Premier Kathleen Wynne has denied a request by Toronto city council to impose tolls on the Don Valley Parkway and Gardiner Expressway.
Instead, the province is increasing municipalities' share of the existing gas tax from two cents/litre to four. The change will be phased in starting in 2019 with the process completed in 2021.
Premier Wynne swears her rejection of tolling the DVP and Gardiner isn't some quick trick to improve her standing in the polls.
She insists it's about giving municipalities what they need, better transit option. "There are not enough choices in place and that is the point we are making today. The decision has been made listening to people, not just from the 905, but people from other parts of the province."
Wynne argues there's a big difference between the road tolls Mayor John Tory was seeking and the tolls put in place on provincial highways. "The reality is that if you look at the high occupancy toll lanes that we're putting in place there's a choice, you can either drive in that lane or not drive in that lane. If you look at the 407, there's a choice; you can either drive drive on the 407 or you can drive on the 401."
"In all of my conversations with Mayor Tory I've talked about the need for options and I've talked about timing. Right from the beginning of this process I've talked about those conditions that needed to be in place and they're not in place," she adds.
Mayor John Tory was clearly frustrated while responding to the news. "It is time that we stop being treated, I stop being treated as a little boy going up to Queen's Park in short pants to say 'Please could you help me out with something that I thought was in the City of Toronto Act that I could do?' and to be told 'No. I am terribly sorry, go away and come back some other day.' when houses are falling down and having to be closed up, transit needs are not being met, traffic is in chaos. That is just something that is a reality that has faced my predecessors and it faces me now but I am not giving up."
Tory argues Toronto is a global metropolis with needs that go way beyond and are more complex than cities and towns much smaller in Ontario. "I heard the minister refer this morning, in the same breath as talking about Toronto, to the bus service to Wawa and Sioux Lookout. Wawa has one bus and you call it to come to your house to pick you up. The notion that we would be compared, and I say this with no disrespect to these communities whatsoever, I've been in them all, but the notion you would compare the needs of a city of millions of people, that has millions of people going to work on transit and going to school everyday and the notion that we would be put in with them is part of the problem, here."
The City of Toronto currently receives about $170-million annually in gas tax revenue to go toward transit projects.
with files from Siobhan Morris