing . . . the more you go along with this, the worse it gets.”

Others like first-term councillor Jon Burnside say they need more information to make up their minds. He said he’s “certainly not” committed to the mayor’s plan.

Ontario’s Minister of Transportation Steven Del Duca said the province remains committed to the subway extension, but promised no additional money to build it.

Tory said they would look to the private sector “and others” to potentially reduce what he called “preliminary” costs.

TTC CEO Andy Byford said a third-party already helped with the engineering estimates to look at creative solutions for tunnelling or station design.

“I welcome the suggestion of having a third party at least review our costs because we want to make sure that we’re being as efficient as possible,” Byford said, adding: “I want to deliver the Scarborough subway for the best possible price.”

But asked if it’s realistic to expect hundreds of millions of dollars could be shaved off the costs, Byford said: “I think that would be a challenge.”

CHANGING COST ESTIMATES

$1.48 billion: Original estimated cost of seven-stop LRT

$3.56 billion: Original estimated cost of three-stop subway extension

More than $2 billion: Original estimated cost of one-stop subway extension

$2.9 billion: Revised estimated cost of one-stop subway extension

$1.6 billion: Estimated cost of 18-stop LRT along Eglinton Ave. East