How our Congestion Crisis is Impacting Toronto's Businesses with John Kiru

Toronto’s gridlock has reached crisis levels. To get our region moving again, the Board is preparing to release a bold Congestion Action Plan. John Kiru, Executive Director of the Toronto Association of Business Improvement Areas, joins our President and CEO, Giles Gherson to discuss how better coordination, smarter policies, and decisive action can finally get Toronto moving. 

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From the Toronto Region Board of Trade, this is Toronto Talks. Toronto, let's talk congestion. No matter where you are in this city, the consensus seems to be that traffic stinks. And a new poll shows traffic in Canada's biggest city has reached a crisis level. Now most also agreed that it's having a negative impact on the economy. 63% said traffic was creating problems for their own household. If you're stuck in traffic right now, or you rely on just-in-time deliveries to keep your business going, you know Toronto's congestion isn't just frustrating, it's costly. For too long, congestion has been treated as just an inevitable byproduct of growth. But it doesn't have to be this way. That's why the Toronto Region Board of Trade created our Congestion Task Force. The result? A bold action plan designed to address Toronto's gridlock and unlock the economic and social potential of our region. Before we released the plan, we wanted to hear directly from the people it impacts most. That's why our president and CEO, Giles Gerson, recently sat down with John Kirou, the Executive Director of the Toronto Association of Business Improvement Areas. Here's their conversation. John, terrific to have you here. And first of all, I want to thank you for being such an important part of our, I call it our Congestion Solutions Task Force. One of the reasons we wanted to have this conversation is because, you know, we represent the business community at large in the GTA, but you do too. Tell me a little bit about, you know, what you're picking out from your members and why congestion is such a big deal. Absolutely. Look, congestion continues to grow on the minds of our businesses. We are those small SME-type businesses along Main Street that people see out there. And, you know, the post-COVID, that hangover, is still out there, contrary to many people's beliefs. The volumes of business that's taken place, especially the restaurant industry, is not back to normal. And every day we're hearing about restaurants and businesses closing out there. And congestion is one element of it because the volume of materials that people are bringing in, be it the restaurants, etc., is impacting on the deliveries. We're finding areas in the city where restaurant supplies with the green grocers and the like that used to deliver to the restaurant are no longer delivering. They're basically saying, sorry, the times I can't guarantee delivery, the on-time delivery that businesses got used to to deliver and provide the product out there is no longer out there. There is zero predictability on when you can get your stuff to the point, like I said, where these delivery operators are saying, I'm not delivering to that part of town. So think of Greektown with all those restaurants where a supplier used to drop off all kinds of stuff, go from restaurant to restaurant to restaurant, we're now saying, sorry, we're not delivering. So what's happening out there is that these restauranteurs are having to jump into their vehicle or one of their employees, go out to pick up the meat at that market, the green grocers at the terminal, or stuff like that, and then they're all coming in. So what used to be one trip in terms of deliveries for, you know, every second or third day is now multiple trips down that. So yet another little factor that is adding to the congestion that is compounding that issue. You know, that's major. That is absolutely major. And that's what we're hearing from the small business people, those deliveries, that ability to do that. What do you think are the sort of the key, if you had to do three things that would affect the lives and the prosperity of your members, what would it be on the congestion front? Sure. Look, construction, construction closure, lane closures around construction continue to be a major issue, not only in the development industry where the towers are going up, but certainly transit too. Transit's important. Don't get us wrong. It's just timely delivery of that transit. We can all point to Eglinton, Ontario line. Seems to be going a lot better, etc. So pre-planned and providing some insights to the local business people. So information, you mean? Information, absolutely. And not the bottled information that the Metrolinx of the world would be out there, but in-depth information. Just in time, presumably, right? Yeah, exactly. that look, in the first six months when a project comes into your neighborhood, whether it's that or any project, here is the impacts that are out there. We've never done an in-depth timeline study of a project from its inception to its end. And while we agree things will be a hell of a lot better for everybody, once we're done the project, we really haven't scaled that out there. So tell us what we can expect in the first six months, in the year, six months after the project is done, so that when we go into a community, when we go into a BIA or a neighbourhood on the commercial side of things, we can tell them. The poor folks up on Pape Avenue right now, part of that Ontario line thing, are absolutely devastated because they have no clue what to expect. And it's those expectations, it's that predictability of out there. We all understand this is Toronto. Progress is our strength, really. And we need this stuff to happen. But give us a fighting chance. Give us the opportunity to get out there. And that goes, like I said, with road closures around the construction, major construction projects for infrastructure, etc. So I think that's one of them. The other is the built form. I think we really need to understand that all streets don't have to be parceled out the same way. You know, bike lanes is one of those issues. In the inner city, it might make more sense. But as you get out of that concentric circle, you know, there needs to be some adjustment and consideration based on volume. So where do you place the bike lanes, you're saying? Exactly. The location of the bike lanes, et cetera. So that's yet another. So it's sort of the built form that we've got. Unfortunately, we're an older city. Our sidewalks are fairly narrow. So we've got a number of challenges from that built form perspective. and we really need to think about it. The third element, in my opinion, is the fact that decisions are made without consideration of what the impacts are going to be. It all sounds great until we take the lens of a congestion impact on that project, on the immediate neighborhood, on the city as whole. You know, a 1% or 2% congestion increase by a project compounded on top of something that's already a problem moves us into a whole different level of congestion issues. You know, one of