Ontario’s 407 Deal Is Still Costing Drivers
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Summary
For millions of Ontarians, the 407 isn t freedom, it s a rolling invoice. A 108-kilometre monument to what happens when the government sells tomorrow to survive today. In 1999, Ontario leased Highway 407 for 99 years. At the time, it was pitched as smart economics. Debt reduction, fiscal responsibility, modern infrastructure.
Transcript
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They called it innovation. The world's first fully electronic open access toll highway.
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No booths, no stopping, no friction, just motion. But for millions of Ontarians, the 407 isn't
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freedom. It's a rolling invoice. A 108-kilometer monument to what happens when the government
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sells tomorrow to survive today. In 1999, Ontario leased Highway 407 for 99 years.
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The price? $3.1 billion. At the time, it was pitched as smart economics. Debt reduction.
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But here's the problem with short-term political math.
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Today, the same highway is estimated to be worth more than $30 billion.
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The tolls generate hundreds of millions every quarter.
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Drivers pay some of the highest roadway costs in North America
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just to escape congestion created by the public system beside it.
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And the irony becomes almost impossible to ignore.
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And now the public pays private investors to use that road.
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The Canadian Pension Plan Investment Board now controls over 50% of the highway,
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meaning Canadians are trapped inside one of the strangest economic loops ever created.
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because your retirement fund owns the toll road you already paid taxes to build.
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It's about a country monetizing access to itself.
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because one public infrastructure becomes a permanent profit engine citizens stop being
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owners and they start becoming customers tonight we ask the uncomfortable question did ontario
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solve a budget problem in 1999 or create a 99-year extraction machine that canadians can never escape
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driving and commuting in the 400 series highway in southern ontario is amongst the most painful
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exercises you will find i would rank it with the pain of the um the los angeles freeway that you
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see the multi-lane freeway in los angeles and the major highways around the world but nothing
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compare to the out and out daily congestion at all times of the day even on weekends and holidays
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there are jams on the 400 and the 404 and the 401 and every highway and trying to get from one part
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of the city to the other for work or for family or for recreation entertainment purposes is getting
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worse and worse it's the largest urban area in the country and it has some of the worst traffic grid
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in north america among the very worst well jim so we we see a lot of two-lane highways up north
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right northern ontario anything uh referencing highway 11 which is one of the most dangerous
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highways in the entire country all the way down to the 401 in southern ontario it's a mess um our
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infrastructure has always been a mess get on the highway 102 in nova scotia from the airport to
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truple i don't remember or i don't know if you remember six months ago i had a thing over top
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of my desk of infrastructure comparably from the u.s canada and europe so we're 75 years behind
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europe at that time as of last year yep and 40 to or 35 to 40 years behind the united states just
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terms of infrastructure okay like i've been i've driven from nova scotia from newfoundland
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basically every province in the country there's not one province in canada brady
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that you can't find an issue with the roads and transportation system that is immediate need of
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upgrade so not one so if we if we all agree that the infrastructure even from from the statistics
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standpoint we're behind okay push that off to the side so we're not gonna we're not gonna complain
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about infrastructure okay that's a completely different show yeah what we're going to complain
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about is the cost of the 407 the ridiculous deal that was done which i i had laid out in my opening
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monologue and now where we're at in 2026 um over 30 years later this thing has been built it's there
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and it seems like this is a luxury item at this point okay but time is money time is money and so
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every day when i leave our studio and i hit home north of toronto yeah i have no choice if i don't
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take the 407 for a couple exits to get to another highway i'll add 45 minutes to my drive by going
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down to the 401 because it's so bad during the day and that's part of the problem for millions of
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people in southern ontario sometimes you have to bite the bullet pay the 407 toll fees otherwise
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you may may not get to something on time or be stuck in traffic or it's a risk you are gambling
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you are with your time every time you get in the 401 and that's part of the business plan
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as we were breaking this down that's part of the business plan the stress of looking that can you
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just save 45 minutes to get home a little bit earlier to have a little bit more time to yourself
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or to get to that next appointment that you're supposed to be at right they're hoping that
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you're stressed out they're hoping the 401 and this is in terms of the people who own the 407
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right now they're hoping that you're stressed out and that you're gonna bite the bullet and pay the
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fee to get on here i don't know for people in other parts of canada who've never been on one
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yeah the 401 is the busiest stretch of highway in the country yes and it runs really busy busy from
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east to oshawa on the east end all the way to milton on the west end through the busiest corridor
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of driving in the city and it used to have something called rush hour now there is no
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such thing as rush hour always rush hour so and that's commuters yeah and people driving on
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vacation and tractor trailers and logistics and go buses and you you every vehicle you think of
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is on there all times every time going as fast they can to get there because everyone's in such
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a hurry okay so we we've laid out infrastructure is pushed over here now our anger for the 407
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we've somewhat justified it a little bit but let's start let's before we get too crazy and
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and we start breaking down every one of our specific anger points.
