Why Toronto needs more toll highways like the 407 | The Toronto Star - Peter Shawn Taylor:
November 18, 2019 - "Highway 407 ETR ... Toronto’s east-west toll highway is the road everyone loves to hate. Some critics say it’s robbing taxpayers blind, others accuse it of causing congestion across the GTA. Both views are nonsense. Rather all Torontonians should celebrate its mere existence. Whether you pay the tolls or not – and even if you don’t drive at all − everyone benefits from this freeway that isn’t free.
"A few months ago the road’s owners, which include majority stakeholder Canada Pension Plan, released a report from the Canadian Centre for Economic Analysis (CCEA) totalling up its wide-ranging impact. The highway boasts an average 413,000 trips every weekday, a substantial chunk of daily commuter traffic. (More trips than GO Transit.) And these trips are smooth and fast. During peak hours, 85 per cent of vehicles on the 407 ETR are travelling at or above 100 km/h. By comparison, 85 per cent of drivers on the equivalent portions of the 401, are going below 50 km/h at the same time.
"The toll road is also substantially safer than the alternatives. The 407 ETR’s annual collision rate is less than 0.30 accidents per million vehicle kilometres travelled; on other freeways in Ontario the collision rate is nearly double that. The gap for fatal collisions is wider still.
"Because of its striking lack of congestion and accident delays, the CCEA study estimates Highway 407 ETR users save a cumulative 22.7 million hours every year, as compared to driving on roads as congested as an un-tolled GTA freeway ... equivalent to more than 12,000 full-time jobs. If we add in the effect on businesses of employees travelling during the workday, the time savings grow by another 7.7 million hours per year, or a further 3,700 full-time jobs.
"These effects are real and tangible, and have an immediate impact on families and employers. They cannot be ignored or waved away as part of any ideological crusade. While many transit or cycling advocates either tacitly or explicitly argue in favour of greater road congestion in order to push drivers out of their cars and into more-virtuous modes of transportation, such an argument crumbles on the basis of economic efficiency.
"A Metrolinx estimate once put the cost of congestion in the GTA at $3.3 billion per year in lost time and environmental impacts. The 407 ETR is a practical, on-going response to those costs....
"It is true only drivers willing or able to pay the tolls can reap these direct benefits. But by capturing a significant share of traffic volume, the road has a beneficial spillover impact on all the other public thoroughfares. In the absence of the 407 ETR, congestion everywhere in the GTA would be much worse. Plus, these time savings provide society-wide benefits in terms of lower greenhouse gas emissions and, due to reduced collision rates, lower health care expenses as well. So even folks not using the road should feel thankful.
"And let’s be clear: the benefits arising from this highway are as a direct result of its tolls. Invent a new social obligation for the CPP to provide cheap travel for Torontonians by dramatically reducing fees, as some toll-road detractors do, and these advantages disappear. Plus, this would fatally undermine the pension plan’s higher-level duty to professionally manage its contributors’ money."
Read more: https://www.thestar.com/business/opinion/2019/11/18/why-toronto-needs-more-toll-highways-like-the-407.html
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November 18, 2019 - "Highway 407 ETR ... Toronto’s east-west toll highway is the road everyone loves to hate. Some critics say it’s robbing taxpayers blind, others accuse it of causing congestion across the GTA. Both views are nonsense. Rather all Torontonians should celebrate its mere existence. Whether you pay the tolls or not – and even if you don’t drive at all − everyone benefits from this freeway that isn’t free.
"A few months ago the road’s owners, which include majority stakeholder Canada Pension Plan, released a report from the Canadian Centre for Economic Analysis (CCEA) totalling up its wide-ranging impact. The highway boasts an average 413,000 trips every weekday, a substantial chunk of daily commuter traffic. (More trips than GO Transit.) And these trips are smooth and fast. During peak hours, 85 per cent of vehicles on the 407 ETR are travelling at or above 100 km/h. By comparison, 85 per cent of drivers on the equivalent portions of the 401, are going below 50 km/h at the same time.
"The toll road is also substantially safer than the alternatives. The 407 ETR’s annual collision rate is less than 0.30 accidents per million vehicle kilometres travelled; on other freeways in Ontario the collision rate is nearly double that. The gap for fatal collisions is wider still.
"Because of its striking lack of congestion and accident delays, the CCEA study estimates Highway 407 ETR users save a cumulative 22.7 million hours every year, as compared to driving on roads as congested as an un-tolled GTA freeway ... equivalent to more than 12,000 full-time jobs. If we add in the effect on businesses of employees travelling during the workday, the time savings grow by another 7.7 million hours per year, or a further 3,700 full-time jobs.
"These effects are real and tangible, and have an immediate impact on families and employers. They cannot be ignored or waved away as part of any ideological crusade. While many transit or cycling advocates either tacitly or explicitly argue in favour of greater road congestion in order to push drivers out of their cars and into more-virtuous modes of transportation, such an argument crumbles on the basis of economic efficiency.
"A Metrolinx estimate once put the cost of congestion in the GTA at $3.3 billion per year in lost time and environmental impacts. The 407 ETR is a practical, on-going response to those costs....
"It is true only drivers willing or able to pay the tolls can reap these direct benefits. But by capturing a significant share of traffic volume, the road has a beneficial spillover impact on all the other public thoroughfares. In the absence of the 407 ETR, congestion everywhere in the GTA would be much worse. Plus, these time savings provide society-wide benefits in terms of lower greenhouse gas emissions and, due to reduced collision rates, lower health care expenses as well. So even folks not using the road should feel thankful.
"And let’s be clear: the benefits arising from this highway are as a direct result of its tolls. Invent a new social obligation for the CPP to provide cheap travel for Torontonians by dramatically reducing fees, as some toll-road detractors do, and these advantages disappear. Plus, this would fatally undermine the pension plan’s higher-level duty to professionally manage its contributors’ money."
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