Road tolls, hotel tax needed to fund $33B in projects: Tory
Posted November 24, 2016 2:34 pm.
Last Updated November 24, 2016 8:31 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Toronto Mayor John Tory says road tolls on two of the city’s highways and a hotel tax are needed to help fund transit and other much-needed projects in the city.
“A road toll on the DVP and Gardiner Expressway of just $2 would raise the City of Toronto more than $200 million every year,” Tory said at a noon-hour address at the Toronto Region Board of Trade on Thursday.
All drivers would pay the toll – not just those living in the 905 area.
“These tolls would be paid by those who drive in and out of our city as well as by our local 416 residents, sharing the burden among everyone who uses these city-owned and financed roads,” he said.
However, at a news conference after the speech, Tory would not commit to the toll only costing $2, saying there are different pricing models on the table.
Tory said the city has been under-invested over the years, from transit and infrastructure to housing, and that Torontonians are feeling it. He said there is a $33-billion list of projects that need to be built over the next 20 years to keep up with the growth in the city. One of them includes transit expansion.
“Traffic is a growing nightmare and the Number 1 fix is to give people more transit options so they can get out of their cars,” he said.
However, in order to get those projects funded, the revenue has to generated from somewhere.
In order for the city to obtain $200 million each year that it can collect from tolls, Tory said council would have to increase property taxes from 5 to 10 per cent, which he does not favour. Nor does he want to cut services, support a sale or partial sale of Toronto Hydro, or implement a parking levy and a vehicle-registration tax.
The $33 billion is not just for transit projects but also to construct new long-term care homes and flood-proof the Port Lands. He also pointed out that while the federal government is providing $840 million to fund transit, the city also has to match that number.
The mayor said he believes road tolls are fair and will give people a choice, lead to a positive impact, and would enable the city to designate the money directly towards things that the city needs.
Tory confirmed that money raised from tolls “would be directly invested in unfunded capital projects, starting with the expansion of our transit network.”
He believes that tolls would reduce travel times, ease congestion and encourage more people to take transit.
The mayor is also calling for a mandatory hotel tax to be applied to all hotels including Airbnb, which would raise $20 million a year.
Tory said he will be recommending road tolls and the hotel tax to budget chief Gary Crawford to implement in the 2017 budget.
He did not mention how long it would take for road tolls to take effect once approved, but that it would happen as SmartTrack and the GO network starts to expand. Earlier on Thursday, Crawford said that if road tolls are approved, it could two to three years to implement them.
“It is time for decisive action by city council,” Tory said.
Here are five other major cities around the world that have implemented tolls or congestion charges. The prices listed are for two-axle vehicles and have been converted into Canadian dollars.
San Francisco — Car drivers coming into the city on the Golden Gate Bridge must pay a toll fee of $10.12. Drivers with a FasTrak pass pay $8.77.
New York City — Cash tolls of $20 are collected for cars entering New York City on two tunnels and four bridges.
London — The United Kingdom’s capital charges a congestion fee of $19.33 per day to drive in central London on weekdays between 7 a.m. and 6 p.m.
Stockholm — The Swedish capital has a congestion charge for drivers on weekdays during the daytime, except during the month of July, with a maximum charge of $15.31 per day.
Singapore — Singapore has had an electronic toll collection system since the late 1980s in an effort to curb traffic. Prices for local cars that pass through certain checkpoints in central Singapore range from $3.01 to $3.58. Foreign vehicles are charged $32.97 per day if they pass through the checkpoints between 2 a.m. and 5 p.m. on weekdays. It is also an offence to keep a foreign-registered vehicle in the city for more than 14 days.