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and the reason why the 407 seemed like it used to be a really good idea
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It's built north of the city, north of Steeles Avenue,
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in what's called the 905, and that's the suburbs.
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That's the Peel region, York region, Durham region suburbs.
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And if you go to Regina and Edmonton and Calgary
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and a lot of cities in winnipeg a lot of cities across canada they have something called a ring
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highway yeah and instead of spending all day stuck in traffic you can hop on the ring highway
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get to one of the four quadrants of wherever city you are in canada and get to where you want to go
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it's way more efficient it's less congestion less stuck in traffic but with toronto they had never
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had anything like that so they thought let's build like a almost a horseshoe ring highway
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around toronto bypass the nonsense that's the 401 and keep people moving and build an area because
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they knew there was going to be growth more growth north of the city more access for people to drive
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so it started as a plan to basically alleviate traffic inside of the gta and the surrounding
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areas 100 and then it got extended big time it's been extended all the way out to niagara falls
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yes right and uh how far north does it go just past peterborough right or just
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east to the the 115 okay so we we've we've expanded this thing um the property the original
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property that this was built on who do you know who owned that property it was a collective of
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people but i actually don't i thought it was just uh landowners and farmers or whatnot that owned
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the property it was and that's the collective and then it felt like um a lot of that land kind of
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got backdoor sold okay so i i have a friend who and i'm not gonna out their name because i don't
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get them in trouble with the stuff i don't know if a lot of this is public or not but from my own
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sources i know someone that used to own a good chunk of that land okay through family and they
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they it was completely kind of donated and given away to the 407 there and now that was some family
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stuff they didn't want to leave you know so they owned it they owned a good chunk of that land
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okay and it got kind of donated so i know that there were some weird deals on how the land was
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acquired but let's just say the land was acquired and it was acquired legally and perfectly everybody
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spent the money that they needed to spend they built this highway and to alleviate stress on
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the 401 the 403 the 427 anything that was seen like it was getting congested hopefully if we
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open up this 407 this will alleviate the congestion and it did i remember as a kid i just started
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working i was young i was born in 84 so by the time 94 95 came around i seen the use for something
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like this that was in the car in the back seat way too much and it made things a lot easier to
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get it really did somewhere and it was affordable and that's the word that i'm going to keep using
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throughout this show affordable at the beginning the toll rates were very reasonable very reasonable
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and this is before the transponders this is just going off your license plate that's right then it
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started getting a little expensive so we figured okay if you're a regular 407 user we're going to
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give you a transponder which is going to give you some discounts it's going to give you some kind of
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basically your acquiring points and you hear a beep because it's electronically scanned yeah
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so when you get off your exit you'll hear three beeps knowing that it it made it noted your travel
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time and how far and how many exits you went so it used to be affordable you could get from one end
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to the other end without feeling like you actually took a chunk out of your paycheck for right so
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we got your 407 bill every month it was was like oh okay a couple hundred bucks maybe 400 if you're
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using it a lot but it wasn't painful it wasn't painful it didn't feel like a mortgage payment
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didn't feel like a rental payment right and this is where we're at now where these are succeeding
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some of these people are using the 407 doing are all around toronto succeeding their rent payments
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Well, I mean, right now, it wouldn't be unusual for someone to spend $400 to $500 on a week traveling in the 407 for work and family purposes.
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I mean, there was a woman, there was a story in Southern Ontario recently, a woman, I think it was well over $1,500 for one month.
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Yeah, $1,700 for one month of toll fees on the 407.
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And that was a viral story around the nation a couple of weeks back.
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And that's what we were planning on doing a 407 talk for a while now, and it just didn't seem like it was the right time.
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Well, now it's the right time because now this is a national story of people, like people on the West Coast.
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I could only imagine them opening up that article and seeing, what do you mean $1,700 to drive on a highway per month?
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My sister-in-law used to live in New Jersey, and it's all toll highways in New York, New Jersey, Connecticut.
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And wild guess of what this works out per kilometer right now.
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The rate of the 407, what it works out to per kilometer, the average.
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Because certain parts of the 407 cost more than others.
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We're looking at $1 to $1.25, depending, is the average.
