Mayor John Tory (open John Tory's policard) admires former mayor David Crombie but will not heed his plea that Tory pause or abandon efforts to ensure the east Gardiner Expressway stands for generations to come.

Tory told reporters he will continue to push council to approve next week a rebuilt elevated link to the Don Valley Parkway and is not swayed by pleas and expert advice to replace it with an at-grade boulevard.

“I admire David Crombie greatly, he's a friend of mine, but that doesn't mean we're going to agree on every single issue every single day ...,” the mayor told reporters Tuesday after a downtown Microsoft event.

“I put forward my position to show some leadership in terms of what I thought was best — not perfect — best for the whole city in terms of its economy, jobs for people, their time with families and not extending congestion and commuting times.”

A day earlier Crombie, beloved as Toronto’s “tiny perfect mayor” in the 1970s and, at age 79, a respected voice on civic issues, came to city hall with former chief planner Paul Bedford and Ryerson University president Sheldon Levy.

They all said the best thing for Toronto in terms of opening up waterfront land, adding vibrancy to the derelict east shoreline and helping the economy and jobs was to pull down the Gardiner east of Jarvis St. and replace it with an eight-lane boulevard that would connect to the DVP.

Crombie, who gave Tory’s mayoral candidacy a boost last year with a well-publicized endorsement, pleaded with his old friend to at least wait for more information rather than press ahead with a disastrous decision.

“I just think (Tory)’s wrong on this issue, as its stands so far — tragically wrong — because we have such an extraordinary opportunity to create a boulevard,” between Jarvis Street and the DVP, Crombie said.

Tory said: “David Crombie made a statement yesterday. Today we have the financial services business alliance ... and assorted others representing thousands of jobs in this city staying that the position I'm taking is the correct one if you want to make sure you advance the Toronto economy ... and at the same time make sure you don't extend commuting times or congestion in Toronto.”

He was referring to a website, DontCutMeOff.net, launched by an industry coalition to try to rally public and council support for keeping the expressway standing.

“Simply put, removing Gardiner East would create traffic chaos in this city,” coalition spokesperson, Stephen Laskowski, senior vice president of the Ontario Trucking Association, said in a news release.

A comparison of the two options in the environmental assessment prepared by Toronto city staff and Waterfront Toronto suggested the boulevard option would extend commutes by two to three minutes more than partial removal.

A separate University of Toronto study, commissioned by the same groups behind the website, including CAA South Central, the Ontario Trucking Association and the Toronto Financial District Business Improvement Area, pegged removal delays at one to 10 minutes.

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Removal is best overall in terms of Toronto’s economy, a consultant’s evaluation prepared for the city and Waterfront Toronto said, suggesting traffic delays would not have a serious impact while removal would open up more land for development and help create more jobs.

The coalition, however, counters that increased congestion could cost the region $36.6 million annually in lost productivity and divert about 1,600 cars a day from the Don Valley Parkway onto Richmond St.

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