Transport Committee on June 16th, 2009

[Michael Roschlau]

High-speed rail is an evolving phenomenon that began in Japan many years ago and was then developed in Europe, initially in France, then in Germany and Spain, now Italy, connecting to places in Belgium and the U.K. through the Chunnel. Now Korea's developing one. They're talking about it in many countries because it's a great way of bringing people together fast.

I think the study needs to look carefully in that regard at the objectives in terms of transportation choices, but also the outcomes in terms of the distances that people travel, that they need to travel or are indeed encouraged to travel. Where is the balance, if you will, from a sustainable perspective, between people travelling together in a sustainable electric mode, people travelling long distances, as opposed to locating things closer together and not needing to travel as much? In other words, there are two sides to the coin in terms of the benefits and disbenefits of a particular investment.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

Having travelled on the high-speed rail in Japan, I think it's remarkable how these trains work. I had to arrive somewhere on time; well, there's a train every three minutes on a high-speed line there. It's a truly remarkable feat of engineering with these things hurtling down the tracks at that rate.

So it's very impressive, but I didn't see as much connectivity in the Japanese system. Perhaps I wasn't looking for it. I was impressed with the connectivity at some of the airports, such as Schiphol airport. Now, there's a place where everything seems to come together in the same location.

Are you familiar with that?

[Michael Roschlau]

I am, although I don't think the high-speed train comes into that airport. I think it connects from the central station in Amsterdam to Brussels and Paris.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

But there is a very good link there. There are subway links—

[Michael Roschlau]

Absolutely. It has a great link with the local regional rail as well as the subway and bus networks around the Netherlands.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

What do you think of the proposed link that Toronto is looking at between its airport and Union Station?

[Michael Roschlau]

Our airports definitely are under-connected to their communities. If you look around the world at the way in which major cities have built rail links to their communities, whether it's to downtown or other parts, even across the U.S., such as Chicago, Washington, Philadelphia, and Atlanta, we are not at that level of development. However, in two months Vancouver will have an airport-rail link. It will be the first one in this country.

I think those linkages are really important, whether they are heavy rail or light rail or a really good bus connection like Ottawa has on the transitway. I use the 97 bus every time I come here, 20 minutes to downtown.

[An hon. member]

For two dollars.

[Michael Roschlau]

For two dollars, that's right.

Certainly airports like Toronto and Montreal don't have the level of connectivity that they should.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Ms. Brown.

[Lois Brown, Conservative, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

I could argue about the cost of the 97 bus. It's $3 a ticket if you buy a single ticket, right?

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

It's $2 if you buy it at the information kiosk at the airport.

[Lois Brown, Conservative, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

I've only bought mine on the bus. I stand corrected. I'll have to make use of that. I do take the bus from the airport downtown.

[Michael Roschlau]

It's a bargain, regardless.

[Lois Brown, Conservative, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

It is, absolutely, and I am an advocate for public transit, Mr. Roschlau, so thank you.

First of all, I want to say thank you very much for continuing to send your pamphlets and magazines. I have really appreciated them, particularly in this study. It's been most helpful to have them. One issue of your magazine, maybe a month or so ago, had quite a write-up on what Toronto was planning to do. I'm sure my colleagues here are going to get very tired of my saying this, but I am a York region member of Parliament, Newmarket—Aurora is my riding, and I'm very concerned about what's going on in the York region area.

We've obviously had our growing pains with public transit. Our government has committed substantial dollars to Toronto for upgrading public transit. Part of that is being felt now in York region, with the subway that's going to go to Vaughan and the proposal to take the subway up to Richmond Hill. Our investment in the Viva system is going to be of tremendous assistance to York region.

I saw in your magazine that Toronto has a plan to bring in a light rail line north along Jane St. and a second one north along Don Mills. I don't how far north those are coming; they just had arrows on them, so I'm not sure what the distance north will be.

I have a couple of questions for you.

Do you have any benchmarks in your studies for at what point it would be wise for an area to start discussing a subway? I mean, I look at the history of Toronto, and Toronto had a subway by the time it had a million people. They were already building the subway by then. York region now has a million people in it. Although the subway's starting to come north, we're kind of late off the mark. Do you have a benchmark for that?

