Ontario pays too much and builds too little. Deliver transit continuously, connect regions by rail, and get roads moving again.
Build transportation infrastructure as a continuous, standardized program to bring down project risks and costs.
Connect Ontario's regions with HSR, regional rail, and modern bus service.
Fight congestion and traffic through operational reform and smart enforcement.
Ontario pays the most and builds the least. The routine work of a competent government, putting in a transit line or twinning a highway or running a train between two cities, has turned into a saga of delay and overrun, delivered years late at several times what comparable countries pay. Meanwhile, congestion eats hours out of people's days, and whole regions go without the rail and transit a modern economy runs on.
The real problem is not concrete. It is lost capacity: the institutional ability to plan and deliver big things well, which the province has let wither.
This section rebuilds that ability. It stops treating each transit project as a one-off political event and runs construction as a steady, standardized program, the way the countries that build quickly and cheaply actually do it. On that foundation it builds the future: high-speed rail through Southern Ontario, all-day regional rail, rapid transit in our mid-sized cities, and bus service restored to the towns the province walked away from. It also gets the roads moving again with smarter operations, real enforcement, and private capital for new capacity. A province that cannot build cannot grow.
Stop treating transit projects like one-off political events. Run delivery as a continuous program with standardized designs, protected corridors, and project-cost benchmarks taxpayers can hold the system to. Ontario must improve its state capacity to deliver infrastructure at globally competitive costs.
Connect Ontario's regions with frequent, fast, reliable rail and transit. Build out high-speed rail, complete GO electrification, expand higher-order transit in mid-sized cities, and restore bus service to the communities the province stepped back from.
Move more people and goods through the corridors Ontario already has. Modernize traffic signals, coordinate construction, enforce the rules that keep traffic moving, and use congestion pricing and private capital to add capacity without burdening taxpayers.
| Goal | Lower | Upper |
|---|---|---|
| Total — Build The Future Of Transportation | ($3.1B) | ($3.7B) |
| Deliver On Time and On Budget | ($20M) | ($30M) |
| Connecting Communities With Rail & Transit | ($3.0B) | ($4.9B) |
| Win the War on Traffic | ($160M) | +$1.2B |
Net budgetary impact over the Ontario Budget 2026 baseline. Negative numbers represent net new provincial spending; positive numbers represent net savings or revenue.
Detail on how each cost or savings estimate was derived. All figures represent net budgetary impact over the Ontario Budget 2026 baseline.
| Idea | Lower | Upper | How it was estimated |
|---|---|---|---|
| Build transit as a continuous program, not one-off projects. | $0 | $0 | Funded within existing budgets. Generates major savings on the $30-40B in active and planned capital projects. |
| Separate transit construction from operations. | $0 | $0 | An organizational restructuring funded within existing budgets. |
| Create a rolling 25-year transportation pipeline and corridor bank. | ($20M) | ($30M) | Funds a pipeline and corridor protection team inside MTO and Infrastructure Ontario at $20-30M/yr. Pays for itself many times over by cutting land assembly costs, expropriation delays, and rework. |
| Standardize designs and cost benchmarks for repeat infrastructure. | $0 | $0 | Funded within existing Metrolinx and Infrastructure Ontario capacity. Experience in Spain, France, and Asia shows standardization plus continuous delivery cuts unit costs 30-50% over time. |
| Publish project cost, timeline, and delivery benchmarks. | $0 | $0 | Funded within existing Infrastructure Ontario and MTO reporting capacity. An accountability tool that drives savings down the line. |
| Idea | Lower | Upper | How it was estimated |
|---|---|---|---|
| Build an Ontario high-speed rail network. | ($1.0B) | ($2.0B) | Funds $1-2B/yr toward a $30-50B capital plan. Partly covered by reallocating capital within the existing $38B transportation budget, federal cost-sharing, station-area value capture, and public land rights. Over 25 years the returns far exceed the roughly $4B/yr capital cost. |
