Secret transit deals totally sickening

Private political finagling done to ensure GO Transit stops for Kirby, Lawrence Avenue East

This week, I regurgitated the bile I had swallowed over transit planning in the region.

The catalyst was news that approval of new GO transit stops in Kirby and at Lawrence Avenue East came only after provincial transportation ministry pressure; Kirby is in the minister’s riding and the Lawrence stop is needed for Mayor John Tory’s dubious plan.

I could taste again the bitterness formed over three decades of reporting the half-truths, secret deals and political interference that has sullied the transit planning process in Greater Toronto.

Metrolinx, the arm’s-length agency that is supposed to give us the unvarnished truth about transit options and decide on which ones best serve the region’s needs, was co-opted on this file, documents suggest.

We always suspected this, even though stellar public servants, such as Anne Golden, sit on the board.

But now comes the evidence that Metrolinx, at first, did not approve the two stations because a consultant’s analysis showed the system would lose riders, not gain, by spending the $123 million to add those stations to the network. Then Metrolinx officials reversed the decision after interference from Steven Del Duca’s ministry, with supporting documents subsequently altered to downplay the earlier concerns.

The political finagling was done in private, unknown to the public, until a freedom of information request from Star reporter Ben Spurr unearthed the truth.

But worse of all, few of us care enough to raise an eyebrow once the underhanded manoeuvring became public; Del Duca easily deflected concerns.

Tory continues to defend his position on SmartTrack. And Metrolinx chair Rob Prichard ignored requests for comment, responding with a one-word, “Yes,” to Star queries about whether he stood by the station-approval process.

This proves again how sedated we have become on the transit file.

We are not surprised that politics trump good planning, because we have seen it play out with the Sheppard Subway, the subway extension into Vaughan and also one proposed to the Scarborough Town Centre.

Cynical and skeptical we may be. But not agitated or resentful enough to demand better. We fall back into acceptance. But censorious vituperation and raw anger is needed.

I have long felt that righteous indignation might stop this madness and prevent Toronto from wasting billions of dollars in the worthy quest for transit improvements. The minister should resign.

And the civilian overseers at Metrolinx, starting with chair Rob Prichard, should be sent packing.

There is enough evidence of shoddy, misleading, unsupportable, politically motivated, damaging and wasteful decisions to sustain outrage for months on end . . . until the culprits start taking heed.

That came to mind when it was reported that Toronto’s chief planner Jennifer Keesmaat was moving on from the city at the end of September. Keesmaat did save us from the more damaging aspects of Tory’s transit plan, a scheme so obviously flawed that she risked being fired rather than endorse SmartTrack as it was proposed. She made it palatable, but not healthy. Now, even her improved version is being exposed as bad for transit in the corridor.

You have probably tuned out long ago, but a quick recap reminds us of the madness that flowed from the simple task of modernizing and replacing the Scarborough RT line, running from Kennedy subway station up to the Scarborough Town Centre at McCowan and the 401.

Instead of modernizing the RT (see Vancouver), Mayor David Miller proposed a LRT network and Queen’s Park agreed to pay the $1.7-billion price tag. Obviously, there was a stop at Lawrence Ave. E. But madcap Mayor Rob Ford bellowed “subways, subways, subways!” and had council abandon the funded LRT for a nearly $3.56-billion, unfunded subway.

But wait! New Mayor John Tory wins the election on a proposal to build SmartTrack, with a Lawrence station right next to the now-subway station at Lawrence. Keesmaat and everyone else knows you don’t need a subway stop and a SmartTrack (GO) stop cannibalizing each other in a corridor that barely has enough riders for an LRT stop.

So Keesmaat masterminds a deal that moves the subway east to McCowan, with no stop at Lawrence. Alas, Metrolinx studies showed that, even with the compromise, a Smart-Track GO stop at Lawrence isn’t warranted, and would have the system lose riders because it would slow down the GO commute. Of course, Tory and Del Duca can’t take no for an answer. Kirby is in the minister’s riding. And Tory needs the Lawrence East GO/ SmartTrack stop to claim his gutted SmartTrack plan remains viable. So Metrolinx acquiesced. How refreshing it would be if, at least now, freed of the constraints of the mayor’s office, Keesmaat could say clearly how disastrous the mayor’s designs were and how conflicted and less than ideal her compromised one-stop subway solution is.

Yes, it’s asking a lot of a bureaucrat who has a long career ahead and is concerned about the repercussions. But if the Toronto region is to be rid of these political charlatans and their schemes, it will take courage from the civil servants and bureaucrats who prop them up.

And it will take a more vigilant and determined press. Royson James’ column usually appears Saturday. Email rjames@thestar.ca