# Ontario Canada's Premier, Doug Ford, and the 401 Tunnel **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [November 7, 2025, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ontario-canadas-premier-doug-ford-and-the-401-tunnel/1024667 "2025-11-07T16:24:09Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Spoons](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spoons/32/3141_2.png) [@Spoons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoons)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2025, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ontario-canadas-premier-doug-ford-and-the-401-tunnel/1024667/41 "2025-11-12T02:07:25Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > So, the problem is that Toronto isn’t properly maintaining their infrastructure … As @FinsToTheLeft notes, funding throughout the Gardiner’s history has been inconsistent, and maintenance costs money. But the additional challenge is Toronto’s climate, which ranges from icy cold winters to blazingly hot summers. Contraction and expansion are going to take their toll on an elevated roadway. Plus, in winter, salt gets dumped on the roadway (not just the Gardiner; all major Toronto roads get salted), which makes driving on the road safer at the time, but over decades, that salt also takes its toll on the road surface, the expansion joints, and the concrete that keeps the roadway up. Under these circumstances, I’d suggest that the cost of maintaining the Gardiner, no matter who pays for it, is going to get to the point where it’s going to cost more and more. As I said, parts of it (at its eastern end) have already been torn down as too expensive to maintain given their use. ---
**Author:** ![Horatius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/horatius/32/3572_2.png) [@Horatius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatius)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2025, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ontario-canadas-premier-doug-ford-and-the-401-tunnel/1024667/42 "2025-11-12T18:15:39Z")
> [@wolfpup](#): > > It sounds like a reasonable alternative, except that these structures tend to deteriorate over time. Okay, hear me out: _Air Tunnel_. We built an elevated roadway over the existing 401, and then build an end-to-end Giant Cylinder over the whole mess to protect the roadways from the weather. Failing that, I’ll bring up my Dome Over the City plan again. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2025, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ontario-canadas-premier-doug-ford-and-the-401-tunnel/1024667/43 "2025-11-12T21:27:36Z")
> [@Dr\_Paprika](#): > > The 400 highways around Toronto, Canada are some of the busiest roads in the world. They connect the six boroughs of Toronto To nitpick, Toronto does not, and did not, have six boroughs. Only Scarborough styled itself a borough at any point and they stopped that in 1983. Toronto is a merger of six cities, and none of them exist in any way anymore. As to the tunnel, it’s a preposterous and impossible idea. > [@snowthx](#): > > To my point - would banning heavy trucks on that road help? Banning trucks would cost billions upon billions of dollars in lost commerce and cause massive job losses and economic dislocation. ---
**Author:** ![Dr\_Paprika](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr_paprika/32/3042_2.png) [@Dr\_Paprika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr_Paprika)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2025, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ontario-canadas-premier-doug-ford-and-the-401-tunnel/1024667/44 "2025-11-12T22:29:55Z")
We could call it the Thunderdome. When Ford first started talking about this, I assumed it was to deflect against other things. But when he talked about how they could dig under the English Channel, it made me think he was more serious. That doesn’t make it a good idea - opening up the 407 is much easier. But if tunnel technology was somehow perfected over the next hundred years and it could be done much more cheaply and safely - is it still a terrible idea? ---
**Author:** ![wolfpup](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolfpup/32/10618_2.png) [@wolfpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfpup)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2025, 12:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ontario-canadas-premier-doug-ford-and-the-401-tunnel/1024667/45 "2025-11-13T00:26:06Z")
> [@Dr\_Paprika](#): > > But if tunnel technology was somehow perfected over the next hundred years and it could be done much more cheaply and safely - is it still a terrible idea? What kind of technology are you envisioning that could dig a tunnel wide enough to accommodate, say, 12 lanes of traffic and at least 40 km long, with many entrances and exits all along the way, and do it cheaply, including removal and disposal of all the earth and the necessary supporting concrete infrastructure? Or, as the saying goes, if my grandmother had wheels, she would be a streetcar. “If” is doing some heavy lifting here. This is insane. The only practical solutions are to reclaim the 407, improve public transit, and reroute as much freight as possible from big trucks clogging the 401 to the railroads. Every one of those is a daunting proposition, but at least not insane. Selling the 407 was a very, very bad idea that will be very hard to undo. It’s such a big moneymaker for investors that guess who one of the part owners is? The Canada Pension Plan, known for astute and very profitable management of its assets! ---
