Toronto mayoral candidate Jennifer Keesmaat says she will have the eastern portion of the Gardiner Expressway torn down if she is elected.
Speaking near Parliament Street and Lake Shore Boulevard on Sunday morning, Keesmaat said she commits to tearing down the Gardiner east of Jarvis Street. The expressway would then be replaced with a grand boulevard, she said.
Incumbent mayoral candidate John Tory has previously committed to repairing the crumbling portions of the Gardiner instead of having it torn down.
“His decision to re-build a portion of the Gardiner East is not only fiscally reckless but represents bad land use, bad design and a bad deal for the people of Toronto,” Keesmaat said.
In July of this year, the city awarded construction company Aecon Group a $248-million contract to replace the structure of the Gardiner Expressway between Jarvis and Cherry streets.
The project plan is to use prefabricated slabs to cut and replace that portion of the Gardiner beginning in the fall of this year, with a full completion date sometime around December 2020.
Beyond 2020, construction is then scheduled to begin on the Gardiner east of Cherry Street.
Council approved a “hybrid” plan for Gardiner East repairs in 2015, which aimed to consider other projects in the area, including waterfront development.
It is a part of the wider multi-billion-dollar F.G. Gardiner Strategic Rehabilitation Plan, which is supposed to repair nearly all damaged portions of the Gardiner by 2025.
Keesmaat said tearing down the Gardiner east of Jarvis instead of repairing it would benefit the waterfront and real estate in the area as well as provide opportunity for economic development. She also claimed that it would save up to $500 million, which would then be invested in transit.
“Traffic will continue to flow well on a ground-level boulevard,” she said. “We have an opportunity to build an amazing mixed-use neighbourhood here to attract a mix of film and technology companies and other commercial uses alongside beautiful, green, waterfront-side housing and retail.”
Tory responded to Keesmaat’s announcement Sunday by claiming that her opinion has flipped on the current Gardiner plan.
Tory pointed to a tweet from Keesmaat in March 2016, back when when she was the city planner. In the tweet, she said, “New gardiner hybrid improves waterfront access, redevelopment. Congrats my @CityPlanTo team for excellent work.”
“The fact is that the council – by a vote of 36 to five – approved this expressway being moved and put in a new place where we can free up more waterfront land for development on a plan that at the time that Ms. Keesmaat took credit for,” Tory said. “I don’t think people have any time for that kind of flip-flopping.”
Keesmaat’s campaign responded by saying that she has been consistent in advocating for the Gardiner to be torn down east of Jarvis but was “obligated to work with the will of the previous council.”
“Once debate was done and council voted, Jennifer frequently tweeted support for the work of her team,” the campaign said in an email to Global News.
Comments