Now that Toronto City Council has approved building the Scarborough subway extension, Transportation Minister Steven Del Duca said he expects discussions concerning a new transit agreement for the former borough will begin soon.

“Now that we see the decision made by council, I’m sure that Metrolinx, the city and the Ministry of Transportation (MTO) will engage in discussions in the next number of days, and weeks,” said Del Duca on Thursday.

The Scarborough subway extension is just one part of the 15-year transit plan Toronto approved Wednesday, that requires close co-operation between the city and the province, on every project, every step of the way.

It's been the most controversial. Councillors voted to move forward with a one-stop subway extension to Scarborough Town Centre, rather than the building an LRT — potentially putting an end to a long, and fractious debate.

“I think it was important to have the discussion, the discussion has now occurred, and now it’s important to move forward towards producing those positive outcomes,” said Del Duca.

In 2012, the province signed an agreement to pay $1.48 billion to an LRT to replace the aging Scarborough RT, but in 2013, when Glen Murray was Transportation Minister, committed that funding to building a two-stop subway, after former mayor Rob Ford had campaigned for subways, subways, subways, and council voted to build a subway instead.

The province remains on board with the one-stop express subway approved by council Wednesday.

“We were first at the table with our funding commitment. We want to see shovels in the ground on that project and all of the others in which we’re involved,” Del Duca said.

Toronto city staff’s preliminary estimates the cost of the project at $3.2 billion. Funding is expected to come from the province’s contribution, escalated to $1.99 billion since 2012, and $660 million committed by the federal government.

Del Duca said the province worked closely with the city on the 15-year transit plan.

All of the projects, except the Scarborough subway extension, involve Metrolinx: adding six stations to Metrolinx’s GO regional express rail project within Toronto as "SmartTrack," extending Metrolinx’s Eglinton Crosstown LRT east to University of Toronto’s Scarborough Campus and West to the Pearson International Airport area. Planning of the city’s relief line project is moving forward in partnership with Metrolinx, thanks to $150 million recently announced funding from MTO.

The councillors authorized City Manager Peter Wallace to negotiate funding and cost-sharing agreements for the projects.

Metrolinx President and CEO Bruce McCuaig said Metrolinx and the city are already in the process of negotiating an agreement on the maintenance and operation of all the city's LRT projects, which are owned by Metrolinx and operated by the TTC.

The other key change in the TTC-Metrolinx relationship is fare integration, a major report on which is due this fall. McCuaig said it's well underway, and the demand for better integration is clear, but a lot of work on the plan still needs to be done.

"As we're building more transit services that come up to the municipal boundaries, we want to make sure we're facilitating people who cross those boundaries on transit, instead of taking a car," he said.

For Mayor John Tory, co-operation with the upper levels of government has meant more funding for Toronto transit. "We are also working with the provincial and federal governments as they prepare to roll out the first phase of the federal transit funding, which will see unprecedented investment in TTC state of good repair projects in Toronto, and will provide additional funding for the planning work that is required to get our major transit projects shovel ready," he said, in a statement.

"We will be participating in the development of the second phase of this program, which will likely focus on the funding of large projects including those approved yesterday by City Council."

Toronto’s 15-year transit future tied up with Metrolinx, MTO

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