Come clean on GO stations

It may be nothing more than a case of bad optics. But even the whiff of possible political interference in Metrolinx’s decision to approve the construction of two new GO stations — despite a study strongly advising against them — is just too pungent to ignore.

Call it coincidence, but one of the stops derided in the study, Kirby in Vaughan, is in Liberal Transportation Minister Steven Del Duca’s riding. His department also oversees the provincial transit agency Metrolinx.

The other, Lawrence East in Scarborough, has been championed by Mayor John Tory as part of the SmartTrack transit plan he campaigned on.

A secret report commissioned by Metrolinx with taxpayer dollars, and obtained by the Star’s Ben Spurr, determined that seven stations, including the two in question, were low performing and not worth pursuing for another decade. Of those, only Kirby and Lawrence East were approved.

While there’s no evidence that Del Duca or Tory did anything improper to secure the stations’ approval, Metrolinx should at least make a public case for why it approved the stations to clear the air of any appearance of political interference.

After all, not only is there a good deal of taxpayer money at stake, there are environmental and congestion considerations at play as well.

The Kirby station, for example, is expected to cost $125.7 million to construct and operate over the next 60 years. It was approved though the study found it wouldn’t attract many new riders even if politicians worked with developers to “maximize transit-oriented development” around it.

Worse, because adding a station to the line would increase travel time for “upstream” passengers, the study’s authors posited many riders would opt to drive instead, leading to 688.1 million kilometres of additional car travel on the region’s roads over the next six decades. The social costs associated with greenhouse gas emissions and traffic congestion resulting from that would total $374.4 million, the study found.

Still, Del Duca defended the stop as a way to prevent gridlock “that is choking our neighbourhoods and damaging our quality of life.”

That argument directly contradicts the report, which found the proposed Kirby station “does not generate any benefits related to vehicle kilometres travelled, vehicle operating cost savings, decongestion on the road network, safety impacts or environmental impacts.”

The study’s findings for Lawrence East were just as dismal. That stop is expected to cost $45.8 million. But according to the report, increased travel times generated by adding the station would result in a net loss of about 500 daily GO riders, as well as 181.7 million additional kilometres travelled by cars over the next six decades. The associated costs to society are estimated at $367.4 million.

In defence of the station, the mayor’s office told the Star the city’s own analysis shows Lawrence East would attract strong ridership.

There may well be a case to be made, but Torontonians can be forgiven for being skeptical. Del Duca says the Kirby and Lawrence East stops will undergo further study before they are built. He should be held to that promise. And unlike the Metrolinx-commissioned report, those studies should be made public to ensure that this time there is no appearance of political interference in the transit authority’s decisionmaking.

For too long, politics rather than good policy has determined transit decisions in this city. The mayor and the province have work to do to earn back the public trust. They can start by asking Metrolinx to explain exactly how this decision was made.

A study indicates two proposed GO stations in Vaughan and at Lawrence East don’t make sense financially or environmentally. But somehow the two stops were approved