**Author:** ![FinsToTheLeft](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finstotheleft/32/2930_2.png) [@FinsToTheLeft](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinsToTheLeft)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2025, 12:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ontario-canadas-premier-doug-ford-and-the-401-tunnel/1024667/46 "2025-11-13T00:31:06Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > To nitpick, Toronto does not, and did not, have six boroughs. Only Scarborough styled itself a borough at any point and they stopped that in 1983. Nope. As a kid who grew up in North York, it was a Borough. It became a city during Mel Lastman’s reign in 1979. The others were also boroughs at one point with East York holding out to the bitter end. [![](https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTm9eJfKCqh9_kqNh6B_EzeuJF1mf2x1xN326DvSgn3Sw&s=10) ](https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTm9eJfKCqh9_kqNh6B_EzeuJF1mf2x1xN326DvSgn3Sw&s=10) > [@wolfpup](#): > > What kind of technology are you envisioning that could dig a tunnel wide enough to accommodate, say, 12 lanes of traffic and at least 40 km long, with many entrances and exits all along the way, and do it cheaply, including removal and disposal of all the earth and the necessary supporting concrete infrastructure? Pure Doug Ford Bluster can do it! ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2025, 12:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ontario-canadas-premier-doug-ford-and-the-401-tunnel/1024667/47 "2025-11-13T00:41:59Z")
> [@wolfpup](#): > > This is insane. Yeah, that’s my point. I know that anything involving infrastructure is expensive. But compared to pretty much any other idea, a tunnel is even more expensive. ---
**Author:** ![Spoons](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spoons/32/3141_2.png) [@Spoons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoons)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2025, 10:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ontario-canadas-premier-doug-ford-and-the-401-tunnel/1024667/48 "2025-11-13T10:58:09Z")
> [@FinsToTheLeft](#): > > Nope. As a kid who grew up in North York, it was a Borough. It became a city during Mel Lastman’s reign in 1979. The others were also boroughs at one point with East York holding out to the bitter end. Agree with @FinsToTheLeft . There was the City of Toronto (the inverted T on maps), and the boroughs of Scarborough, North York, Etobicoke, East York, and damned if I can recall the other. At any rate, they all started calling themselves cities at some point in the 1980s. Cities or boroughs; it didn’t really matter, as they were all members of the Municipality of Metropolitan Toronto. In 1997, cities or boroughs really didn’t really matter, as they were now all just Toronto. ---
**Author:** ![FinsToTheLeft](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finstotheleft/32/2930_2.png) [@FinsToTheLeft](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinsToTheLeft)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2025, 1:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ontario-canadas-premier-doug-ford-and-the-401-tunnel/1024667/49 "2025-11-13T13:18:54Z")
> [@Spoons](#): > > There was the City of Toronto (the inverted T on maps), and the boroughs of Scarborough, North York, Etobicoke, East York, and damned if I can recall the other. York was the 6th. By 1997 before amalgamation they were all styled Cities except for East York which used the slogan “Canada’s Only Borough”. ---
**Author:** ![moes\_lotion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ba0ec/32.png) [@moes\_lotion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/moes_lotion)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2025, 6:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ontario-canadas-premier-doug-ford-and-the-401-tunnel/1024667/50 "2025-11-13T18:08:57Z")
> [@FinsToTheLeft](#): > > York was the 6th. By 1997 before amalgamation they were all styled Cities except for East York which used the slogan “Canada’s Only Borough”. For what it’s worth, and note that this is my first ever use of Google AI Overview as a source, I submit the following: “Before the 1998 amalgamation, the “boroughs” of Toronto were the six lower-tier municipalities of **Toronto** , **Etobicoke** , **North York** , **Scarborough** , **East York** , and **York**. These were governed by the upper-tier Municipality of Metropolitan Toronto” ---
**Author:** ![FinsToTheLeft](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finstotheleft/32/2930_2.png) [@FinsToTheLeft](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinsToTheLeft)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2025, 9:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ontario-canadas-premier-doug-ford-and-the-401-tunnel/1024667/51 "2025-11-13T21:05:36Z")
> [@moes\_lotion](#): > > “Before the 1998 amalgamation, the “boroughs” of Toronto were the six lower-tier municipalities of **Toronto** , **Etobicoke** , **North York** , **Scarborough** , **East York** , and **York**. These were governed by the upper-tier Municipality of Metropolitan Toronto” I know we are drifting from the topic at hand, which henceforth I will refer to as “The Big Doug”. Toronto was originally more than 25 towns and villages with York at the centre. York eventually became Toronto and the 25+ municipalities amalgamated over time. When Metropolitan Toronto was formed in 1953, there were 12 towns, villages, and townships plus the City of Toronto. Further amalgamations took place in 1967 which left the City and 5 Boroughs. The Boroughs, with the exception of East York, all reincorporated as cities in the 1970s and 1980s. Toronto was never really considered to be or legally a Borough. ---