Also, can you talk about the connectivity in the Toronto area? Obviously, Durham, Peel, and York region are all going to be impacted by how this connectivity happens. The one thing you do need to know is that I will advocate for high-speed rail to come into York region.

[An hon. member]

Hear, hear!

[Lois Brown, Conservative, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

If we're going to do that, I would think that the corridors down into Union Station are absorbed by what's going on there now, and I could see usage of the 407 corridor or the hydro corridor being a real possibility for us for high-speed rail. I would advocate for it to come in around the north end of Markham, and it could go through to the airport from there. Do you have any comments on that?

One other comment that I would like to make upfront is that not only does our government see its responsibility in investing in public transit, but at the same time, it's urging people to make use of those investments by allowing them to get tax credits on their income tax for usage of public transit. They're trying to come at it from both ends, not only on the investment but on the incentive to use it as well.

I wonder if you could comment about the connectivity in York region in particular, but in the GTA area in general.

[Michael Roschlau]

I'm impressed with your understanding of the issues.

[Lois Brown, Conservative, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Thank you.

[Michael Roschlau]

I appreciate the government's commitment, absolutely.

Your question about a threshold is an interesting one. I think it has less to do with the overall population of a community than it does with the way in which that community is designed. You can have a million people in an area that's spread out uniformly and would never support a subway, but you can have a million people concentrated along one corridor, like Yonge Street in Toronto, that could support two subways. Ultimately, it's a question of the distribution of those people and the way in which they're concentrated.

That gets me back to this whole issue of coordinating the development plans and the growth of a city with the transportation investment you make. If the plan is to develop a uniformly low- to medium-density set of residential, commercial, and industrial subdivisions, then you'll have to invest in a very extensive roadway and parking network that serves the local, the regional, and the high-speed connections with freeways.

If you build clusters of mixed-use medium- to high-density developments in places or along corridors where you can justify building light rail or a subway, and then decline that density as you move away, you can put in that kind of infrastructure. Those are the questions that need to be asked. What kind of future do we want? How do we want to develop our cities? Do we want to develop more automobile-dependent lower-density communities? Or do we want to put those million people around highly efficient and effective public transit?

[Lois Brown, Conservative, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Newmarket comes under Mr. McGuinty's places to grow legislation. There was legislation introduced three years ago that designates certain points in Ontario as places to grow for population intensification. Aurora, which is at the south end of my riding, is not nearly as impacted by that population intensification because it has the Oak Ridges Moraine going through the south end of it and it's quite rural, owned by one owner.

Newmarket is going to be impacted by the legislation. However, because the normal flow of traffic is south, to Toronto--most people head south for shopping, for work--Aurora is going to be impacted just because of the traffic flow.

So again, my question is, how do we build for that in the future? If we know that the population intensification is coming, and Newmarket already has its urban plan in place, and a great deal of population is going to go along the Yonge Street and Davis Drive corridors, are the studies for Toronto building out that far? Are you looking at those areas in your studies and making recommendations to these towns?

[Michael Roschlau]

I think the vision that the province has developed for the Greater Golden Horseshoe--the integration of the various policy levers that are in place, whether it's land use or the Municipal Act, or the places to grow legislation--really does look in a very integrated fashion at coordinating those kinds of growth centres with the transportation links that need to bring them together. When I look around the world, I must say that Ontario stands out as a model of good policy in terms of what's happening right now in transportation planning, in land use planning, in providing the municipal governments with the right incentives and the right levers to become more sustainable in the future.

As it impacts the York region, it's a step-wise progression in terms of moving from a very heavily automobile-oriented environment to one with an improved bus service, to the bus rapid transit with Viva, to putting those buses on their own rights of way, on their reserved lanes, and then to moving into rail when the demand warrants. And that's mostly the east-west connections. The north-south ones are different because they need to be seamless into Toronto, which is why extending the subway makes sense, which is why the GO trains work as well as they do, and which is why the Jane Street and Don Mills light rail lines that have been proposed by the City of Toronto would probably eventually run north of Steeles Avenue as well.

[Lois Brown, Conservative, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

So we're talking about high-speed rail coming into the York region.

[Michael Roschlau]

You bet.

[Lois Brown, Conservative, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Thank you.