mini-mid pen proposed

CATCH News – November 7, 2010

Flamborough expressway backed by city but opposed by residents

The provincial government is recommending a 35-kilometre highway across Flamborough and the Niagara Escarpment to connect the 403 to the 407. Opposition from residents to this partial mid pen highway was clearly evident at a meeting Wednesday night at the Rockton fairgrounds. City staff and business organizations attended to urge the Ministry of Transportation (MTO) to extend the expressway down the peninsula all the way to Fort Erie and the US border to serve the aerotropolis.

The meeting was called by Citizens Opposed to Paving the Escarpment and Ward 14 councillor Rob Pasuta and was attended by over 75 people. It was addressed by MTO officials and consultants who are working on the Niagara to GTA corridor environmental assessment study. MTO consultant Patrick Puccini outlined a hierarchy of steps starting with optimization of the existing transportation system, followed by rail and transit expansion and widening of existing roads, and finally by construction of a new highway in the Fort Erie-Welland area and study of one across Flamborough.

However, city staff, led by Neil Everson and Alan Kirkpatrick of the economic development department, urged the MTO to make the priority the construction of a full 130 km mid-peninsula highway from Fort Erie to the 407 in Burlington. Everson noted the city’s desire to increase greenfield development, and to connect the aerotropolis (Airport Employment Growth District) with surrounding markets via the mid-pen as well as expansion of highway 6 to six lanes.

Flamborough residents didn’t agree with either government. They contended that the MTO and city are not considering the value of agricultural lands in the planning process and suggested that the planning projections are failing to anticipate rising oil prices.

Pete Zuzek, a member of Citizens Opposed to Paving the Escarpment (COPE) argued that MTO projections for population growth are overly optimistic and based on consultant’s opinions rather than independent peer-reviewed research. He maintained that air quality, remaining agricultural lands, and protection of the Niagara Escarpment ecology are under-valued in MTO’s planning.

In a report presented at COW on October 12, city staff recommended that a mid-peninsula highway be made a priority rather than the “last possible alternative” it was made in the MTO study. At its last meeting before the elections, council voted 15-2 – with Bob Bratina and Brian McHattie opposed – to endorse the staff recommendations.

Bratina moved an amendment to re-insert earlier staff concerns about the cross-Flamborough road. Pasuta seconded the motion but subsequently withdrew his support and voted for the staff package, but on Wednesday evening he said he now opposes the new highway through Flamborough.

Everson and Kirkpatrick foresee an increasing “north-south shift” in goods movement between Hamilton to manufacturing centres in southern US states, such as Georgia and Alabama, rather than traditional markets in Ohio and Michigan. John Best, a representative of the transport industry, and Daniel Rodrigues, a member of the transportation committee at the Hamilton Chamber of Commerce echoed the city’s submission to the MTO.

Both stated that anything less than a full mid-peninsula highway would inhibit goods movement, although Best conceded that the west Hamilton highway segment would likely not be used by truckers, who are unlikely to use the 407 toll highway. Rather, Best and Rodrigues want the highway focused on the Niagara border crossing as well as the GTA.

Best claimed the QEW through Niagara was “overbuilt.” MTO representatives and consultants however noted that the ease of widening the QEW, plus the smaller growth projections in the region, minimized the need for a new corridor in this region.

Everson noted his disappointment at the failure of previous city planners to reserve land next to the Lincoln Alexander Parkway for industrial development. Along with the AEGD, they expect the mid-peninsula and Flamborough highways to offer new opportunities for development – significantly expanding the footprint of the corridor.

When asked why the city doesn’t develop brownfields downtown, Everson claimed too few lands are available due to the unwillingness of brownfield owners to sell them, and he projected there will be a rapid decline of available greenfield sites in the AEGD and other business parks.

Residents vocally opposed any reduction in farmland, either through widening or new road building, noting that over 40,000 acres of farmland have been lost in Flamborough. Pasuta, who supported the AEGD, spoke in favour of protecting farmland.

Judi Partridge, the councillor-elect from Waterdown, was in attendance, and intends to host future community meetings in her ward to review the MTO study.

