A taxpayer advocacy group is calling on the province to ignore the will of city council and forge ahead with Mayor Rob Ford's subway building plan.
The Toronto Taxpayers Coalition is holding a rally near Yonge St. and St. Clair Avenue this afternoon to launch their "Save the Subways" campaign.
The campaign will see advertisements touting the benefits of subways over LRTs placed on city busses in Scarborough, Etobicoke and North York.
The advertisements are being funded by donation.
"We want to make sure that transit in the future is underground not at grade," Toronto Taxpayers Coalition President Matthew McGuire told CP24. "In the long run subways are far less expensive than LRTs, they move more people faster and they spur economic development."
Earlier this month, council voted 25-18 in favour of a light rail transit plan, dubbed Transit City.
The plan, which was originally developed under former mayor David Miller, would see the city build light rail lines on Eglinton Avenue, Finch Avenue West and Sheppard Avenue East with $8.4 billion in provincial funding.
Ford's plan would use the funding to build an underground subway line on Eglinton Avenue with an expansion of the Sheppard subway line funded by the private sector.
"At the end of the day it is provincial money and the province has the final say on how it is spent, so we want to have the province listen to their constituents and vote in favour of building subways," McGuire said. "City council made an irresponsible decision."
As part of the "Save the Subways" campaign members of the Toronto Taxpayers Coalition are collecting signatures petitioning the province to hold a vote on which plan to support.
Transportation Minister Bob Chiarelli has said in the past that the "will of council reins supreme".
