TTC wants to charge developers who block traffic lanes

Thestar.com
Feb. 22, 2019
Ben Spurr

As Torontonians try to get around their increasingly congested city, there are few things that frustrate them more than poor transit service and construction-induced gridlock.

But the Toronto Transit Commission is hoping to leverage one to help alleviate the other, by compelling developers who block lanes of traffic to pay for the cost of running extra buses and streetcars.
The Toronto Transit Commission wants to be compensated by developers for the extra costs it incurs due to construction-related lane closures.

The city already charges companies that temporarily block a street as part of construction projects.

But according to a briefing note released by TTC staff Wednesday, the existing fees are based on foregone street parking revenue, and don’t take into account the effect construction has on transit service.

The agency says lane closures delay buses and streetcars, which leads to overcrowding unless the TTC adds more vehicles. The agency is asking council to approve a change to the lane occupancy fee program that would allow the city to charge developers for the cost of those additional vehicles, with the proceeds going to the transit agency.

In addition to helping the TTC recoup the cost of the extra service, the agency argues the fees might also spur developers to finish projects faster.

The proposed fee would “go a long way to help us with some of the challenges we’re facing on the surface routes as part of the TTC operations,” said TTC chair Jaye Robinson.

“I hear everyday about buses bundling and streetcars being delayed, and it’s unacceptable. So we have to use every tool in our tool kit to make sure this isn’t happening.”

Robinson, who is also councillor for Ward 15-Don Valley West, dismissed developers’ concerns about being hit with additional costs.

“If you want to play in the city, you have to pay,” she said.

TTC spokesperson Stuart Green said construction’s effect on transit service is difficult to quantify, and varies from year to year.

“However, when development-related construction blocks a lane on one of our routes, it often requires we deploy additional resources in order to maintain service levels related to frequency and crowding,” Green said.

He stressed that the fee would be “a cost recovery exercise only” and “would only be levied for the time the added service is required.”

The fees would be calculated by determining whether traffic delays resulting from a blocked lane would cause bus and streetcar service at existing levels to exceed the TTC’s crowding standards.

If the agency needed to add more vehicles to a route to ensure the standards aren’t exceeded, the developer would be charged the cost of the extra buses or streetcars.

The costs would include the wages of the vehicle operator, fuel, and vehicle servicing and incremental maintenance. and work out to $97 an hour for a bus and $110 an hour for a streetcar, according to the TTC.

The transit agency says the fee change would generate $300,000 for the TTC in 2019, and $1 million when fully implemented in 2020.

The Building Industry and Land Development Association (BILD), the organization that represents GTA builders, developers, and renovators, opposes the proposed fee change.

“Currently BILD and our members are having difficulty with the lack of information to justify this TTC component,” Justin Sherwood, the organization’s senior vice-president of communications and shareholder relations, said in an email.

Without clearer information about how the fee will be applied, “we cannot support this proposed charge,” he said.

Sherwood said lane occupancy fees are already “substantial.”

“In a city where we have a housing affordability problem everyone should be concerned about adding additional costs onto new development that in turn drives up the cost of new homes,” he said.

He rejected the idea that the proposed charge would provide an incentive for developers to finish jobs quicker, saying it’s always in builders’ interests to stop occupying lanes as quickly as possible.

Council is expected to vote on the proposal in March as part of the city’s 2019 budget.