The Transit Boss Torontonians Love to Hate
When Phil Verster was announced as Metrolinx’s CEO in 2017, there was universal praise. But with an $856,000 salary and a tenure defined by cost overruns and years of delays to projects like the Eglinton LRT, critics want him out. How did it go so wrong?
After 20 Years, Torontonians Will Have to Wait Even Longer for an Accessible TTC
Until this September, the TTC reported being on-track to meet its 2025 deadline for provincially mandated accessibility improvements. The transit authority had two decades on the clock—where did it go wrong?
Minor Tweaks to Road Safety Policy Won’t Get Us to Zero
City council just approved a series of changes to Toronto’s Vision Zero program—but the improvements fail to address a key weakness in the way the program is run.
“Canada’s Worst Obstacle Course”
Metrolinx has promised Toronto a more interconnected tomorrow. As it rips up some of the city’s busiest streets, is it paying enough attention to the safety and wellbeing of Torontonians today?
At Jane and Finch, a Fight for Community Space
Metrolinx is building a maintenance shed in the middle of their community. These residents are fighting to make sure they get something in return.
Growing Up on the 36 Finch West
It takes me two hours on transit to visit my mom in Rexdale. Can a transit line begin to connect a neighbourhood that sometimes feels a world apart?
The Slow Fight for Rapid Transit on Finch West
After more than fifty years of talk, northwest Toronto is finally getting an LRT. But as the new line brings higher rents, changing businesses, and on-going construction, residents are demanding a say in how their community will change.
Welcome to Finch West
The LRT doesn’t open until next year at the earliest, but it’s already transforming Toronto’s northwest.
For Scarborough Bus Riders, a Long Wait Gets Longer
The TTC is implementing a new round of cuts to bus services on March 26. Many of the biggest wait time increases are in Scarborough.
The Brutish Lives and Hideous Deaths of Toronto Rats
Rats are cunning, ravenous, daring, disgusting. They stand in for everything squalid and dysfunctional about urban life and we will never be rid of them.
The Deadly Inequality of Toronto’s Vision Zero Rollout
An investigation by The Local using FOI requests, city-wide speeding data, and analysis of council minutes, reveals a system that makes wealthy downtown neighbourhoods safer while leaving lower-income inner-suburban communities to fend for themselves.
New Downtown Councillors Will Have a Tough Job from Day One—Managing Development
With an exploding population, constant building, and wards the size of small towns, the candidates who win Toronto’s downtown seats will inherit problems, and possibilities.
Pulled Off Wheel-Trans and Forced onto the Subway
Cost-cutting measures will push thousands of paratransit users onto the TTC, with disabled and elderly riders forced into gruelling bus and subway trips.
The Great (Surprisingly Expensive) Outdoors
Introducing kids to nature is how you build the next generation of environmentalists. But how do you make outdoor education in Toronto affordable and accessible?
A Brine Against Nature
Winter road salt finds its way into Toronto’s waterways all year long, harming wildlife, decreasing biodiversity, and damaging infrastructure.
The Drive to Reduce Car Pollution Hits Gridlock
Pollution from major roads causes premature death and illness, disproportionately affecting the low-income people who live next to them. Solutions are available, but the political will is not.
Carving Out a Brand New Island
With Villier’s Island, the city aims to combat climate change, create a new mouth to the Don River, and add needed housing. But constructing a climate positive neighbourhood from scratch is no small task.
As Toronto Temperatures Rise, Inequalities Widen
Climate change causes heat waves, but the city’s politics, policies, and design determine who suffers most.
For TTC Bus Riders, the Wait is Endless
Buses are the unglamorous workhorses of the TTC. By neglecting them to build flashy rail projects a decade from now, is the TTC failing the people that need transit most today?
What is the PATH?
Below ground, the hair stylists, dry cleaners, baristas and sushi chefs are ready. But are the office workers coming back?