[URBAN NOTE] "Why We Need to Focus on Expanding Rail Networks"

[rfmcdonald]

Torontoist's Tricia Wood argues in favour of a much better rail network for not just the Greater Toronto Area, but all of southern Ontario.

I just spent a week in London—the really big one, in the United Kingdom. There are many lessons to learn from such a large and complex transit system as London’s, but what stood out to me was how well-connected the city is to everywhere else.

Here in Toronto, we have nothing that compares to that. Not even close. Regional intercity transit is one of the weakest links in the transportation network in southern Ontario. It reveals our politically lazy reliance on the car to get us everywhere we want to go.

Over-reliance on the car is an important environmental issue. It’s also an economic one. Toronto, the greater Toronto region, and all of southern Ontario each has much unrealized economic potential. Our subpar productivity is routinely noted.

Southern Ontario contains several important cities: Toronto, Hamilton, Kitchener, Waterloo, London, St. Catharines, Windsor, Barrie, Mississauga, Brampton, Kingston, and Ottawa. The area has a combined population of over 12 million, which is over 90 per cent of the province’s population.

Train service throughout the region is pretty limited. To or from Toronto, you can take commuter GO trains to Barrie, Brampton, and Mississauga.