In Rob and Doug’s ideal Toronto, you wouldn’t know that public transit even exists: It would have been banished underground and handed over to the province, leaving the city, its budget and its streets free for their rightful inheritors, drivers.

Not that that’s likely to happen anytime soon. The Fords, whose grasp on reality is shaky at best, have now floated the idea that the province, i.e. Metrolinx, should take over the Toronto Transit Commission.

The province, not surprisingly, said thanks but no thanks to the offer. But even if it hadn’t, the chances Queen’s Park would do a better job running the show are highly doubtful.

From the Fords’ point of view, the most obvious advantage — and the least probable — is that the province would assume financial responsibility for the commission, including its $450 million annual operating budget.

For Toronto itself, the most obvious advantage would be that the TTC might find itself free from the crass political interference practised by the Fords. But that, too, is doubtful.

In truth, every aspect of transportation policy is political. This has long been the downfall of public transit in Toronto and environs, which is 25 or 30 years behind Europe and Asia. Indeed, we have reached the point where lack of transit has become the most serious impediment to the GTA’s continued prosperity.

According to the Toronto Board of Trade, gridlock costs the regional economy fully $6 billion annually.

And these days the talk is all about cutting routes, increasing fares and killing Transit City. All of which will make it worse.

“Be careful what you wish for,” warns Toronto’s most important transit advocate, Steve Munro. “This would represent uploading on a scale unlike anything we have seen. Where will the money come from? Simply off-loading your largest cost onto the province isn’t going to solve the problem. It doesn’t make sense.”

Instead, let’s all get aboard the Fords’ plan to bring an NFL football team to Toronto — though that scheme has about as much chance of seeing the light of day as an OTC, an Ontario Transit Commission.

“Why would the province want to take on this enormous cost when it has an out-of-control deficit on its hands?” asks TTC commissioner Maria Augimeri. “And why would Torontonians want to put their transit system into the hands of politicians from South Porcupine?”

In the meantime, the provincial transportation agency, Metrolinx, has made it clear it has no interest in local transit, only the regional network.

Besides, even though politicians were all removed from the Metrolinx board, there’s no evidence the provincial government is any less susceptible to political pressure. For example, the subway is now being extended to Vaughan, where densities come nowhere near the break-even point. And what about the much underused Sheppard Line? It was started after the province filled in the hole dug when work began on the Eglinton subway.

Much of what the Fords have said and done comes from a place of deep ignorance. Even their NFL dream was out of touch with 21st century Toronto. Theirs is a heart of darkness the light of reality has yet to pierce.

Their much-vaunted love of subways comes from nothing more than their vain wish to see the streets clear of everything but cars and trucks.

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The Fords may speak nonsense, but their logic is telling. The notion a problem can be solved by passing it on to another government will lead to some interesting encounters in the years ahead.

Christopher Hume can be reached at chume@thestar.ca

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