by

Mr. Tory’s Legacy

On February 17, I did an interview on CBC’s Metro Morning about the potential legacy of John Tory for Toronto’s transit system. Here is a link to my recording of it.

As and when CBC posts the interview on their own site, I will flip the link over to them.

8 thoughts on “Mr. Tory’s Legacy”

  1. An excellent 10 minute segment. I was unaware of this coming up on Metro Morning, and the interview mentioned with Keesmaat. Even though she isn’t running (unfortunately, albeit I can understand why not) her input on candidates’ platforms would be valuable to hear.

    Just found it!

    Steve: The Keesmaat interview ran Thursday, but was repeated Friday in the 5:30 to 6:00 am slot, and so I was able to refer to it when I was on at 6:10 assuming many listeners would have heard it.

    Liked by 1 person

  2. Having just listened to Keesmaat’s interview, many observations aligned with Steve’s. She stated “mixed” on Tory’s record. Steve stated “half empty, half full”. Same difference. Ditto on SmartTrack. Same points made from two vectors.

    I hope to hear a lot more from both Munro and Keesmaat before the election to add clarity and perspective to a lot of claims we’re going to be hearing. Transit is a crucial issue, but it can’t be viewed in isolation, as absolutely proven by the present security situation, and what it will take to address it, a huge part being housing and mental/social issues deteriorating.

    Policing isn’t the cure, not even a temporary fix. It’s ‘whack-a-mole’ at best.

    I was feeling pretty despondent on Toronto’s future, even though Tory had to go. Without meaningful discussion, we’ll end-up back where we started, with our transfer timed-out.

    Like

  3. The one thing John Tory was good at was making announcements. 5 or 6 days a week. Always announcing something. Talk, talk talk. But, says little. And, you always have to look for the asterisk * Whatever the count was for something he was promising it would actually be 10 this year, 10 next year etc. and the entire amount in 10-20 years!

    Liked by 1 person

  4. Mr. Tory did show a work ethic, and commentary on a wide range of issues, including transit. However, there’s a huge gap between Big Spending and wiser investment, and alas, we’re far more down the BS hole than smarter investments, which can and should include basic maintenance, and the $ums shouldn’t be always from milking the core, for developer’s benefits, and some of the political parties too. For me, all of the major projects are on the suspect side, and a 23-19 vote on Dec. 13, 2016 on amending EX20.2 to exclude more rationality on major transit projects was a salient ‘huh?!’ as why vote clearly to be irrational with the billions of tax dollars? But as per Steve’s interview (and glad we have public investment in news), we do need broader discussion of where we’re going, and how, and that should also include how private cars are given subsidies, and how those tend to be hidden, and diffused. “Carmunism”!

    Liked by 1 person

  5. The problem with John Tory’s announcements was that they were invariably expressions of his moral outrage at whatever new problem had hit the fan.

    I don’t doubt his outrage; he has always seemed to be decent person.

    But; he never appeared to realize that it was his job to offer workable solutions, or that Toronto was becoming an unpleasant mess, under his administration.

    Liked by 2 people

  6. Steve:

    John Tory passed a budget of take aways for TTC riders by raising fares and cutting service for working People. Seniors got spared. Service cuts mean driver layoffs and driving ridership to cars and taxis and uber. People working evenings have this choice left. Why did the council not wait for feds and the province for the money that was promised from the feds and the province, use some of their reserve for the service instead of cuts. Fare raise ok but not both.

    Council were afraid of Tory and his powers this was his legacy ruin [of] the City of Toronto.

    PS: I remember last August tracking new buses, where are they now? They should be adding service to bring people out of cars on to transit. That is the only way to bring people back after Covid.

    I listened to your CBC interview. You WERE Fantastic. You told it like it is. You were right on everything.

    Liked by 1 person

  7. It sure is uphill, including trying to get the idea we need investment, not big spending alone on capital works that can and likely will blight the entire system and City maybe, sigh, and let’s hope it’s not deliberate, thinking of the Star editorial that suggested every new rider on SSE will be at cost of c. $1.45M sum oops, and not $$$$ from Mr. Tory’s pockets.

    I was trying to get a bit of reading done to justify the tonnage and got to p. 82 of Steven Higashide’s Better Buses Better Cities, where there’s a suggestion that increased frequency of service does mean a better perception of safety, and yes, transit is a bit gendered (and I suspect that car driving is towards men, which can explain the high degree of subsidies and how they’re hidden, and why we can’t begin to get towards a basic vehicle tax not even at a ratio of anywhere close to fare-payings, though the cars are costly to run, yes).

    Thanks Steve

    Like

Comments are closed.