Voter disappointed by election results
WHAT HAPPENED UXBRIDGE! I thought you wanted change. Thought you wanted a new beginning!
Grumble, grumble, grumble.
Did you not want lower taxes or a tax freeze? Did you not want your municipal road repaired? Did you not want more police presence? Did you not want to see where the money goes? I guess not!
What you will see is more poverty. Farmers losing their livelihood, animals, homes. It is a big disappointment to Uxbridge.
Grumble, grumble, grumble.
WHY can there never be a difference and why does it always have to be the same old same old.
See you lining up at the food bank. Tax money spent frivolously.
Elizabeth Deven, Uxbridge
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Alto ad doesn’t reveal full accounting of rail costs
The full-page Alto advertisement in the Cosmos does little to convince me this is responsible spending.
The Parliamentary Budget Officer’s October 1 report puts construction costs at $75–113 billion, well above Ottawa’s own $60–90 billion estimate. That’s construction alone, before the cost of actually running the trains. A 2023 federal briefing, as reported by The Hub, projected roughly $150 billion in total costs against $105 billion in revenue over 40 years. For a country already struggling with overspending, those are staggering numbers.
VIA Rail’s problem in the Toronto–Ottawa–Montréal–Québec City corridor isn’t simply a lack of speed. It’s that passenger trains share tracks with freight trains, where delays can quickly snowball. VIA’s on-time performance was just 51 per cent across its network in 2024. Why are we talking about spending up to $113 billion on a new system before properly addressing the problems with the one we already have?
A dedicated passenger-track proposal for VIA was estimated at $4–6 billion, with Transport Canada figures projecting on-time performance of up to 95 per cent and Toronto–Ottawa trips shortened by as much as 90 minutes. These figures need updating, but the cost difference is enormous. Why aren’t taxpayers being shown a current, independent comparison of the two options?
I’m not against improving passenger rail. I’m against committing tens of billions of dollars to Alto before Ottawa demonstrates why a much less expensive alternative isn’t good enough.
Fix the fundamentals first. Taxpayers deserve answers before they’re handed the bill.
Scott Hughes, Uxbridge
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Some ideas for municipal council
Think about it…
Representation by population creates urban-centred governance at all levels. Brock, Scugog. and Uxbridge Townships are in the lowest tier. Even so, they still have an urban centre, which has more votes over their rural counterparts. Brock may be an exception. The dominance of urban over rural votes increases exponentially as you move up the tiers. Agricultural property owners provide humanity with one of life’s basic needs, yet they are disregarded in the Growth and Development Economy OF UNEXPECTED (https://invest.durham.ca/north-of-unexpected-north-durham).
From my perspective, the middle class, a.k.a. the public, is but a commodity in a highly competitive growth economy. We keep the upper class rich through our consumer habits and investments. We maintain the lower class through our taxes, community support groups/charities, individual and corporate donations, government programs. Rights violations are a given in a growing lower class, maintaining the related stigma.
The government’s job primarily is to ensure the middle class can go to work relatively happy in all aspects of their lives.
It’s time for us to come back down to the basics of living sustainably and kindly on Mother Earth. The public has the power to do this. We can create the foundation for a healthy future, with government, and independently through self-organization.
A Township Committee for Public Input Strategies Development could be the starting point for our new council. Collaborative public decision-making has antithetical processes. The resources to develop it are all there, many of which I have on my bookshelves. Let’s do this.
June Davies, Uxbridge