Toronto has made progress bridging the yawning infrastructure funding gap that lies before the city in the decades ahead, largely due to the new deal with the province, but it’s not out of the woods yet when it comes to the state of its assets.
“Eight billion dollars more towards fixing our city and stopping the deterioration now; that is in our capital plan,” Mayor Olivia Chow told reporters Tuesday morning as she helped unveil Toronto’s 2025 Corporate Asset Management Plan.
The city’s latest $59.6 billion infrastructure plan includes $32.4 billion to fix crumbling roads, bridges, playgrounds, recreation facilities and other assets.
While Toronto is still about $17.9 billion short in its 10-year state-of-good-repair plan, that’s $8.1 billion less than the gap in last year’s plan. Most of that decrease is thanks to the new deal with the Ontario government, which will see the Don Valley Parkway (DVP) and Gardiner Expressway uploaded back to the province.
“That is a decrease of 31 per cent, which is substantial decrease, because that’s $8 billion more that we are putting in so that our gap is not so wide,” Chow told reporters. “At least that stops the deterioration, right? So, yes, we still have that shortfall, but at least we’re now dealing with it.”
More than half of the $18 billion shortfall in the state-of-good-repair plan comes from transit ($11 billion). Substantial shortfalls also exist for Toronto Community Housing ($4 billion), the road network ($2 billion) and city facilities ($1 billion).
The plan also assesses the state of $215 billion worth of city-owned assets and finds that most of them are rated as “fair” in terms of their performance, “indicating that, on average, city assets are fit for service and continue to perform at an acceptable standard.”
However, assets in a number of departments clearly fall short. That includes Toronto Paramedic Services, where 44 per cent of assets are rated as being in fair or better performance and the Toronto Police Service, where 50 per cent of assets are rated as being in fair or better performance.
Just 16 per cent of the city’s dock walls and breakwaters are considered in fair or better performance. That number was 44 per cent for Senior Services and Long-Term Care; 56 per cent for community housing; 42 per cent for corporate real estate and 48 per cent for Parks and Recreation.
The report also notes that many city assets are approaching the end of their life, likely contributing to higher operating costs for ongoing monitoring and maintenance, though city staff noted the ageing infrastructure does not pose a risk to health and safety.
While Chow said the new deal with the province greatly helped to shrink the state-of-good-repair shortfall, she said that the deal is more than the sum of its parts, and that it encouraged the federal government to come to the table as a “silent partner” on some key infrastructure projects, such as new subway trains.
Referencing Prime Minister Mark Carney’s trip to Washington D.C. to discuss trade with U.S. President Donald Trump, Chop said she’s hopeful the federal government will continue to come to the table to help with other infrastructure costs.
“Our Prime Minister is down in Washington meeting with President Trump. I hope he comes back with a deal, but if nothing else, we know he is committed to building. He said it, and we’re going to hold him to it,” Chow said.
“And a lot of the building happens right here in Toronto, because our region accounts for 50 per cent of Ontario and 20 per cent of Canada’s economy. You cannot have a healthy, resilient Canadian economy without investing in the City of Toronto.”
The report satisfies a provincial regulation that comes into effect in July requiring municipalities to include proposed service levels in their asset management plan so that they can better plan the building and maintenance of city infrastructure.
Chow’s Executive Committee will consider the plan on May 13 and it will then be reviewed by Toronto City Council on May 21.
