Reactions to Ontario's Subway Takeover Plan

Last week, Ontario Premier Doug Ford announced a plan to replace Toronto's subway expansion plans with a vision of his own. Reactions have been pouring in ever since.

2 minute read

April 17, 2019, 2:00 PM PDT

By James Brasuell @CasualBrasuell


TTC Subway

Vadim Rodnev / Shutterstock

That sound last week in Toronto was the ground shaking as the provincial government completely up-ended transit planning in Canada's most populous city.

As Planetizen detailed on April 10, Ontario Premier Doug Ford announced a new plan for subway expansion in Toronto announced a plan to shelve existing plans to build the Relief Line subway, and instead build a subway spanning Ontario Place to the Ontario Science Centre, dubbed the "Ontario Line." Premier Ford also announced plans to construct four additional new subway routes: the Scarborough Subway Extension, the Yonge North Subway Extension, and the Eglinton Crosstown West Extension.

We've rounded up the opinions, editorials, and analysis published in the days since that ground-shaking announcement, collected here for your consideration in assessing the significance, and the likelihood for success, of Premier Ford's big move on transit.


James Brasuell

James Brasuell, AICP is the former editorial director of Planetizen and is now a senior public affairs specialist at the Southern California Association of Governments. James managed all editorial content and direction for Planetizen from 2014 to 2023, and was promoted from manging editor to editorial director in 2021. After a first career as a class five white water river guide in Trinity County in Northern California, James started his career in Los Angeles as a volunteer at a risk reduction center in Skid Row.

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