Toronto — New Barns, Delivery Delays, More Cars

January 2015

According to the National Post, Construction is advancing on Toronto's $400 million Leslie Barns facility, which is custom designed to house the Bombardier low floor articulated cars being delivered now. The new depot, which should open later in 2015, may have plenty of space available at opening as delivery of the new cars has been significantly delayed. A total of 204 of the new cars were ordered in 2009 at a price of $950 million. By late January 2015 43 cars should have been delivered according to the original schedule, but only three of the cars are in service. The TTC is pressing Bombardier, which suffered a long strike in addition to other delays, to improve the schedule. Under the original plan the last car should have been delivered in 2018, a date that has now slipped to 2019.

Meanwhile TTC CEO Andy Byford told city councillors that the TTC will need an additional 60 of the cars to meet increasing demand. Under the contract for the new cars, the option to purchase the additional cars at the same price as the original 204 could be preserved for a $42 million commitment in 2015.

TTC ridership has grown from 514 million in 2012 to as much as 545 million in 2015.