Begged by Torontonians to run against Mayor Rob Ford, with polls suggesting she would handily win, NDP MP Olivia Chow has softened her opposition to the idea, saying: “We’ll see what happens down the road.”

In an interview from Ottawa on Wednesday, Chow spoke in a markedly different tone than in June, when the Star revealed there was a campaign to draft her.

She said then: “No, I am not running for mayor. My focus is in Ottawa ...,” fighting for a national transit program and infrastructure dollars for Toronto.

She gave the Toronto Sun a flat “No” when asked the question Aug. 22.

But on Wednesday the Opposition transportation critic, former councillor and widow of former NDP leader Jack Layton acknowledged that Torontonians are begging her to run against the arch-conservative, gaffe-prone Ford.

“I’m still very focused on representing folks in Trinity-Spadina and getting a national city agenda, so we could get more funding to cities and public transit,” Chow said.

“I have been hearing a lot from a lot of people that are encouraging me to run. Every weekend when I’m in Toronto, I get people coming up to me on the street and trying to encourage me, but I’m not considering a run at this moment.

“I’m not considering a run now. Will I consider it? We’ll see what happens down the road. We do need better leadership at city hall.”

The next civic election is not until October 2014. However, a Superior Court judge’s ruling on Ford’s alleged conflict of interest, expected soon, could trigger a mayoral byelection for the remainder of his term.

Chow noted that mayors from across Canada, starting with Mississauga’s Hazel McCallion, signed up to support her private member’s bill calling for a federal transit strategy. Ford, however, has ignored her letter as federal Tories start work on the 2013 budget.

“I would love to partner with a mayor that can push the Harper Conservatives to fund better transit, to help with infrastructure needs of the city, to fix the Gardiner (Expressway) so concrete won’t fall on people,” Chow said.

“Fishing (with Prime Minister Stephen Harper) is good, but where’s the money? Our mayor gets caught up with all types of controversy, and the real issues of commuter times, traffic jams — that’s not being dealt with.”

Forum Research independently conducted opinion polls June 25-28 and Aug. 9-10 suggesting that, back then, Chow would crush Ford in a head-to-head vote, and win a hypothetical three-way race against Ford and Newstalk 1010 host John Tory. The first poll had a 2.81 per cent margin of error 19 times out of 20; the second a 3.44 per cent margin 19 times out of 20.

“Chow has huge numbers. She would run away with the election,” Forum president Lorne Bozinoff predicted Wednesday.

“We’ve had people who are either good in the old City of Toronto or good in the inner suburbs. No one else has been good at both, and what was astounding about that poll is that she was winning everywhere.”

Two members of council’s centre-left, Adam Vaughan, who represents the same downtown area as Chow, and Shelley Carroll (Ward 33, Don Valley East) are considering challenging Ford.

Asked what would change if Chow runs, Vaughan (Ward 20, Trinity-Spadina), a staunch Ford critic, said: “All the various computations make you think about it differently.”

He said lots of people are having conversations about the mayor’s race, but also about who can otherwise bring city builders together.

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“All of us have a role to play — how do we put an end to the ‘us and them’ stuff? We’ve got to figure out how to rise above it.

“On the second floor (the council area of city hall) and beyond, there are conversations that aren’t pro- or anti-Ford; they’re: ‘Why aren’t we building transit?’ and ‘How do we build it better?’

He said many are pointing to compromise that made possible Councillor Ana Bailão’s working group report on the fate of TCHC single-family homes and asking, “What if we applied that to the transit plan, to the budget process?”

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