WATCH ABOVE: John Tory plays on his electoral success to answer Rob Ford’s question.
TORONTO – Mayor John Tory reminded former Mayor Rob Ford Tuesday that he won the election during a row about Tory’s SmartTrack plan.
Councillors were debating whether to spend $2.5 million to further study the technical aspects of how the $7 billion plan would be built, including how it would affect Eglinton Avenue in Etobicoke.
Ford suggested it would rip up the road and accused Tory of trying to hide that from residents.
“You did not tell them that, did you?” Ford said.
“I will put a fine point on it, one of my competitors for the race, your brother, raised it repeatedly, and the fact of the matter is, I won the election,” Tory said.
Tory said the further study of his plan was needed before asking provincial and federal governments to invest.
Ford, however, disagreed, telling reporters he didn’t need feasibility studies before getting funding for the Scarborough subway extension.
“We didn’t have to do all these feasibility studies, he’s just asking for more money,” he told reporters at city hall. “It’s about subways, I’m representing the people that want subways, now there’s some people that want LRTs or to St. Clair-ize the whole city.”
The portion of SmartTrack running along Eglinton Avenue West has been criticized in the past, suggesting it would conflict with an already studied plan for the area. That criticism didn’t sway most councillors however, who voted 35-9 not to remove Eglinton West from SmartTrack’s plans.
Ford later put forward a motion to scrap the SmartTrack plan altogether. It failed in a vote of 41-2.
Ford also suggested he had “the best subway plan ever” during the election, which called for subways along Sheppard Avenue and Finch Avenue as well as in Scarborough. Ford promised he could build 32 kilometres of subways for $9 billion – almost half of what it cost per kilometres to build the Bloor-Danforth extension. After Ford dropped out of the race, his brother Doug replaced him and touted the same subway plan before losing to Tory during the October election.
Comments