Hi everyone:
Just a reminder that you have until June 18 to make your voice heard to Metrolinx. Please write or email, and copy our local politicians. Also please sign the Clean Train Coalition petition here: http://www.cleantrain.ca/petition.php
Cheers!
Keith
Here is the letter I wrote today:
Dear Metrolinx:
I am a concerned citizen living near the rail corridor (near Dundas and Bloor). I cannot support the use of diesel for the rail vehicles, with the associated noise and health effects. In my mind, electrification is the only viable option, and certainly it is one that a country and a city of our calibre should be able to implement. Diesel was fine several generations ago, but we should be moving forward, not backward!
Further to this, I am opposed to the entire notion of these trains “blasting through” our neighbourhoods solely to get to the airport quickly. Aside from the fact that it will pollute our neighbourhoods with noise and fumes, it will make the Railpath a very unappealing route for cyclists.
We risk missing a fantastic opportunity to combine this worthy project with the Downtown Relief Line, which proposes an actual subway running from Dundas West Station to Union Station and up the other side to Pape along the existing rail corridor.
Extend this subway up through the Junction and Weston and out to the airport, and you will have a fast, electric-powered line that actually serves the communities that it affects. The positive spinoffs, especially for underserviced neighbourhoods like Weston, amply justify such an approach.
What you have now is a proposed diesel fixed link that:
• is widely opposed, especially by those who live near the corridor;
• cuts through our neighbourhoods but doesn’t serve our neighbours;
• serves a single purpose;
• will likely negatively affect property values and therefore city income;
• will pollute our neighbourhoods with noise and diesel fumes;
• is unnecessarily expensive, virtually guaranteeing that those who live near the few stops provided will not use this method to go downtown;
• can only become more expensive to operate as fuel costs increase in the future;
• uses what, in 2009, can only be described as an antiquated technology.
What you can have is a subway that:
• is welcomed heartily by those who live near the corridor;
• serves the neighbourhoods it affects;
• serves many purposes;
• will certainly increase property values and therefore city income;
• does not pollute the air;
• can operate at TTC fares because it will be widely used by the citizenry;
• has the possibility of being permanently inexpensive because its cost of operation will not be exclusively tied to fossil fuel costs;
• can be described only as visionary.
At one of your open houses, I was told that this idea was not on the table because it would increase the amount of time it would take to get out to the airport. To which I say, so what? People ride the subway because it’s quick, and don’t call for stops to be removed because they slow things down, because they know that the subway’s purpose is to serve everyone. Most major cities have subway connections to their airports, and travellers use them without complaint because they are convenient.
The opportunity exists to create a transit line that could serve hundreds of thousands of citizens, rather than an exclusive (and unnecessarily expensive) fixed link that would treat the western neighbourhoods of Toronto as an impediment. This is a regrettably narrow vision.
The cost of a one-way trip on this system could be reduced to existing TTC rates if the project were indeed treated as a subway, with sufficient stops to serve the citizenry of Toronto.
We have been without a fixed link to the airport for all these years; a few more years delay would be very acceptable if the result were truly visionary. I urge Metrolinx to take its time, consider these possibilities carefully, and be visionary rather than expedient.
Thank you very much,
Keith Denning
23 Herman Avenue
Toronto, Ontario
(just a stone’s throw from the corridor)