**Author:** ![jjakucyk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/3d9bf3/32.png) [@jjakucyk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjakucyk)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2025, 2:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ontario-canadas-premier-doug-ford-and-the-401-tunnel/1024667/52 "2025-11-14T14:00:34Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > Banning trucks would cost billions upon billions of dollars in lost commerce and cause massive job losses and economic dislocation. Except it most likely won’t. That’s the sort of fear mongering traffic planners and automobile industry shills like to spout, but “carmageddon” basically never happens because people plan for it and adjust. If those trucks were just Thanos-snapped out of existence then sure, but they’ll find alternate routes, alternate modes, and alternate schedules that work. Also the highway already caused and is still causing billions upon billions of dollars in lost commerce, job losses, and economic dislocation, just for a different subset of people and businesses. There’s no reason to presume the current status quo is the better one. Has there been a highway teardown project or congestion pricing scheme that didn’t result in less traffic, better air quality, and improved mobility? ---
**Author:** ![3AxisCtrl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/3/ecd19e/32.png) [@3AxisCtrl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/3AxisCtrl)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2025, 4:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ontario-canadas-premier-doug-ford-and-the-401-tunnel/1024667/53 "2025-11-16T04:01:53Z")
> [@Dr\_Paprika](#): > > It is more ambitious than the Big Dig which paralyzed Boston for a decade. 100 km of 8-lane highway built deep under a city’s major roads would make the Big Dig look cheap and quick. I think a few million dollars per foot might be a sensible place to start the cost estimate. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2025, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ontario-canadas-premier-doug-ford-and-the-401-tunnel/1024667/54 "2025-11-17T18:43:58Z")
> [@jjakucyk](#): > > Except it most likely won’t. That’s the sort of fear mongering traffic planners and automobile industry shills like to spout, but “carmageddon” basically never happens because people plan for it and adjust. If those trucks were just Thanos-snapped out of existence then sure, but they’ll find alternate routes, alternate modes, and alternate schedules that work. You can always find alternatives; the alternatives are often vastly less efficient. I work in industry in this region; the dependence on trucks is huge. Sure, things would adjust. They always do; the adjustment often hurts a lot and results in a less desirable state. > [@3AxisCtrl](#): > > 100 km of 8-lane highway built deep under a city’s major roads would make the Big Dig look cheap and quick. I think a few million dollars per foot might be a sensible place to start the cost estimate. The Big Dig was child’s play compared to the idiotic 401 Tunnel idea. The Big Dig was something like five or six miles of tunnels and cost, in 2025 Canadian dollars, around $20-25 billion. Ford is proposing a tunnel ten times longer to be buried underneath one of the busiest and most important freeways in the history of roads. It would cost $200 billion if it cost a dime, and quite frankly I think I’m being extremely conservative. That’s basically the entire provincial budget for a year. Not the provincial budget for transportation for a year - EVERYTHING. This is a province that after 14 years still hasn’t gotten the Eglinton LRT line working, a project that is fifty times less difficult. ---
**Author:** ![wolfpup](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolfpup/32/10618_2.png) [@wolfpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfpup)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2025, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ontario-canadas-premier-doug-ford-and-the-401-tunnel/1024667/55 "2025-11-17T18:55:12Z")
> [@jjakucyk](#): > > > [@RickJay](#): > > > > Banning trucks would cost billions upon billions of dollars in lost commerce and cause massive job losses and economic dislocation. > > Except it most likely won’t. That’s the sort of fear mongering traffic planners and automobile industry shills like to spout, but “carmageddon” basically never happens because people plan for it and adjust. If those trucks were just Thanos-snapped out of existence then sure, but they’ll find alternate routes, alternate modes, and alternate schedules that work. Moving a significant portion of long-haul freight transport from trucks to other modes, in particular to railroads, would have a tremendous benefit in easing congestion on the 401. That, and turning the 407 back into a freeway vs a toll road would go a very long way to solving the congestion problem. It also occurs to me that it would have a secondary benefit. One of the big reasons that expressways have to undergo so much repair and repaving – which itself is a major cause of traffic backups – is because of constant pounding by big heavy trucks. Reducing heavy truck traffic would significantly extend the lifetime of our major highways. Trucks are best utilized for local transport, not for long-haul. ---
