A lot of people gloss over (or are unaware of) a lot of things when discussing these tolls, so I'll try to fill in some of the gaps:
- First of all, this is ALWAYS incorrectly framed as a 416 vs 905 issue. How do you think people in the Beaches feel about being kneecapped by these tolls? All they have for transit is the ghastly Queen streetcar, which may in fact be slower than walking. Or someone who just lives in the west end?
- Further to that, if the DVP and Gardiner are tolled, what do you think traffic is going to be like on interior streets like Bayview, Lakeshore, King/Queen, etc.? WAY worse. Kind of defeats the environmental purpose of a toll, right?
- Almost every study I've seen extolling the virtues of tolls refers to the HOT lanes like we had during the Pan-Am games, and not to tolling entire expressways. This is rarely mentioned. And by the way, I'm fine with HOT lanes....