TRANSPORT ACTION ONTARIO Advocating for Integrated Public Transportation across Ontario Box 858, Station “B” Ottawa, ON K1P 5P9 http://ontario.transportaction.ca January 3, 2021 Letter Cover The Honourable Catherine McKenna, Minister of Infrastructure and Communities, 180 Kent Street, Suite 1100 Ottawa, Ontario K1P 0B6 Email:
[email protected] The Honourable Jonathan Wilkinson Minister of Environment and Climate Change Fontaine Building 12th floor 200 Sacré-Coeur Blvd Gatineau QC K1A 0H3 Email:
[email protected] The Honourable Marc Garneau Minister of Transport House of Commons Ottawa, Ontario K1A 0A6 Email:
[email protected] 1 TRANSPORT ACTION ONTARIO Advocating for Integrated Public Transportation across Ontario Box 858, Station “B” Ottawa, ON K1P 5P9 http://ontario.transportaction.ca January 3, 2021 Critique of Ontario's Draft Transportation Plan for Northern Ontario. As you know, Ontario released a draft transportation plan for Northern Ontario in early December 2020. The Environmental Register of Ontario allows stakeholder input on provincial plans and potential regulatory issues, so Transport Action Ontario (TAO) prepared and submitted a response to the draft plan that is appended to this cover letter. Although largely a provincial matter, we believe your ministries should be aware of our concerns with the plan, as it would be subject to elements of federal jurisdiction and financing requests. These concerns are as follows: • The plan is extremely highway-centric and gives little consideration to other viable transportation options, particularly rail, bus and truck/rail intermodal. Rail offers the benefits of lower capital and maintenance costs, lower GHG emissions, and additional climate-flexible mobility options to residents.