As the Oct. 22 municipal election draws nearer, we take a look at some of the most pressing challenges facing Toronto, what voters think, and how mayoral candidates propose to tackle them.The Issue: Public transit hasn’t kept up with population growth, and residents face a daily challenge on overcrowded bus lines and an inadequate subway network that some believe is too expensive to ride.Riley Peterson wants to go back to school, and has her sights set on the city studies program at the University of Toronto Scarborough. There’s only one thing stopping her: she’s not sure she could endure what she predicts would be a four-hour round-trip commute on the TTC every day. Peterson, 19, lives near Keele St. and Eglinton Ave. in York South—Weston, and U of T Scarborough, the only school that offers the program she wants, is on the other side of town. “The commute’s the only thing that’s really actually holding me back,” said Peterson, a youth worker who doesn’t have a driver’s licence and relies on transit to get around. Read more:As Toronto has grown, it`s become more unaffordable. Is it a problem city politicians can even fix?Which Toronto mayoral candidate is telling the truth about the relief subway line?Key transit projects in limbo as PCs do ‘line-by-line audit’Peterson already commutes about 90 minutes to a job downtown at a progressive think tank, often waking up before 6 a.m. to take a bus, subway and then streetcar, a daily journey she calls “exhausting.” She says local TTC service isn’t much better. “I have a terrible experience with the Jane bus,” she said, describing regular wait times of up to 20 minutes. “The 89 Weston bus is always crowded, and I wait a long time for that, too.”The Eglinton Crosstown LRT is set to open in 2021, and a stop that’s part of Mayor John Tory’s SmartTrack plan could be built at St. Clair—Old Westo ...
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