Stintz says province’s Scarborough subway plan falls short

While the residents of Scarborough continue to wait for a transit plan to get on track, the political wrangling continued on Wednesday, with TTC Chair Karen Stintz expressing her displeasure with the province’s two-stop subway extension proposal.

Stintz emerged from a Wednesday meeting with Premier Kathleen Wynne saying the plan rolled out recently by Transportation Minister Glen Murray “doesn’t meet council’s objective, which was a subway to Sheppard.”

Murray said the government would put up $1.4 billion to build two stops at Lawrence and Scarborough City Centre stations.

The proposed route will be 6.4 kilometres long and will run from Kennedy along the current Scarborough RT route.

The money will fund only two-thirds of the subway line city council approved and is $400 million less than what was promised for the original plan to build light-rail transit (LRT) there.

Stintz continues to back council’s original plan to extend the subway all the way to Sheppard.

“There’s a concern there in terms of what type of service the residents of Scarborough are receiving out of this (Murray’s) proposal,” Stintz said Wednesday after meeting with Wynne.

She also said Mayor Ford wants the subway extended to Sheppard.

“The mayor is supporting council’s plan…I think he is recognizing that better service for Scarborough means extending transit to Sheppard.”

Stintz also said Metrolinx told her the city would be “responsible for any overruns on the project.”

“(That’s a) concern because the Murray plan doesn’t include key components like subway cars, power and signal systems. Those elements are quite costly, so it’s unclear whether the city is expected to pick up the costs that weren’t included in those plans.”

To complicate matters, the city has a master agreement in place with the province specifying an LRT would be built instead of a subway. If they can’t agree on a subway plan before a September 30th deadline, that original plan could kick into place.