The new chair of Metrolinx says he wasn’t appointed to usher in a period of austerity at the transit agency, despite the new Progressive Conservative government vowing to rein in provincial spending.

Don Wright, a veteran financial executive and former CEO of TD Securities, was tapped by the province in August to lead the board, and is the first chair to serve Metrolinx under a non-Liberal government.

He takes control of the board as the agency is in the midst of a $13.5-billion expansion of GO Transit called regional express rail, and is building expensive light rail lines across the region.

In his first sit-down interview with the Star, Wright discussed the fate of major projects such as the Finch West LRT, and his plans to ensure the board acts with transparency.

The provincial government says it wants to clean up what it says is a financial mess left behind by the Liberals. Your main experience is in the financial sector. Is it your job to trim the agency’s budget?

If you were to ask me my mandate, we want to run this operation like a business.

It’s not a matter of cutting budgets to cut budgets, it’s to do things in an effective and efficient manner. And if out of that you save some money, great.

Really what Metrolinx is looking to do is to engage our passengers more, to provide better service to them, and to make it efficient at the same time.

Should the public expect a period of austerity at Metrolinx? Could we see projects like regional express rail scaled down?

There’s certainly no instruction in that regard. We have lots of things in the works, and as far as we know those things will continue to be things that Metrolinx will continue to build.

We’re going to try to make sure that every project we try to do is managed tremendously well. But there’s no austerity program per se.

Things like the electrification of the GO network, is that going to proceed?

One of the things that we’re doing on that is back when the decision was made, I think it was 2010, electrification was the way. We looked at another technology, which was (hydrogen-powered trains). That has come a long way in that period.

So I think we’re going to do the appropriate due diligence just to make sure that (hydgrogen) isn’t a route that should be considered as well. But as it stands right now we’ll be proceeding.

Is there a chance the Finch West LRT could be cancelled?

I haven’t been advised by the government any different. Our expectation is that it goes along.

One thing Metrolinx CEO Phil Verster has said has good value for money is reducing GO fares to $3 in Toronto and for shorter trips. Do you anticipate that will go ahead?

There’s an economic basis for why that’s a good proposal. And we’re trying to get some of the people that now use the TTC, which from time to time, especially at rush hour, is overloaded, (to use GO instead).

It costs some money in the short run but over time we think it’s a reasonable way to go. At the end of the day it will be up to the government to decide.

Under the previous chair, Rob Prichard, we saw Liberal transportation minister Steven Del Duca interfere in the planning process to win approval for GO stations that weren’t supported by evidence. That happened with the chair’s knowledge. How will you ensure Metrolinx and the board are acting transparently?

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I have a reasonably strong view on this, and that is our role from the point of view of Metrolinx is to give the best advice that we possibly can to the government. But we also understand that at the end of the day it’s the government’s responsibility to make decisions of where we spend money.

I think from an integrity point of view I can’t imagine, unless new facts come to light, that we would change our advice on something (at the request of the government). It’s certainly something I would not do.

The government is proposing uploading the ownership of the TTC subway to the province. How do you see Metrolinx’s role in that?

That decision hasn’t been made yet. As you know it’s under consideration, and I think it’s at a fairly early stage.

When we get a little bit closer, I’m sure Metrolinx will be asked for their and advice and their opinion. As of yet, we have not.

But remember, if you did one of those things, you don’t lose all the skills that you already have at the TTC. They just become part of Metrolinx, if that’s the way it went.

Metrolinx seems to be in transition, waiting for the new government to make some key decisions on issues like uploading. Do you think there will be a change in course for the agency under this new government?

I don’t see a dramatic change in course. We’re going to focus on the things we’ve always focused on. Maybe a little more so on certain aspects than others.

We’re going to be looking at every expense, we’re going to be doing our homework on any projects we do, to make sure there’s a reasonable expectation of a payoff for everything that we do.

Are there areas where Metrolinx has been overspending?

I don’t see any dramatic (overspending). I’ve read some of the (Ontario auditor general) comments, and so I can see some places where things need to be tightened up, and I know that’s happening right now.

So sure, there are places where we spent a little too much money. Maybe we’ve used an outside contractor when we could have done it internally. Those kind of things. But we’re tightening all that up and looking at it very closely.

This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.

Ben Spurr is a Toronto-based reporter covering transportation. Reach him by email at bspurr@thestar.ca or follow him on Twitter: @BenSpurr

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