Improving city comms and increasing
development charges also popular
TORONTO July 15th, 2014 - In a random sampling of
public opinion taken by the Forum Poll™ among 754 Torontonians 18 years of age and
older, the most popular of the 35 "Big Ideas" for the city's future
proposed by the Toronto Star, expressed as "a unique idea that you would
put on the short list of ideas" is building the Downtown Relief Line, or
DRL, now (52%), and this is followed in popularity by reforming city
communications to improve coordination between departments and keep the public
better informed (50%) and increasing development charges to pay for transit and
green spaces (50%). Among the least popular ideas are adopting a regional
government for the GTHA and supporting the sharing economy (20% each) and,
especially, allowing city staff to pilot interesting projects without council
approving (16%).
"The ideas that are
liked best are about Toronto, not the region, and not especially the
neighbourhoods or former metro cities. De-amalgamation isn't popular, neither
is regional government, regional transit or zone fares. Torontonians seem to
want to see Toronto become more like Toronto," said Forum Research President, Dr. Lorne
Bozinoff.
Lorne Bozinoff,
Ph.D. is the president and founder of Forum Research. He can be reached at lbozinoff@forumresearch.com or at (416)
960-9603.
