Toronto Mayor John Tory leaves Ottawa confident he made a strong case for SmartTrack funding and other city issues, but not knowing how much his discussions will be reflected in the federal parties’ platforms.

“They all understood we are in a crisis situation of our own making, by ignoring gridlock and other problems, and the day of reckoning is fast upon us and we have to act,” Tory said Wednesday as he prepared to fly back to Toronto after a 24-hour trip to lobby federal leaders and other MPs.

“Nobody took issue with the fundamental premise that took me to Ottawa . . Now it’s seeing what they emerge with in their (election) platforms.”

The mayor flies home without any firm funding commitments, something he says he did not expect before parties release their policies ahead of a federal election that must be held before November.

Tory flew to Ottawa on Tuesday with three senior staff members. He met with Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau and MP Adam Vaughan, the Liberal urban affairs critic; Conservatives Transport Minister Lisa Raitt, Labour Minister Kellie Leitch and Infrastructure Minister Denis Lebel; and NDP Leader Thomas Mulcair and his urban affairs critic MP Matthew Kellway.

The mayor also informally met rank-and-file MPs, many representing GTA ridings, on Wednesday.

Tory said he made the case for federal help funding his signature $8 billion SmartTrack plan — transit expansion based on the use of existing GO Transit rail — and that cities including Toronto can no longer fund social housing and road, bridge and sewer replacements primarily from property tax revenues.

He described the meetings with the party leaders and cabinet meetings as “excellent”, with some differences.

Mulcair got the most “granular” with detailed questions about affordable housing policies. Vaughan, until last year a Toronto city councillor, had the “keenest and most complete knowledge of (city issues) of the people we saw.” Raitt and the other Conservative cabinet ministers seemed keen to help the city, Tory said.

After the meetings Tuesday, both Vaughan and Kellway raved about Tory and their respective leaders’ like-minded approaches to urban issues. A Conservative spokeswoman described Tory’s time with Raitt and Leitch as “a good meeting, discussing transportation priorities in the GTA.”

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