{"id":26639,"date":"2012-02-27T08:45:20","date_gmt":"2012-02-27T13:45:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spacingtoronto.ca\/?p=26639"},"modified":"2012-02-26T21:56:15","modified_gmt":"2012-02-27T02:56:15","slug":"lorinc-fords-opponents-must-sell-their-transit-story","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2012\/02\/27\/lorinc-fords-opponents-must-sell-their-transit-story\/","title":{"rendered":"LORINC: Fords\u2019 opponents must sell their transit story"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

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In the universe where I live, politicians seeking to deliver on a campaign promise sell their plan to the public and their colleagues during a process known as a \u201cdebate\u201d that typically culminates in a \u201cvote\u201d (a.k.a., \u201ca decision\u201d).<\/p>\n

In the universe where the brothers Ford live, the story line appears to run in reverse, with the final decision functioning as a kind of prologue to the campaign.<\/p>\n

But hey, the Fords march to their own theme song. They are the un-deciders.<\/p>\n

So what to make of the two strands of information \u2013 yesterday\u2019s radio launch of the Fords\u2019 permanent revolution and the trial balloons about possible taxes to finance transit \u2013 that began streaming out of mayorville last week?<\/p>\n

It is tempting to dismiss Councillor Doug Ford\u2019s bluster, as reported by my colleague Marcus Gee<\/a>, as so much methane. After all, 2014 is a long way off, and the Fords will be in the politically complicated position of defending to voters their failure to deliver a privately-funded subway to Scarborough Town Centre.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

At the same time, their approach reminds me of a wonderful scene in \u201cThe West Wing,\u201d when President Jed Barlet\u2019s advisors are trying to strategize their way out of a tough spot. One says that what they really need is a widely reviled opponent against whom they can fight the good fight.<\/p>\n

“I have the perfect candidate,” exclaims C.J. Cregg, the press secretary. \u201cThe U.S. Congress!\u201d<\/p>\n

If Mayor Rob Ford, borrowing a page from The West Wing<\/a>, plans to spend the next 30 months vilifying council as a collection of obstructionist know-nothings, he\u2019ll be on familiar rhetorical terrain, aligning himself with the hard-done little guy who always gets the short end of the urban stick. While I doubt these guys have the stamina to keep it up for more than a few months, the left and the centre would be wise not to underestimate the mayor\u2019s dualist narrative of populist entitlement (suburbs vs. downtown, subways vs. LRTs, cars vs. bikes, etc.).<\/p>\n

Indeed, I\u2019d argue that the Fords\u2019 opponents must sell their transit story and do so aggressively \u2014 something David Miller failed to do when he delivered the Transit City cash in 2007. Moreover, they shouldn\u2019t fall into the bear trap that is the Fords\u2019 either\/or rhetoric. With all due respect to Transit City fans, subways are<\/em> important, desirable and necessary in big cities. They don\u2019t kill street life and they concentrate development. Indeed, transit experts like Eric Miller, of the University of Toronto\u2019s Cities Centre, understand that what\u2019s needed is a hierarchy of modes that function together as a network. It\u2019s not black and white.<\/p>\n

Which brings me to the Ford camp\u2019s unexpected smoke signals about parking levies or sales taxes. Ignore the switchbacks and the weekend poll showing that most people don\u2019t want to pay extra for transit. What\u2019s important about the brothers\u2019 new-found interest in taxation is that it strongly suggests they\u2019ve been warned about the difference between guaranteed and speculative revenue streams.<\/p>\n

Allow me to suggest a thought experiment: let\u2019s say the Stintz 25+ fell silent on the subway file while the Fords blundered ahead with a deal to attract private investors. At some point, the city would have to begin shopping a request for expressions of interest (REOI), and then a full-blown request for proposals.<\/p>\n