Tolls, taxes, fees for transit? John Tory aims to lessen the stigma

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/toronto/tolls-taxes-fees-for-transit-john-tory-aims-to-lessen-the-stigma/article1549090/

John Tory, like the policy battle he’s about to join, has evolved since 2003.

In the mayoral race that year, he “rose up in great indignation” at David Miller’s suggestion that Toronto’s roads be tolled.

Now, seven years later, Mr. Tory intends to use his platform as chairman of the Toronto City Summit Alliance to ratchet down the public indignation that often greets five ideas for funding public transit: road tolls; a Greater Toronto sales tax; a parking tax; a gas-tax hike and a property-tax increase.

“The notion that it’s none of the above is not on,” Mr. Tory said. “This is a test of leadership because otherwise to say you’re going to build all this transit without saying how you’re going to pay for it is, to me, a meaningless promise.”

The Toronto City Summit Alliance, which Mr. Tory took over after the death of founder David Pecaut, has quietly formed a working group of about 25 top minds to pore over five options for funding transit, along with other issues of transportation and infrastructure in Greater Toronto. Members have been drawn from the Toronto Board of Trade, regional transportation agency Metrolinx, and the prominent planning firms Urban Strategies, Inc., and IBI Group, among other organizations.

The official goal will be to recommend ways to raise the approximately $2-billion a year Metrolinx has said it needs to crisscross the GTA and Hamilton with new rapid-transit projects over the next 25 years.

More important, the TCSA, the city-building organization that helped conjure Luminato from thin air, intends to make it possible for candidates to utter the words tolls and taxes without being crucified.

“What’s going on right now is a bit of denial in the populace at large,” said Joe Berridge, a partner at Urban Strategies, Inc. and member of the TCSA subcommittee. “They feel we should just build this transit and get on with it. But we’re looking at a very big build and governments that are not flush with the cash. In some way or another we’re going to have to tax ourselves in the region – whether that tax is in the form of a gas tax, sales tax or various kinds of road pricing.”

Beating congestion has so far dominated the race to replace David Miller. His light-rail plan, Transit City, has been temporarily derailed by the province, which postponed $4-billion in transit funding in its budget in March.

Although the delay made the transit-funding question more urgent, all but two major candidates have rejected road tolls as a means of raising new revenue. Women’s Post publisher Sarah Thomson has pitched a rush-hour toll on the Gardiner Expressway and Don Valley Parkway to pay for more subways, while George Smitherman has said he’s open to discussing tolls.

“Any mayoral candidate who says you can have your cake and eat it too on transit is just not telling the truth,” Mr. Berridge said.

The TCSA group, which has met twice, intends to hold public roundtables this summer, Mr. Tory said. He said it was too early to say whether members would have firm recommendations in time for the Oct. 25 election. The TCSA’s next formal summit is not until February, 2011 – less than a year before provincial politicians face the electorate. Most of the funding options would need Queen’s Park’s approval.

The Toronto Board of Trade, meanwhile, intends to unveil separately its recommendations for funding transit in plenty of time for municipal voting day. “We may take it down to a short list [of funding options],” said Carol Wilding, president of the board. “We’ll ask the candidates to do the same thing, recognizing they may not want to go there. But we’ll be pushing.”

Hamilton-Toronto corridor

http://www.thespec.com/News/Local/article/701840

Rush-hour blues reach Hamilton TheSpec.com - Local - Rush-hour blues reach Hamilton

QEW, 403 are both slowing drivers down

Meredith Macleod
The Hamilton Spectator

(Jan 9, 2010)

As congestion continues to trudge outward from Toronto, Hamilton is now the western front.

Morning rush hour drivers cruising into Hamilton, either on the QEW from Niagara or the 403 from Brantford, find their speeds dropping 15 to 20 kilometres an hour upon hitting the city limits.

When commuters hit Burlington, it gets much worse, with speed dropping another 30 km/h.

Traffic on the Toronto-bound QEW slows to 57 km/h on the QEW, from Fairview Street in Burlington to Royal Windsor Drive in Oakville, and then to 52 km/h from Erin Mills Parkway to Hwy. 427 in Mississauga.

The drive home is worse.

Speeds drop to 43 km/h from Royal Windsor to Fairview, before picking up again past Hwy. 20.