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which is way way too much what are we talking about what are we talking about well a company
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well a company and the canadian pension plan who own the 407 are making money and that's i brought
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that up in the opening monologue and we'll break that down as to how that happens so uh anybody
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who's an economic expert or an infrastructure expert says that this deal that canada did over
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these past 30 years and we'll explain the deal that actually happened would be a deal that you
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you would never want a government to make in the first place nor would you ever let a government
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make that deal again now this was not the federal government this was at the time the very uh
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controversial premier mike harris who did make a lot of friends in ontario with his way he governed
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the province but that was his great deal and at the time in 1999 the province made just over three
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billion dollars for selling the highway and money that was used for different things for the
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province and at the time he was trying to sell it to the peoples what a great deal for canada
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what a great deal for ontario we just made over three billion dollars yeah selling this highway
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3.1 billion in 1999 the problem is is they never accounted for inflation or time or population
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growth times compounding so now the market value if you were to buy the 407 now would cost 35
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billion dollars it's gone up 12 times even some estimates as high as 38 yeah so it's 12 times the
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value is when the province sold it yeah 12 times yeah so i don't know like i said i'm not an
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economics expert hello i'm not even a highway expert but i know a bad deal when i hear one
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right right and in 1999 you can't tell me well we didn't know the future no you have a rough idea
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that this is a not a great idea if this thing's only projected to generate three billion dollars
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in 1999 why would you only pay 3.1 for it that's not business and as a matter of fact in the mid
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to late 1990s before the sale a lot of the municipal mayors in different pockets of the
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province of ontario got together with the premiers at the time from bob ray to mike harris and
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government officials and they did long-term growth projections yeah looking ahead 15 20 25 years
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identifying pockets of the province that they knew were going to grow they knew needed
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infrastructure and they knew needed highways so they knew in 1999 that the you know the
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clarington oshawa area the east willinbury north york region the milton georgetown area were all
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going to grow huge yep and so they had all these plans these 30 40 year plans to build suburbs and
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whatnot but they never took into account that the highway would be so they could have easily
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asked for 10 billion in 1999 and still would have been a deal i i'm not going to say it sounded like
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some sort of backdoor plan uh you can't because that's easy to do and be like oh well somebody
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obviously knew and they did some no that's not what it is i think this was just really bad planning
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right and we can break down negotiating bad negotiating bad planning and bad projections of
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what the actual future could bring in canada um which seems to be a recurring theme here so now
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country the the the upside the upshot of all this is there's an upside no not an upside it's it's
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the the result of this yeah is the highway system in southern ontario is almost untenable the the
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401 is so clogged with heavy trucks trying to get to the city to avoid tolls that sometimes it's
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hairy when you're driving on the 401 through the city and it's chewing up the roads to no end now
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marth styles the ontario leader the ndp doesn't have great ideas all the time but she has one
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great idea that's long overdue for the love of god and i broke down the math make it free for
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heavy trucks to use the 407 it would cost ontario 250 million dollars a year to pay for all the
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heavy trucks to bypass the 401 however there's a proposed highway 413 that doug ford in the
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the province wants to build that will probably cost 18 billion dollars that's 72 years worth of
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trips for those heavy trucks up and down the 407 to get off the 401 so you're saying don't build
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that highway just give the 407 to the trucks no but we can we'll pay for it but make it free for
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all the heavy trucks all the tractor trailers all the ones who are going from the east end of
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Ontario and they're heading for Kitsch or Waterloo or the Windsor border or the other way are heading
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for Ottawa or Montreal, make it free for them to use the 407, get off the 401. That would make a
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huge difference. So if the 407, let's say we put all the trucks on there, citizens still have access
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to it as well? Absolutely. I'll gladly pay. I mean, they're going to pay for the trucks. I'll
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gladly pay for my 407. Who's paying for the trucks? The provinces. Okay, so the taxpayer.
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I mean, otherwise we're paying $18 billion to build the 413.
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Is there, I guess because I'm already looking at this thing as a whole big mess.
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And if we were to add, yes, I would love to free up the 401 and the 407 and the 427 or the 403.
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Everyone would love to do that and put these guys on the 407.
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i still feel like this is costing taxpayers more dollars than it needs to i think the taxpayers of
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the province have been screwed over so much in the last 25 plus years yeah this is the best of
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a bad deal but it's still not ideal brady but we've been screwed over twice on this thing are
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we going to do it a third time but okay what's the alternative status quo keep the rates the
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way they are keep the 401 being chewed to nothing because they're on the on the 401 every day
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complete gridlock on the major highways as you said throughout the southern ontario area every
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day because they're avoiding the tolls on the 407 and then doug ford talking about building an 18
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billion dollar highway from the 400 to the 401 called the 413 highway well i'm happy that you're
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coming up with solutions for because the one thing that i couldn't do for the past week after
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looking at all this was come up with a solution of how to fix it i don't know if it's just me
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being weak-minded or if this is such a mess that you need a team of people to come in here and
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train right so something needs to be done so this is just me going this way coming up with my own
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little idea but you can't tell me that logistics experts and transportation experts and people
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that do this and have got PhDs in this can't get together and come up with a solution that will be
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more efficient and work for more people than what we're doing right now. Because what's the old
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thing? You keep doing the same thing over and over again, expecting different results. That's
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insanity. Okay. So if every quarter we're averaging 491 million in revenue, let's just
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say 500 just to be, to round it up. Yeah. That's two bill a year. Yeah. We're doing 2 billion a
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year i think that if you did this you were that number is going to drop because you're going to
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see you're not going to see as many civilians going on there because not only can they use
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the 401 now it's not as congested but you're also going to see people not wanting to get stuck in
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the gridlock of being inside of these trucks that people driving on the highway in the 401 one of
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the biggest scares that they have is but you're boxed in with all these massive trucks in and
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then wind oh right you see these trucks moving and in the winter with this it's really bad
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So, okay, so let's say just to be fair, we're going to lose $100 million right off of that quarterly price.
