After waiting more than a year, the City of Toronto has finally received confirmation from both the provincial and federal governments that they’ll help shoulder the massive cost of replacing a fleet of subway trains.
On Friday, the federal government announced it will give Toronto $758 million to buy new subway cars, signing on to a commitment the provincial government made last year as part of its new deal for Toronto.
“Our government knows improving public transit is essential to ensuring our economy reaches its full potential,” Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland said in a statement. “The TTC needs new subway cars to keep up with the growing transit demands of our growing city.”
The subway car funding from Ottawa is part of a broader, long-term transit commitment.
Toronto has been asking for help to buy a fleet of new subway trains to run on Line 2: Bloor-Danfoth as technical issues with the current fleet grew. The cost of buying new trains, however, was something the city said it simply couldn’t handle on its own.
Last year, as part of a new deal with Toronto that also uploaded responsibility for the Gardiner Expressway to Queen’s Park, the provincial government promised it would help with the costs of 55 new subway cars — on condition Ottawa pitched in too.
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With the confirmation of $758 million from Ottawa, Queen’s Park said its identical funding will also flow.
“It’s nearly 12 months to the day that the Government of Ontario reached a historic deal with the City of Toronto to help ensure the city’s long-term financial stability,” Transportation Minister Prabmeet Sarkaria said in a statement. “After months of uncertainty, we are pleased to see the federal government step up.”
Toronto’s current fleet of Line 2 trains is roughly 30 years old and is reaching the end of its useful life.
Over the past year, in particular, the TTC has been increasing its warnings about the state of Line 2, which runs from Scarborough in the east to Etobicoke on Toronto’s western edge.
Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow has been beating the drum to get a deal signed to secure funding since her election in 2023.
“I am very concerned about the lifespan of the Bloor subway cars, it is getting very old and it takes a while for us to get new ones and for new ones to get constructed,” she said in October last year.
Chow said the city had to cancel plans to order new trains when no other levels of government came to the table with a secure funding plan.
“We have one-third of the funding ready now,” said Chow at the time.
The TTC has suggested it takes between three to four years to receive new subway cars, with a portion of the current fleet set to reach the end of its design life by 2026.
— with files from Global News’ Matthew Bingley
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