Drivers on the 403 heading east from Brant County are moving at an average of 105 km/h in the morning until they hit Wilson Street in Ancaster. As a crush of cars from the Lincoln Alexander Parkway inch onto the highway, mean speed drops to 86 km/h from Wilson Street to the QEW/407 split, hitting as low as 40 km/h at the Linc.

The story during the evening commute is almost exactly the same, only in reverse.

The Travel Time Study by the Ontario Ministry of Transportation, a mammoth 1,700-page document that helps guide planning for the province's major highways in the Golden Horseshoe, found that generally, congestion is getting worse, travel times are growing and drivers can count on long commutes more of the time.

That's no surprise to local commuters who say they are leaving earlier to get to work.

"It's slowly gotten longer," said Marshall Craft, who has been driving to Toronto from Hamilton and now Grimsby for 10 years.

It leaves commuters like Craft looking for that sweet spot -- a quasi-scientific formula of latest departure time without running the risk of arriving late.

He heads out the door at 6:30 a.m. Tuesday to Thursday but at 7 a.m. on Mondays and Fridays when he says traffic is lighter.

That generally gets him to work at 8:15 a.m., 45 minutes early. But if he leaves any later, he doesn't have a hope of sitting at his desk at 9 a.m.

In MTO jargon, Craft is building in buffer time -- the extra minutes needed to consistently arrive on time. The ministry's study found that commuter trips in 2008 could be expected to take 13 to 24 per cent longer than the same trip in 2002.

Craft, a graphic designer for a Toronto newspaper, says the biggest change he's noticed is heavier traffic heading west through Oakville and Burlington in the morning.

MTO data bears that out. Gone are the days of watching jammed lanes pouring into Toronto in the morning and out at night from free-flowing lanes in the opposite direction.

Bustling development and job growth all across the Golden Horseshoe means rush hour now cuts both ways.

For instance, a stretch of the Niagara-bound QEW in the morning takes 15-20 minutes to travel. The same stretch heading to Toronto takes 16 to 25.

Goran Nikolic, head of traffic planning for the MTO's central division, says given the huge tracts of housing built around Burlington and Hamilton, local commute times are staying relatively stable.

"We're talking minutes here or there ... There are problems on the QEW during peak hours but that's not new for anybody," he said.

"There has been phenomenal development and it's phenomenal we're still moving."

The MTO study included 4,270 kilometres along 13 major 400-series highways and 92 arterial roads in the GTA.

Nikolic says about 61 per cent of the studied highways didn't see a significant change in travel times and average speeds between 2006 and 2008.

But those that did, including segments of the QEW, Hwy. 404 south, the 410, and 401 eastbound, got markedly worse.

The biggest drop in speed came in the 401 collector lanes between Mississauga Road and Dixie Road, which fell from an average of 95 km/h in 2006 to 50 km/h in 2008 during the morning rush.

The eastbound QEW between Erin Mills Parkway and Hwy. 427 gained speed, from 48 to 52 km/h between 2006 and 2008, but the stretch is still considered the fifth slowest 400-series segment.

Overall, the survey, which used a fleet of GPS-equipped "probe" vehicles covering 141,000 kilometres, found congestion is a problem in the core GTA but is growing in outlying areas as well.

Marilyn Walden of Hamilton has racked up a sizable 407 bill thanks to her long commute to Oakville and Brampton.

The drive to two campuses of Sheridan College where she works as an IT technician is taking longer all the time.

"It's chaos anytime ... if I try to leave here after 3 p.m., I'm stopped on the QEW."

The hike to Brampton where she works two or three days a week takes 3 1/2 to 4 hours daily. And that's with $160 a month in highway tolls. According to Mapquest, it should take her more like 90 minutes two ways using the 407.

"I dread those days... the drive is just brutal."

On the plus side, improvements on the QEW, 401 and other highways boosted average speeds between 2006 and 2008. As well, high-occupancy vehicle lanes cut travel times by as much as 43 per cent in morning rush hours on the eastbound 403.

