Mayor’s subway disconnect

Re A strange place for a subway, June 1 Mayor John Tory is concerned that the proposed Scarborough subway route will jeopardize his SmartTrack and wants the route of the former changed at great expense. A much simpler solution would be for city hall to cancel the expensive subway and instead return to the LRT, which is much cheaper and would service a larger population.

Public transport is supposed to transport the public and the LRT would do it better. Barbara Harrison, Toronto This article shows again that there is not sufficient ridership, regardless of the route, to warrant a Scarborough subway. This is even truer given the proximity of John Tory’s SmartTrack to the proposed routes. Yet Mayor Tory continues with his big lie — that he will do what is “rational” — when in fact his actions are all about buying the Scarborough vote. Peter Pinch, Toronto Let me get this straight, our new mayor, a fiscal conservative, wants to: build the hybrid Gardiner Expressway, price tag $414 million (plus $500 million to maintain); build a “Smart” railway line around the city, price tag $8 billion; and install a new subway under a leafy Scarborough street, price tag more than $360 million (on top of the initial $3.3-billion estimate).

I never thought I’d say this but, bring back Rob Ford. Ben Bull, Toronto So we’re embarking on building a subway in sprawling Scarborough, and maybe rebuilding a highway downtown despite the numbers being against both mega-projects, and the reality that it would be anomalous for city-building and would also ignore pressing needs for those billions in other civic things, including maintenance. Am I alone in having some “beam-me up” moments? Hamish Wilson, Toronto