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Okay, so we're going to lose $400 million a year off of that $2 billion.
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How long would it take for us to get ourselves out of the hole?
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Right now, as far as getting out of the financial hole, I have no idea.
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But I do know that if we do something to make it free for tractor trailers and heavy trucks to use the 407, we can get out of this endless hamster wheel of infrastructure.
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Because every two or three years, not only is the 401 jam with people and trucks and cars, they have to do heavy construction to fix it.
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So the civilian gets a little bit of a break here.
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but what does this do for Ontario and the debt and where we are now in a zone where the Canadian
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pension fund owns 50% of this, which I said in the opening monologue, we have paid for this to
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be built with tax dollars. We are now paying out our tuchuses to ride the thing just to reinvest
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back into our own pension fund brady as far as getting ontario out of debt that is way above my
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pay grade like i i'm just dealing with this is part of the debt though this is a big part of
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the ontario debt yeah okay so the debt is different levels it's this debt yeah and then it's the debt
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of hiring contractors to fix the 401 every two and three years and there's the debt of people
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losing tens dozens of hours every week of productivity because they're stuck in traffic
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and the mental health wear and the wear on the cars and the pollution and then the debt on the
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environment so there's multiple layers to the debt brady and that's my concern if we can get
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the trucks off the 401 get them on the 407 i think mart styles is a great idea things are moving a
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lot you're saving 15 20 25 minutes on your commute that's huge especially in this part of the country
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it's huge so the canadian pension or the canadian pension plan investment board there's 700 or 780
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billion assets under management liability estimate is 1.86 trillion yeah that's from the frazier
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institute yeah i don't understand and i don't think i ever will why the canadian pension
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investment board is involved in this i don't understand why we're gonna why they buy things
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that make money yeah i know but this makes money this is short-term money you know but oh but for
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the last number of years there you want to talk about a sure thing for the pension plan it's been
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investing on the tolls in the 407 right the tolls have not went wow this is really messed up because
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like i said we're taking care of the civilian but we're screwing the population at the same time so
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it looks like we're taking care of the individual but the individual is still paying seventeen
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hundred dollars a month yeah that's the cpp is there to make money for the pension plan of
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canadians and they're looking at the 407 as something that consistently makes money every
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year the population of southern ontario is not going down the rates on the tolls are not going
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down of course they're going to invest because they're making the pension money every year
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producer nick i'll check back in with you in five minutes but can you can you somewhat come up with
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an alternative solution just so we have two different ones that I can choose from thank you
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okay because like I said I don't know if there I know that there was people lobbying this back
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in the day saying do not buy this thing like this is not a good idea or sorry do not sell this don't
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sell it not a good idea they were on the rooftop like don't do it screaming we've had numerous
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uh articles we've had many documentaries put out everything from cbc professors papers on it
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professors at universities that put theses together there has been more people screaming
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that this thing is a mess and please get it under control and it's still going on 30 years later
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okay but here's the problem brady from you think about when they sold it yeah and how long they
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haven't owned it there's no chance that there's no chance that ontario or the federal government
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have the money to buy it back but we can't buy it back we have to buy it back at the dollar that
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it's worth today right because they're carrying so much debt so okay let's come up with a solution
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Which is worth way more than the $30 billion or $38 billion that we've estimated to be.
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But maybe if you put heavy trucks and tractor trailers on the 407 for free, you're not rebuilding the 401 every three years.
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And maybe just maybe people aren't spending 45 minutes to an hour trying to commute in the 401.
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We've cut 15 or 20 minutes each way off their drive.
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Is this done through a transponder and they just wipe the bills?
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So it's 5,000 kilograms over that you would qualify as a heavy truck to be able.
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So like the big trucks, the big tractor trailers, the big heavy hauling, you know, the flatbeds with cranes and excavators on it.
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All the ones that, like you say, you get boxed into the 401, your white knuckle, they'd be on the 407.
