$26B needed for infrastructure

City eyeing costs just to keep status quo over the next decade

- BEN SPURR

A woman waits for a streetcar. The TTC alone will require $2.4 billion more a year over the next decade to maintain its state of good repair. At current funding projections "service levels are anticipated to continue to decline," the report states.

Toronto needs to find an additional $26 billion over the next decade just to keep much of its infrastructure in its current condition, and unless the city comes up with that whopping sum, things like transit, public housing, park facilities and libraries will fall further into disrepair than they already have.

Mayor Olivia Chow says the numbers, contained in a report going to her executive committee next week, are so staggering that the city needs to think twice about building anything new.

She told the Star in an interview that “we’re going to really fix what we have first.”

“Because the longer we wait to fix our old infrastructure, the more expensive it’s going to be, the worse it’s going to look. Which means the service level will go down,” she said.

According to Chow, while the $1.8billion shortfall on Toronto’s operating budget took up most of council’s energy this year, the focus for 2025 should be on the capital budget, which funds infrastructure repair.