But Nikolic acknowledges that when capacity in those lanes is reached, the benefit will be cut.

mmacleod@thespec.com

905-526-3408

Commuters

* Total number of workers (over 15) in Hamilton, Burlington, Grimsby census metropolitan area: 324,650

* Number working in own municipality: 180,815

* Number working in CMA: 13,970

* Percentage travelling outside CMA: 30 per cent

* Percentage of Ontarians leaving CMA to work: 20 per cent

* Number in local CMA travelling to work by private vehicle: 274,705

* Number taking public transit: 28,340

* Number walking or biking: 19,010

Source: Statistics Canada, 2006 Census

Where Hamiltonians are going to work:

Hamilton: 145,480

Burlington: 24,270

Oakville: 7,090

Toronto: 6,925

Mississauga: 6,810

Brantford: 1,925

Milton: 1,860

Cambridge: 1,850

Guelph: 1,105

Haldimand: 1,070

Brampton: 1,055

US Highways Increasingly More Subsidized

Original link: http://www.subsidyscope.com/transportation/highways/funding/

Interesting - this study shows that the US highway system is more subsidized than both GO Transit (80% fare revenue) and the TTC. (70%)

Analysis Finds Shifting Trends in Highway Funding: User Fees Make Up Decreasing Share

The way America's roads are funded is changing. Revenues that predominantly come from users of roads (“user fees”), including fuel taxes, vehicle registration fees and tolls, pay for a decreasing share of road costs. Taxes and fees not directly related to highway use (“non-user fees”) and bonds are making up the difference.

Using Federal Highway Administration statistics, Subsidyscope has calculated that in 2007, 51 percent of the nation's $193 billion set aside for highway construction and maintenance was generated through user fees—down from 10 years earlier when user fees made up 61 percent of total spending on roads. The rest came from other sources, including revenue generated by income, sales and property taxes, as well as bond issues.

Source: Highway Statistics, forms HF-10 and HF-210, Federal Highway Administration.

Going back further, the trend is more pronounced. Forty years ago, user fees amounted to 71 percent of revenues spent on roads. Today, user fee revenue as a share of total highway-related funds is at an all-time low since the Interstate Highway System was created in 1957. A complete data set of highway revenue by source is available for download. In 2007, non-user revenues contributed $70 billion to the highway system. By comparison, this contribution totaled $26 billion in 1967 (in 2007 dollars).

Not all user fees collected are made available for highway purposes. Of the 18.4 cent per gallon federal tax on gasoline, 2.86 cents are allocated specifically for mass transit projects. Another 0.1 cent per gallon is used to pay for environmental cleanup resulting from leaking fuel storage tanks. From 1990 to 1997, the federal government also set aside a portion of taxes on gasoline, diesel and other fuels to reduce budget deficits.

However, even if those funds were fully devoted to highways, total user fee revenue accounted for only 65 percent of all funds set aside for highways in 2007, according to Subsidyscope calculations. This is down from 84 percent in 1997 and 77 percent in 1967. Subsidyscope provides a complete data set of user fee revenues and allocations for download.

Various factors account for the shift in funding away from users fees. Fuel taxes lose their buying power unless adjusted to keep pace with rising highway construction and maintenance costs. The amount of federal fuel tax allocated to highway purposes has not increased since 1997 and states have had trouble increasing fuel taxes to keep up with inflation. Further, changes in driving patterns and fuel consumption can lead to unexpected dips and peaks in user revenues. For instance, increases in fuel prices at the pump can cause vehicle owners to cut back on driving, reducing revenues. Similarly, changes in vehicle efficiency can reduce revenues available from fuel taxes while vehicle usage remains constant.

Another major funding source for roads is borrowing through bond measures, which made up almost 13 percent of highway funds available in 2007. This number has fluctuated over the years. Moreover, the use of bonds to fund roads varies widely from state to state. Subsidyscope considers bonds separately from user fees and other revenue because it is not clear which sources of revenues will be used to repay the bonds.

In addition to a decline in user fee revenue, federal dollars have gradually declined as a share of total highway funding. As a result, state and local governments have taken on a higher share of road costs and are increasingly reliant on alternative sources of revenue.

All data are from Highway Statistics, forms HF-10 and HF-210, Federal Highway Administration. All figures adjusted for inflation using the Engineering News Record Construction Cost Index.

Updated November 25, 2009

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