**Author:** ![Dorjan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dorjan/32/12440_2.png) [@Dorjan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dorjan)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2025, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ontario-canadas-premier-doug-ford-and-the-401-tunnel/1024667/56 "2025-11-17T19:35:37Z")
I went digging for data on just how much GTA truck traffic is long-haul transiting through vs local/regional. The best source I’ve found was this paper from 2009: [http://conf.tac-atc.ca/english/resourcecentre/readingroom/conference/conf2009/pdf/Sureshan.pdf](http://conf.tac-atc.ca/english/resourcecentre/readingroom/conference/conf2009/pdf/Sureshan.pdf) It looks like only 16% of truck traffic in the GTA is long-haul route transiting through. The rest either originates in the GTA, or the GTA is the destination. It still doesn’t break down what % of that traffic is purely intra-regional. IMO that 16% is probably better suited for rail transport, at least. ---
**Author:** ![FinsToTheLeft](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finstotheleft/32/2930_2.png) [@FinsToTheLeft](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinsToTheLeft)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2025, 12:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ontario-canadas-premier-doug-ford-and-the-401-tunnel/1024667/57 "2025-11-18T00:26:11Z")
> [@wolfpup](#): > > Moving a significant portion of long-haul freight transport from trucks to other modes, in particular to railroads, would have a tremendous benefit in easing congestion on the 401. That, and turning the 407 back into a freeway vs a toll road would go a very long way to solving the congestion problem. The only way this will happen is with a dedicated ROW for passenger trains. Keep VIA and GO off the freight tracks and it’s a possibility. ---
**Author:** ![wolfpup](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolfpup/32/10618_2.png) [@wolfpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfpup)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2025, 12:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ontario-canadas-premier-doug-ford-and-the-401-tunnel/1024667/58 "2025-11-18T00:41:23Z")
> [@FinsToTheLeft](#): > > The only way this will happen is with a dedicated ROW for passenger trains. Keep VIA and GO off the freight tracks and it’s a possibility. I can understand that GO pretty much has to own the track. But VIA (and its former incarnation, CNR passenger service) have been sharing track with freight trains across the country ever since the first 19th century railways! > [@Dorjan](#): > > It looks like only 16% of truck traffic in the GTA is long-haul route transiting through. The rest either originates in the GTA, or the GTA is the destination. It still doesn’t break down what % of that traffic is purely intra-regional. IMO that 16% is probably better suited for rail transport, at least. 16% sounds low, but saying that the rest either originates or is destined for the GTA may be misleading. How much of it, for instance, is auto parts destined for gigantic assembly plants in Oshawa or Oakville, or finished vehicles originating from those plants? All of which can be more efficiently transported by rail. ---
**Author:** ![FinsToTheLeft](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finstotheleft/32/2930_2.png) [@FinsToTheLeft](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinsToTheLeft)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2025, 1:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ontario-canadas-premier-doug-ford-and-the-401-tunnel/1024667/59 "2025-11-18T01:22:58Z")
> [@wolfpup](#): > > I can understand that GO pretty much has to own the track. But VIA (and its former incarnation, CNR passenger service) have been sharing track with freight trains across the country ever since the first 19th century railways! The new high speed rail plans wouldn’t work with the existing traffic and track. > **[Alto (high-speed rail)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alto_(high-speed_rail))** > > Alto (stylized in all caps), also known as the Toronto–Quebec City High-Speed Rail Network, is a planned privately-operated high-speed rail network in Canada that will connect Quebec City to Toronto. It was announced by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on February 19, 2025. A design phase for the project was announced with an estimated cost of $3.9 billion and is expected to last 4 to 5 years, with the total cost estimated at $80 to 120 billion. > The railway will feature trains that will reach to... Unfortunately it’s not on the current infrastructure priority list. ---
**Author:** ![wolfpup](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolfpup/32/10618_2.png) [@wolfpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfpup)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2025, 1:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ontario-canadas-premier-doug-ford-and-the-401-tunnel/1024667/60 "2025-11-18T01:30:45Z")
> [@FinsToTheLeft](#): > > Unfortunately it’s not on the current infrastructure priority list. “Unfortunately”? The Toronto-Quebec CIty boondoggle was Justin Trudeau’s politically motivated fever dream and is best forgotten. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ontario-canadas-premier-doug-ford-and-the-401-tunnel/1024667.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ontario-canadas-premier-doug-ford-and-the-401-tunnel/1024667.md?page=4)