My Saturday column on why it could be very expensive for Dalton McGuinty's government to give Rob Ford his new subway stops generated some thoughtful responses. Among them was the question of why the province doesn't just assume control of Toronto's subway lines, which would solve the accounting issues that I explained - or at least tried to explain - in the column.
I happen to agree that would make sense; in fact, I made the case a few months ago for uploading the entire TTC. But my sense is that any major uploading isn't really on the table during the current negotiations between the city and the province.
That, I think, tells much of what you need to know about where the McGuinty government prefers to see provincial transit dollars going - which is to say, not into subways.
The Liberals would like to throw Ford a bone to avoid having to go to war with him, and to show they're willing to take into account the preferences expressed by municipal voters during this past fall's election. But they clearly don't see subway expansion as the future of public transit.
Uploading might not be worth the headache, and the precedent, if it were just to give the Mayor a few more stops on the Sheppard line. But it would certainly make sense if there were any serious thought being given to further expanding existing lines.
The lack of any push to go in that direction means the province either wants to see entirely new subway lines built from scratch, or - much more likely - it wants to move on from this whole subway business and get back to less expensive forms of expansion.
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Update: Some provincial types are eager for me to know that they don't oppose subways in principle, and that they just want to make sure they're investing smartly - i.e. not in lines without the ridership to support them.
That may well be, since another subway extension - to York University - is already proceding. But I still think it's fair to say that if the province really, really want to push subway projects forward, it would remove obstacles by uploading.