[URBAN NOTE] "Scarborough Residents Talk Transit"

[rfmcdonald]

Desmond Cole's Torontoist post last week covering a city-organized meeting on mass transit in Scarborough, the easternmost former municipality of Toronto, was interesting. Scarborough is famously distant from downtown Toronto, not only in terms of geography but of removal from the TTC.

After some introductory remarks by staff, attendees began to discuss how the City could go about improving the way it moves people and goods across the region. Norm Feder, a retired Scarborough resident who primarily uses a car, spoke up. “Improving the travel experience for commuters is my number one priority,” he said. He added that he’d like to see developments along public-transit corridors be planned in better consultation with existing residents. “The City and the province have to co-ordinate development instead of doing it unilaterally,” he said.

Others, like Guled Arale, a student and public transit advocate, argued in favour of density and an accompanying transit network as a way of addressing inequality. “People use cars not because they choose to drive,” Arale said of residents in Scarborough, “it’s because they need to drive. We need to think about building communities where people can live and work without going across or out of the city.” He favoured more walkable communities and transit connections within Scarborough.

The scale of new developments was a recurring theme throughout the evening, one that Councillor Shelley Carroll (Ward 33, Don Valley East) addressed. “Look at how long it’s taken us to build what [former mayor] Mel [Lastman] promised us,” she said, referring to development along the Sheppard subway line. “It’s a huge challenge to develop with density because many people don’t want the buildings, but they also don’t want taxes for transportation.”

Carroll agreed with a comment from one of the City staff members at the consultation, who said that the cancellation of the vehicle registration tax has made Torontonians wary of future City levies for transportation. “The mayor doesn’t seem to accept that the streams of revenue need to match the projects we want to build,” Carroll said. She accused the mayor of “playing political football with revenue tools other municipalities are embracing.”

Rob Hatton, a corporate financing staffer with the City, noted that since Metrolinx is expected to release on a report on how to fund transit in the GTA, now would be a bad time for Toronto to begin its own conversation about taxes and fees for transportation. “We’re not going there,” Hatton said bluntly. He pointed out that one quarter of the approximately $2 billion Metrolinx plans to raise annually will come back to municipalities to fund their priorities.

John Taranu, a volunteer with Cycle Toronto told staff that “the first consideration of any transportation network should be safety.” Taranu noted that Toronto’s public transit network is generally safe, but walking and cycling is often very dangerous, especially at large intersections and near highway on- and off-ramps. “Sometimes it’s very hard for people, especially seniors, just to get across the street in one light,” Taranu said. Cycle Toronto is pushing Metrolinx and the City to include considerations for cycling in all its consultations.