Infrastructure Ontario, in recent years, has created a healthy private sector appetite for alternative financing and procurement<\/a> projects (Triple-P lite). While investors know that such deals involve the transfer of risk, they also can expect to earn a profit (e.g., via a long-term design-build-finance-maintain deal) if they meet specified performance targets. IO claims it has completed $23 billion in such deals<\/a>.<\/p>\n

That, in other words, is the state of the market, like it or not. The Fords\u2019 subway plan \u2013 i.e., the movie version of Gordon Chong\u2019s report \u2013 likely relies on a private partner to deliver the project and financing up front in hopes that the revenue \u2013 from charges related to development along the corridor \u2013 will materialize at some point in the mid-to-long-term future.<\/p>\n

The crucial difference, of course, is there\u2019s no guarantee the development will happen; in fact, there\u2019s an upper limit on the city\u2019s ability to attract investment through zoning changes and mechanisms like tax-increment financing. So even if the private partner did a bang-up job and built the subway in record time and on budget, the investors don\u2019t actually know when they\u2019ll get their money out. In other words, the risk-reward balance is dramatically out of whack.<\/p>\n

Now imagine you run an investment fund that looks for infrastructure deals, and your choices are the subway or the sort of project IO offers. Easy decision, right?<\/p>\n

My hypothesis is the Fords have been told by someone in a position to know that if they put a version of Chong\u2019s subway plan out on the street, it\u2019s unlikely to get any serious attention because no investor group with sufficiently deep pockets has that kind of risk tolerance.<\/p>\n

Indeed, the Fords\u2019 nightmare scenario is a subway RFP, floated during this term of council, that attracts either no interest or just a single bid. Ergo their new-found interest in guaranteed, <\/em>as opposed to theoretical, revenue streams. It\u2019s all about sweetening the pot.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m actually glad they\u2019re joining the real world. But the Alice-in-Wonderland element here is that there\u2019s a good chance Queen\u2019s Park will sign off on the Stintz compromise of February 8, including a Sheppard LRT. So the Fords are shilling for subway-related levies even as Metrolinx is gearing up to negotiate a contract with the city to build surface transit on the very corridors where they want to build subways (Sheppard and now Finch).<\/p>\n

Confused?<\/p>\n

Don\u2019t be: the Stintz 25+ can simply appropriate the Fords\u2019 subway levy trial balloons as the starting point for a long-overdue debate about financing the downtown relief line.<\/p>\n

Notice of motion, anyone?<\/p>\n

photo by Danielle Scott<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In the universe where I live, politicians seeking to deliver on a campaign promise sell their plan to the public and their colleagues during a process known as a \u201cdebate\u201d that typically culminates in a \u201cvote\u201d (a.k.a., \u201ca decision\u201d). In the universe where the brothers Ford live, the story line appears to run in reverse,Continue reading “LORINC: Fords\u2019 opponents must sell their transit story”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4051,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2,8],"tags":[12285,19421,408,10992,425,14697,14821,1174,19422,19423,12451,426,636,475,17085,316,227,3818,6103,506,17551,391],"class_list":["post-26639","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","category-transit","tag-advisors","tag-c-j-cregg","tag-councillor","tag-danielle-scott","tag-david-miller","tag-doug-ford","tag-eric-miller","tag-ford","tag-jed-barlet","tag-long-term-design-build-finance-maintain-deal","tag-marcus-gee","tag-mayor","tag-ontario","tag-president","tag-press-secretary","tag-queen","tag-rob-ford","tag-scarborough-town-centre","tag-u-s-congress","tag-united-states","tag-university-of-torontos-cities-centre","tag-usd"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nLORINC: Fords\u2019 opponents must sell their transit story - Spacing Toronto<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2012\/02\/27\/lorinc-fords-opponents-must-sell-their-transit-story\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"LORINC: Fords\u2019 opponents must sell their transit story - Spacing Toronto\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"In the universe where I live, politicians seeking to deliver on a campaign promise sell their plan to the public and their colleagues during a process known as a \u201cdebate\u201d that typically culminates in a \u201cvote\u201d (a.k.a., \u201ca decision\u201d). 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