| Complete GO electrification and turn GO into true regional rail by 2035. | ($500M) | ($750M) | Adds $500-750M/yr above current GO expansion and electrification spending. Much is already budgeted; this speeds it up and adds frequency, more electrification, and integrated fares. |
| Expand higher-order transit in Ontario's major and mid-sized cities. | ($750M) | ($1.0B) | Funds $750M-1B/yr in capital across the named cities and other suitable locations. Savings from continuous delivery and standardized designs are reinvested here. |
| Make Ontario the world's best place to build and deploy self-driving vehicles. | $0 | $0 | Funded within existing MTO and Invest Ontario budgets. The economic upside from keeping and growing the auto sector is significant. |
| Create a sustainable operating model for transit. | ($500M) | ($750M) | Provides $500-750M/yr in provincial operating support for municipal transit, above current GTA transit assistance and gas tax allocations. Tied to frequency, reliability, and ridership results rather than political negotiation. |
| Restore provincial bus connectivity for rural and smaller communities. | ($200M) | ($400M) | Funds operating subsidies and Ontario Northland expansion at $200-400M/yr, providing roughly 200 to 300 daily intercity bus connections to rural and Northern communities. Modelled on the pre-2018 Greyhound coverage, with improvements. This also appears in the Northern and Rural section. |
| Explore the viability of a Northern passenger rail network. | $0 | $0 | Feasibility study and corridor preservation funded within existing MTO and Ontario Northland budgets. Construction would be weighed in future capital cycles, so nothing is committed here yet. This also appears in the Northern and Rural section. |
| Idea | Lower | Upper | How it was estimated |
|---|---|---|---|
| Modernize traffic signals and intersections. | ($100M) | ($200M) | Funds $100-200M/yr to deploy adaptive signals and transit signal priority across major provincial and municipal corridors. Experience in the UK, Australia, and US cities shows this cuts delays 10-25%. |
| Create a provincial construction coordination function inside MTO. | $0 | $0 | Funded within the existing MTO budget. Generates major savings by reducing overlapping work, speeding up projects, and cutting disruption. |
| Make 24/7 and off-peak construction the default on high-traffic corridors. | $0 | $0 | A procurement and contract reform. Overnight work costs more per shift, but total project costs are usually lower because work finishes faster and disrupts traffic less. No new spending, with savings down the line. |
| Modernize goods movement and highway capacity. | ($750M) | ($1.0B) | Reallocates the provincial highways program and draws on federal trade-corridor cost-sharing. Mostly puts existing MTO capital to better use, with $750M-1B/yr above current trade-corridor commitments at the upper end. |
| Explore funding models for additional highway capacity. | +$500M | +$1.5B | Generates $500M-1.5B/yr in net revenue and savings from privately funded infrastructure delivered through P3s, concessions, or value capture. Pension funds, infrastructure investors, and Indigenous-led partners carry the capital risk while the province coordinates planning and permitting. Highway 413 and similar projects would be considered through this pathway. |
| Introduce variable congestion pricing on the most congested highway corridors. | +$300M | +$1.0B | Generates $300M-1B/yr in net revenue from variable peak-period tolling on the most congested GTA and Ottawa corridors. Designed to keep traffic moving, not maximize revenue, following Stockholm, Singapore, and Greater London. |
| Enforce the rules that keep roads moving. | $0 | $0 | Automated enforcement equipment is covered by ticket revenue, which goes mainly to municipalities. No net provincial cost, a real benefit for municipalities, and better traffic flow. |
| Create an Ontario mobility performance dashboard. | ($10M) | ($10M) | Built within existing MTO data and reporting capacity, drawing on 511 Ontario, ministry traffic operations, and transit agency feeds. Added cost is minimal, about $10M/yr. |
| Upgrade the Northern Trans-Canada Highway as a national project. | ($100M) | ($100M) | A provincial cost-share of about $100M/yr, federal-led through the National Trade Corridors Fund and the Trade Corridors Investment Fund. The program is large and could grow if a federal partnership speeds up timelines. This also appears in the Northern and Rural section. |
Every dollar goes to work — with up to 75% back in tax credits.
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