TORONTO — With the recent announcement that the long-under-construction Eglinton LRT will be completed in 2022, the TTC has assured riders that this is only to ensure that the entire project can be scrapped as late as possible.

“We understand that the Eglinton Crosstown construction has caused traffic delays for years now,” claimed TTC head of Central Planning, Geoff Mesters. “Now that the project is dangerously close to being completed, we want to assure riders that it will be wholly abandoned, in order to preserve current levels of service.”

“As for the 10 years of construction it will require to fill in the hole, that’s just the icing on the cake,” added Mesters.

The decision to delay the cancellation of the Eglinton Crosstown is reportedly a joint initiative between several layers of government. Toronto City Council recently voted overwhelmingly to halt the LRT project after recently-disgraced Councillor Jim Karygiannis (Scarborough—Agincourt) argued, “I for one am sick and tired of Wards that aren’t my Ward getting things and stuff!”

Similarly, Premier Doug Ford agreed that the LRT should be scrapped as far into 2022 as possible, for maximum cost to Ontarians. “If we can lose money selling marijuana and somehow botch license plates, we can absolutely fuck up a project that is 90% complete” commented Ford.

“Also, go to hell Toronto,” added Toronto resident Doug Ford.

Representatives for Metrolinx assured Torontonians that the project cancellation would be timed for maximum heartbreak. “We plan to wait until the last possible second,” said one Metrolinx spokesperson. “Ideally there will have already been a ribbon-cutting ceremony, and commuters will be taking their first steps onto the LRT. That’s the exact moment when we will announce a ‘service delay’, which will of course be permanent.”

Metrolinx has also assured Ontarians that by the time of cancellation Bombardier will have been overpaid by millions, and have already raised PRESTO fares accordingly. They then forecast that the soon-to-be-abandoned tunnels will be “a wonderful place for local teens to smoke pot and have terrible sex.”

Meanwhile, several local residents remain unimpressed at the wait. “Nowadays it takes forever for the TTC to cancel projects,” explained longtime Eglinton West resident Lester Reynolds. “You got that Scarborough subway that’s been limping along for nearly a decade now. Back in my day, Mike Harris would cancel half-built transit projects in half the time!”

Looking forward, transit experts are exploring options to turn the abandoned Eglinton Crosstown tunnel into a series of Starbuckses, an extra already-congested highway, or one 12-kilometer long underground condo.