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Okay, so we have the year increase in trends, the five-year freeze.
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So the five-year freeze, rates remain static during the pandemic and its aftermath due to lower track volumes and contractual agreements with the province.
00:24:08.580
The toll increased for the first time in a half a decade with per-kilometer rates jumping up 3 to 14 cents.
00:24:18.400
So the 2026 spike this year saw a much more aggressive increase in some central zones, like a stretch through North York and Vaughn.
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rates increased as much as 34 cents per kilometer and that's one of the busiest stretches of the
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highway and that's during the afternoon rush hour so they they've not only done it by the area that
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it's in but the time so for people who don't know have never been to this part of the country that
00:24:41.580
takes you from the 404 to the 400 the two major north south corridors in southern ontario has
00:24:49.660
the highest rate yeah because that's where people are trying to trying to get somewhere did you ever
00:24:54.940
go on the 407 you probably did because it was years uh here did you ever go on the 407 during
00:24:59.420
the pandemic oh yeah did you ever go on the 401 during the pandemic yes i did 403 uh basically
00:25:04.620
every highway 427 yeah remember how beautiful that was it was like kramer with the empty highway
00:25:10.380
in steinfeld it was awesome it felt gross because it almost felt like a ghost town like every time
00:25:14.540
you're driving down you're like i what do you know those apocalyptic movies where you're alone
00:25:18.220
on the highway or like it felt like a walking dead or the fallout or whatever it is right
00:25:32.000
So I can't see this just being because inflation is going up
00:25:35.060
and because we've got to raise the cost of this thing
00:25:38.160
I think it was like, holy crap, we lost like two years worth of dollars here.
00:25:42.680
And by the way, the heavy trucks, they get charged 338 cents per kilometer.
00:25:50.260
that would that's a lot that's a lot that's a lot per kilometer rate for a higher
00:25:58.860
are much higher for heavy trucks and multi-unit trucks during peak times
00:26:02.880
get them get rid of that get them off the 401 there's all the other ancillary highways are
00:26:10.580
jammed with trucks trying to avoid that cost because obviously if you're an owner operator
00:26:14.900
or your company you can't pay that okay it's too much so i will nick go ahead nick yeah nick what
00:26:20.740
you got so um some solutions so invest in transit so find other public transit solutions to get
00:26:29.700
congestion down um i like that solution yeah i don't think but again um look at you they're always
00:26:36.660
but nick i will say this i agree but we're always in this country 10 15 years behind where we should
00:26:42.340
be we're trying to play catch up all the time i don't know if you gentlemen have uh been on the
00:26:46.840
go train recently my goodness keep the 407 going i was on the subway saturday night ttc was mess
00:26:53.320
what a mess keep going so uh other one was congestion pricing changing pricing in in regards
00:26:59.900
to demand yeah um better crash clearance again this is a serious issue with clearing uh you know
00:27:05.960
crash cars oh yeah that um but here's the real big brain solution guys tunnel underneath the
00:27:13.960
401 you're not for that are you no i'm joking this was uh that's okay the premier of ontario
00:27:21.240
doug ford yeah exploded the idea of building an express tunnel on the 401 from mississauga to
00:27:28.600
i think pickering um and the cost of it no one could even fathom how much it would ever cost
00:27:35.380
We can't even put an extra lane in a highway now in due order.
00:27:41.020
This sounds like the tunnel under the ocean that Elon wanted to build.
00:27:44.140
Remember, he was going to build a highway under the ocean.
00:27:47.580
Now, mind you, the project and the PowerPoint looked great.
00:27:59.540
which is my confusion and frustration for this episode.
00:28:07.860
So, if you can't get out of it, then you have to...
00:28:13.060
You're not even going to buy your way out of it, Jim, because the number is absurd.
00:28:26.460
You've got seven decades of heavy trucks paid for on the 407.
