[URBAN NOTE] "Hosting Toronto Expo 2025 would cost $1.9 billion: consultants"

[rfmcdonald]

The idea of a Toronto Expo 2025, as described by the Toronto Star's Jennifer Pagliaro, does have a certain appeal to me. There's also the obvious issue as to whether this would be money well spent.

Hosting Expo 2025 in Toronto will cost $1.9 billion, according to consultants paid for by the private sector interested in hosting the world fair.

“We’ve come together because we share a passionate belief that Toronto, Ontario and Canada should launch a bid to host Expo 2025, “Claire Hopkinson, CEO of the Toronto Arts Council and co-chair of Expo Canada’s steering committee, told a press conference at city hall on Friday.

She was joined by several business leaders, including Nicholas Thadaney, president and CEO of Global Equity Capital Markets, TMX Group.

Hopkinson called the report an “extraordinarily good news story,” claiming Expo would result in a $4.37 billion boost in the national GDP and $1.26 billion in tax revenues.

But the cost does not include the nearly $1 billion required to make the Port Lands in the city’s east end developable, including flood protecting the area, or needed investment in transit infrastructure like a waterfront LRT line or GO Station at the former Unilever site — both which have yet to be funded.

And with more than $30 billion in approved but unfunded capital projects already on the city’s books — including rebuilding the Gardiner Expressway and a subway relief line — it is unclear how the additional $1.9 billion needed to host the world fair would be found.