By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON, ON September 12, 2011 It looks like it might be choo choo Dalton. The Premier of Ontario, Dalton McGuinty, told the Toronto Board of Trade today that his government was going to create 68,000 GTA jobs as the province expands GO train service.
“Our goal is to build a high-skills, high-wage Ontario economy. To get that, you need to keep goods and people moving,” said McGuinty. “That’s why we’re expanding GO train service to two-way service, all day, on all corridors.”
Two way service – all day. What exactly does that mean? Will we see a schedule during the off peak hours that is better than the basically hourly service we have now? This government is throwing the words jobs, jobs, jobs around like curses in a grungy bar. A little more detail please. We get that we have an economy that is under a little stress. And there are people out of work – we have something in the 7%+ unemployment range – so new work is good.
Improved GO service is another election promise. Mark that one down and see if they come through on it. Will this promise take as long as the hospital to come through ? And by the way the hospital funding is just that at this point – a promise.
The upgrade to the GO service will mean jobs in construction and engineering. Good high paying jobs – but there were no times lines attached to the announcement.
According to the Premier there are some 45,000 people from communities like Hamilton, Barrie and Oshawa take the GO train to Union Station. If all those people drove to work instead of taking transit, the GTA would need to build four more Gardiner Expressways and four new Don Valley Parkways to accommodate the extra cars. We certainly get how packed those four lanes on the QEW are and what a mess when there is an accident.
All good news – but why do we have to have an election to hear all this good stuff?
The Premier said the province has invested $4.7 billion since 2003 to build new lines, improve stations, add new trains and increase service. Now, there are 12 million more people riding GO than in 2003 — a 28% increase. Today, 94% of all rush-hour trains are on time and passenger satisfaction with GO is 82% — up from 59% a year ago.
The Premier used the occasion to remind us that the last PC government recklessly gutted transit — and made a mess of GO Transit in particular. First, they downloaded GO to the municipalities, then uploaded it again. Now, the Hudak PCs are at it again. They have a $14 billion hole in their platform — which would mean deep cuts to transit at a time when transit is most needed.
The last NDP government also cut GO service and now would introduce a crushing $9 billion in job-killing taxes.
Those are acceptable comments during an election. Are they true ?
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