00:28:30.340
so to me it's the only way yeah i i don't know i think this was more of a political timing thing
00:28:39.780
right i think uh i think premier mike harris at the time did something that was a political move
00:28:45.720
um where they weren't really breaking this down for the long-term thing it was a quick solution
00:28:50.540
it was short-term cash well to say hey guys look at i just made us three billion dollars here as
00:28:55.940
premier and i did it in in an afternoon ha ha look at me but no one thought about 30 years later
00:29:01.460
where you were like dude you just did one guess what the irony all that is brady his whole thing
00:29:05.620
was the common sense revolution that's when we got elected as premier the common sense revolution
00:29:11.540
we're going to bring common sense back to ontario but they didn't use common sense when they sold
00:29:16.340
the 407. so should we be lighting the torches and grabbing the pickforks and and going on the
00:29:21.140
anti-mike harris campaign still the teachers of ontario can still have they they've got that we
00:29:27.340
don't have to do anything so now we're basically left to deal with it like like every other
00:29:32.500
decision that's been made that seems to be leaving us in a in a long-term problem um you may be right
00:29:38.020
but okay we just did a show you know mike and i talking about war rooms and and planning and
00:29:44.260
brainstorming we actually do need to check your ego at the door and bring non-partisan politics
00:29:50.940
different parties uh academics logistics people people who who use it all the time let's come up
00:29:58.720
with a plan that can work for everybody that works for everybody and gets trucks off the 401
00:30:05.060
and maybe brings the cost down and maybe makes things move more smoothly and also is tied into
00:30:10.820
more transit more options for people a lot of the times people are using highways in southern
00:30:15.700
ontario because they don't have another option to get from home to work and i like how you said
00:30:19.920
leave the ego at the door let's get the people that are the most qualified to go into a war room
00:30:23.840
to sit down and have this discussion about this this problem or any sort of problem when it comes
00:30:28.880
to infrastructure or any sort of issue that we've got going on in individual provinces but the one
00:30:33.320
thing that they're going to leave at the with the ego is leave your political belief system there as
00:30:37.820
right so if marit styles and the ndp has an idea don't just you know get rid of it because she's
00:30:43.760
the ndp let listen actually listen to people sorry just because yeah sorry uh actually listen
00:30:50.880
to people yeah with ideas if someone's a professor if someone maybe is not your political slant and
00:30:57.280
is coming at it from a whole wacky way well maybe actually listen to what they say they may have
00:31:02.880
something to provide to this idea to this debate that could help how did canadians end up paying
00:31:08.400
their own pension fund to drive their own on their own highway because that's a canadian thing that's
00:31:13.520
that is the most canadian thing ever brady the the most canadian tax thing ever when we say we're
00:31:19.120
overtaxed we pay the toll every day yet then they're paying it to our own pension plan the
00:31:24.720
answer is technically a paradox because the cpp investments acquired and a controlling stake in
00:31:29.520
the 407 meaning one of the canadian canada's largest public retirement funds profits directly
00:31:33.600
from toll revenue in theory canadians benefit as a pension contributors but in practice commuters
00:31:39.360
feel like they're being financially or they're financing their retirement through daily roadway
00:31:43.200
fees it transforms mobility into a reoccurring extraction system like the pension plans are there
00:31:50.480
for pure profit once upon a time the ontario teachers pension plan owned a huge stake of
00:31:57.120
maple leaf sports entertainment of the toronto maple leaves yeah you're right yeah they have
00:32:04.520
So the teacher's pension plan in the province of Ontario
00:32:07.060
made it like gangbusters when they sold their share
00:32:15.740
and when they think they've maxed out the profits,
00:32:29.380
because we're making money in our pension.
1.00
00:32:31.080
Just another one of those things for the boomers
0.99
00:32:33.480
who are already retired to profit off of it.
0.97
00:32:39.900
Why can't Ontario just take the highway back, Jim?
00:32:44.960
Because the cost they sold it is a fraction of what...
00:32:48.040
Whoever would sell it is not going to sell it for the evaluation.
00:32:55.440
Okay, well, tell me what better fits the definition of the 407.
00:32:59.460
Is transportation infrastructure or investment product?
00:33:08.360
Because the CPP, yes, of course it's transportation, it's a highway,
00:33:13.180
but it's making the pension plan so much money.
00:33:17.120
What changes when infrastructure is run like a corporation instead of a public service, Jim?
00:33:27.600
Does congestion on the 401 actually increase the value of the 407?
00:33:36.980
Maybe the Canadian pension group is the ones putting all those trucks parked on the side of the road.
00:33:42.560
So you go to your Apple Maps and you have to get somewhere for work, for family reasons, for whatever reason.
00:33:53.440
And then you realize, wait a sec, it's going to be another 40 minutes if I don't pay the toll.
00:33:59.000
Do you know how many times I've heard, hey, sir, are we taking the 407?
00:34:06.300
Otherwise, I'm living with you in this armpit stew of an Uber for the next three hours, right?
00:34:13.400
So the bigger Canadian pattern, is the 407 an isolated case or part of a larger trend?
00:34:19.900
I haven't seen any examples like this in other parts of the country.
00:34:22.620
So many analysts are seeing it as part of a broader shift towards monetizing public assets, airports, utilities, parking systems, bridges, health care services, and even data infrastructure increasingly operate through public, private financial models.
00:34:34.820
The 407 became an early blueprint for converting public necessity into long-term revenue streams.
00:34:39.660
These analysts are saying that this is the way the country's going.
00:34:42.140
And let's face it, I was remiss by giving my answer because Mark Carney has stated a number of times they're seriously looking at privatizing the airports of the country.
