Rocket.
Passengers wait for the doors to close on the new subway train. Toronto Council has revitalized Transit City and unearthed the Scarborough-Eglinton Crosstown LRT line in the east end, in a 25-18 vote Feb. 8 that usurped Mayor Rob Ford’s subway-only transit plan.
Staff file photo/DAN PEARCE
Toronto Council has revitalized Transit City and unearthed the Scarborough-Eglinton Crosstown LRT line in the east end, in a 25-18 vote that usurped Mayor Rob Ford's subway-only transit plan.
Ford called the vote "technically irrelevant" after the day-long meeting in which he urged councillors to wait a month before rendering a decision on his plan to use public and private sector money to build a subway along Sheppard Avenue.
But the majority of councillors, led by TTC Chair and former Ford ally Karen Stintz, made the call for a new transit vision.
Council has asked that the $8.4 billion Scarborough-Eglinton Crosstown shave about $2 billion off its cost by running the line along the surface of Eglinton Avenue east of Laird Drive in Leaside to Kennedy station in Scarborough. It has suggested the money saved go toward building a light rail line along Finch Avenue West from Keele Street through to Hwy. 27 in Etobicoke.
And council has asked to set up a panel of experts to assess Ford's Sheppard subway plan and report back to council on its viability.
- David Nickle