Toronto Council debates Mayor John Tory's tactics on downtown relief line

YorkRegion.com
May 24, 2017
David Nickle

Toronto Council is debating the alignment of the downtown relief line and some funding to look at plans for an eventual Yonge Street subway extension into York Region.

But as debate got underway Wednesday morning, councillors were just as concerned with an alliance forged by Mayor John Tory with York Region politicians, to join the two megaprojects together — just days after he’d publicly said Toronto wouldn’t participate in the Yonge line extension project until the province had anted up 40 per cent of the cost of the relief line.

Tory made the announcement earlier this month when three York Region political leaders — Markham Mayor Frank Scarpetti, Richmond Hill Mayor Dave Barrow and York Region Chair Wayne Emmerson — came to meet first with him and then the Executive Committee to convince Toronto to back down from the position and join forces.

And at the May 23 meeting of Toronto Council, the wisdom of that move came into question.

Ward 32 Councillor Paula Fletcher, who was with Tory when he made the original threat to withdraw support, spoke strongly in favour of the alliance.

“I think the projects are joined together now,” said Fletcher, “Especially when the officials, the mayors and others came from the 905 and said we want to support you. We want to have them jointly funded and jointly built.”

Other councillors were more skeptical as they questioned staff. St. Paul’s Councillor Josh Matlow had earlier criticized Tory for surrendering a bargaining chip, and worried that the alliance could end with the Yonge line being built and the relief line being sidelined.

That would be a problem for Torontonians using the Yonge Street subway line, because the 10,000 daily riders from York Region would push the already overcrowded line well beyond capacity.

Staff agreed with Matlow that based on the evidence, the downtown relief line running from Pape Station south and west to the downtown was a bigger priority.

Under questioning, Mayor Tory said that the alliance with York Region didn’t mean that he was abandoning that priority.

“It’s better to have them as allies and not as enemies,” said Tory. “My concern is principally the relief line but the province should be funding them both.”

The debate continues.