00:34:51.980
that means you would say Brady and Jim incorporated here's the price tag to buy the Regina airport or
00:34:58.500
the Halifax airport you would run it now and I guarantee the boys are probably already planning
00:35:03.040
something for the next couple weeks on this too but they're really talking about doing
00:35:06.180
privatizing health care as well having two different types of health care for it and then
00:35:11.120
another privatization like they're really starting to kind of bring this up in in these back rooms
00:35:16.280
apparently oh that is don't want to see this happening but I think this may be right that
00:35:20.920
this is a bigger pattern that's going on inside of our country we're starting to have to pay for
00:35:24.480
things that used to be public services okay so you see how the headaches involved with the 407
00:35:28.840
every day for people imagine the airport in your city in canada run by the abc corporation from
00:35:36.960
name the country and they have a bit of a labor issue on the friday of a long weekend going into
00:35:43.620
the holidays and it's a work to rule their short staff and you're missing your flight because that's
00:35:49.620
the first thing that happens it's bad enough it's right now in canada imagine if it's run by a
00:35:54.160
private company and it's funny because uh i know a few people that have flown this week and they
00:35:58.140
just said they're like domestic is it is an animal house right now because no one's flying
00:36:02.100
internationally right now from canada no expensive and whatever else is going on but i have to fly
00:36:06.160
to halifax a couple weeks i'm already like the airports don't need any more headaches you add
00:36:10.480
something like this and it's going to be even worse okay and then the last one i'll ask you
00:36:13.980
about is the pension time bomb why does the cpp ownership make this politically complicated
00:36:19.980
Well, because our aging population, the stress on the pension, and as a matter of fact, this has been sort of intimated by Mark Carney and his team with the Liberals, that they would like to use the pension money for investment, for the wealth fund, for different things.
00:36:37.860
so it used to be that was taboo you would never ever touch the money in the canadian pension plan
00:36:44.100
that whatever government how you were running it you were running it with this but never that and
00:36:49.980
now carnie's peeling back the layers and go you know what i think we can use that for things and
00:36:54.380
that could be a dangerous road to go down because that if we lose that for a lot of canadians they
00:37:00.660
lose everything the reason why i would consider this being a time bomb is because canadians are
00:37:06.580
simultaneously the customers the investors and the resource group here
00:37:12.180
right that's not good this will eventually eat itself the what the
00:37:18.200
highway the political pressure group right so your political pressure group
00:37:22.280
you're a customer and you're the original investor in the product right
00:37:26.920
those three things shouldn't really I know what are the other but but this is
00:37:31.640
only affecting the people in southern Ontario from anywhere and other parts of
00:37:36.120
country it's your cpp is gaining money from the profit of this but you don't use it well it makes
00:37:42.120
it probably makes our friends in alberta a little happy because when we were out there they're like
0.75
00:37:45.800
ottawa ottawa ottawa ontario you're screwing us you're screwing us well we're not you could be in
00:37:51.880
any province in the country you'll never use the 407 but you'll benefit from it you're going to
0.95
00:37:56.040
benefit from it well well you got closing thoughts on this because i'm i'm still angry um and i'll
00:38:02.440
be i'll be brutally honest here i don't drive on the 407 anymore i don't even drive on the 401
00:38:08.440
hell i do not drive in ontario i try not to drive at all i i'm on the 401 and the 407 and the 400
00:38:16.520
and the 404 unfortunately every day for work for family for leisure i'm on the highways all the
00:38:22.280
time but this is part of a bigger trend happening to me in north america and in canada it's called
00:38:29.320
the public private consortium yeah that was the whole thing with the eglinton crosstown and look
00:38:34.560
how way over budget way past schedule and a lot of governments figure if i can get the brady and
00:38:41.820
nick corporation to work with us it'll be less taxpayer dollars they'll benefit it's win-win
00:38:47.740
well we just registered the company yesterday so hopefully this is on our way i i'm not convinced
00:38:52.960
it's always win-win i'm not convinced that's always the way to go unfortunately the reality
00:38:58.820
is in Canada, especially in the big city areas, you can't build subways and go bus designated lanes
00:39:06.880
and LRTs and roads fast enough to develop and meet the demand in the population. Our
00:39:13.340
infrastructure, as you said, is way behind. So if we can't build it fast enough, we have to come up
00:39:18.960
with other solutions to keep things flowing because they've done all these in-depth studies.
00:39:23.540
We are losing billions of dollars in productivity every year for being stuck in traffic.
00:39:29.980
I really do feel like Ontario needs to give up the attachment to as many millions of people that we have and start trying to encourage people to move to other provinces.
00:39:43.580
I mean, like Ontario just started a new working relationship with New Brunswick.
00:39:46.920
And we're going to send out some guys here, and then hopefully you can meet a nice family
00:39:51.220
or get yourself structured in a white picket fence, and you'll stay in Moncton forever.
00:39:56.680
And we might have to get to that point because, yes, we can complain about bad deals.
00:40:01.320
Yes, we can complain about highways and infrastructure being behind.
00:40:04.400
But the real problem is there's too many people in this area, Jim.
00:40:08.960
look at this is the economic engine of the nation manufacturing yeah media finance you know like
00:40:16.560
entertainment so all these major industries the epicenter is on southern ontario that's the
00:40:22.420
reality of it and and i mean i with you like in a perfect world we'd have stretch some of this out
00:40:28.780
we'd stretch i mean the profits tried this that's one thing mike harris did everything was centralized
00:40:34.500
in toronto and they put the mto in st catharines they put the olg in sudbury so they moved it
00:40:40.660
around to different parts of the province so it wasn't all clumped in toronto but there's still
00:40:45.160
so much business and so much money and so much investment and infrastructure in the southern
00:40:50.240
ontario region yeah that until other areas of the country have a huge car plant or a data center or
00:40:59.040
you name it and a reason to go there this is where the jobs and the money are it's like i said i'm i
00:41:04.960
love it because i'm in ontario so there's lots of opportunity right there and i would be a hypocrite
00:41:09.760
to say that i don't want lots of business going on here and i don't want the highways to be full
00:41:13.840
of people that are on their way and commuting and everybody's doing something and generating an
00:41:17.520
income but it does get to the point where like you said you're now if you have to pay 1700 a month
00:41:25.120
to make just to give yourself a few extra hours a week yeah a few hours look brady
00:41:31.440
i don't know if the jobs and opportunities are worth it if they get to the point where they move
00:41:36.080
major job centers to muncton to moose jaw to prince george bc to chicotomy quebec so there's
00:41:44.320
areas of the country where you don't have to live in southern ontario and you could build a career
00:41:49.040
and build your job resume in those other areas.
00:41:54.380
You have to set the industry and other parts for people for a reason to go there.
00:41:58.580
So in the early 90s, a group of really smart people sat down and said,
00:42:09.640
And they come up with this really good idea to make, let's make a toll highway.
00:42:13.760
And then they sell the land and they sell the highway.
00:42:19.040
but we can't actually buy it out no we're we're now we're stuck in a position where we either
00:42:26.840
need to slowly keep increasing rates do something extreme like let the trucks drive on it for free
00:42:32.600
that's my vote and we don't i'm always i just don't like seeing things that are subsidized
00:42:39.800
get more subsidies but what is the what is and i don't mean that as a whole like there's some
00:42:45.280
things that should get more money that's in more funding but i mean we can't keep going with the
00:42:48.740
way it is we can't it's not workable unfortunately until they as nick said build more credible um
00:42:57.880
transit solutions for people that's still you can have that that's great but you're still gonna have
00:43:03.260
all those trucks chewing up the 401 every day you might be this might be the best answer like i said
00:43:09.760
it's not that i love it and i'm not i'm not crapping on on your answer i think you brought
00:43:14.480
one because at least you brought one nick brought one too but i like yours a little bit better than
00:43:18.640
nick's but no brady this is part of the problem in a war room think tank with all the experts
00:43:24.160
everyone's going to be passionate about what they think is the solution but the at the end of the
00:43:28.480
day all levels of government and academics and the experts in the field of logistics from
00:43:33.520
transportation have to get together and come up with a better way not just for the 407 401 in
00:43:39.440
southern ontario but sort of applying it all across everywhere yes apply it everywhere apply
00:43:44.560
it everywhere so hopefully alberta or vancouver is not going to see a toll ruled come anytime soon
00:43:49.440
um that's not already there right now because it sounds like we don't know how to build a new one
00:43:54.080
because we would be doing a deal like this again well i know from like when you're going from
00:43:57.760
dartmouth to halifax and going on the angus l mcdonald bridge there's a toll there's a toll
00:44:01.920
and there's tolls in vancouver too like there's there's tolls out there but i mean there's nothing
00:44:05.280
like this nothing like this there's no seventeen hundred dollars a month to get to work and back
00:44:09.760
right just to just to make sure that you have a couple extra hours with your kids but thanks
00:44:13.840
jim for sitting down and trying to come up with a solution for me the great thing about this though
00:44:19.440
is that we have an open comment section perfect which means we're going to get a lot of solutions
00:44:23.760
hopefully in that comment section they're going to call me and you names they're going to call
00:44:27.280
me and you brilliant and everything in between and the best part about this i'll get on the 427
00:44:31.600
and the 407 before it gets too busy thanks jim thanks do the best brother