the things that we have to, I think, come to grips with is that we really haven't got any new road surface over the last 30 or 40 years. And we've got probably a couple of million more vehicles on the roads. And so it's that sort of we reached probably capacity of our roads in Toronto in the 1970s, and yet massive more population, massive more number of vehicles. And so the value, if you could put it that way, of each square meter of road surface has gone way up. Absolutely. Absolutely. Look, you know, it's almost a Stephen King novel, The Perfect Storm. We're caught up. We're caught up in this. I mean, progress is great. The only thing that's not changing, to your point, is the roads, is the kilometers of roads that we've got on there. We've not built any new roads that I'm aware of, notwithstanding driveways or access to some of the developments out there. When you think of it, I come into the city from the West End. When you think of the YYZ out there and the volume of goods that come through there, getting into the city from the West End. let alone the East End, and they've got their own issues, etc. I just can't fathom how businesses, how transport companies and logistics deal with that sort of volume. And we've got to make it easier on them to get out and get the goods through here. Is it on-time delivery? Is it planned delivery in off-peak hours? I don't know. Those are taller foreheads than mine. Well, I wanted to ask you a bit about that, because obviously you talk about the many Main Street businesses that the BIAs represent and the whole delivery problem that has surged since the pandemic. During the pandemic, the province did make it easier for overnight deliveries. And then that policy was extended beyond the pandemic when it was over. But it seems to me there's still more that could be done. But I'd be interested in your response. What do you think about that? Is that something that has a... That is definitely a discussion at our level amongst the BIAs. We're definitely considering that. Clearly, some businesses like restaurants, etc., who are open into the later hours, there's the capacity of somebody being there to receive those goods for those next cetera. You think of a dry goods, you know, the shoe store that closes at 7, 8 o'clock or 6 o'clock in the late afternoon, early evening, that becomes a little bit problematic. But again, sometimes, you know, a little bit of tough love is one of those things that we really need to do. So let's take a look at it. Let's get some analytics in here. Let's get a third party to evaluate. Let's do a peer review across the continent internationally, see what is working out there, what's not working out there, and work around that. It's in the best interest of all of us. But going back to the whole question of the cost of congestion, I think one of the things that's going to be very important as we bring forward the action plan, and it's layered, right? It's going to be, I call it a souffle. It's going to have like 10 or 12 ingredients, and you can't pick and choose. If you pick and choose, you're going to end up with a much smaller impact. It's really because most of these different issues, different solutions are mutually reinforcing. So clearly the impact on your members is going to be quite large, or not, depending on the degree to which the action plan is carried out. So very important, I think, from a public interest perspective and a communications perspective for the public to really understand the cost, the everyday cost of congestion to the small businesses that they use every day. Really, again, most people think it's a commuter issue, and that's big enough. and that's very impactful for many, many businesses, particularly in the downtown core, but elsewhere as well. But really, I think it's often what people miss is the cost of delivering goods and services and getting people to the small businesses and the huge cost that is borne by these more fragile businesses. So again, I think that's something, if you want to just hum a few bars on what it means to small businesses to have a congestion problem, as severe as it is right now. I think we've seen businesses go in and out of business more quickly than we used to. The failure of businesses, that's very costly to have businesses fail. Talk a little bit about the real cost of this. Look, there's no secret it costs any economic development, anybody, two and a half times more to bring a new business in once it's lost, versus keeping somebody in there. I mean, there is a number of pressures the small businesses have upon them, whether it's the rental rates in this city, taxes, and certainly the ability to deliver goods. In order for me to make money, I've got to have the product to either transform into a meal or to resell. And the ability to get that product in, I can't be ordering eight months ahead in terms of that sort of stuff. So it's becoming very systematic. And small businesses, unlike many of the larger corporate type businesses, don't have that capacity, don't have that channel to process that. Most of that is truly needing that delivery from the green grocers to put fresh vegetables and fruits in the kitchen that I can serve to you as out there. But also the visit from the plumber or the electrician, if you've got a problem, right, and you're about to open that night at, you know, at 5 o'clock for dinner and something's not working, can you get that service in when you need it? Exactly, and these service folks are saying, sorry, not going down there. Oh, it's going to cost you an extra $50 for me to park to do that delivery and et cetera. So these are all these little inherent costs that are out there. So everything sort of layered to your souffle is causing these issues. And ultimately, the consumer has also changed the way they approach small business. Their expectations haven't changed on quality, service, etc. But what has changed is time of getting there. Am I going to find parking? Am I going to do this? Am I going to do that? And it's so much easier with digitization and home delivery, which is part of a congestion issue as well. Scooters that are running up and down, it's easy enough for somebody to call up and say, you know what, I'm not going to go out today. I'll stay at home. I'm going to stay home. I'll call my favorite restaurant and have them delivered. And that's a whole new different dynamic that not only impacts small businesses in terms of the ability and the ability to upsell while they're that extra drink, et cetera. It all adds up to the bottom line, but at the end of the day, it puts the delivery vehicles out on the road, whether they're scooters, whether they're cars, et cetera. And that's yet another layer onto our congestion issue. We did a poll, as you know, in the summer with Angus Reid to show really the depth of feeling and concern around congestion. And what we found was that 86% of respondents in the region thought congestion was a crisis, and 85% thought it was hurting the economy, which is quite interesting, because normally you don't get that sort of almost economic connection, the connection to the economy, which you did get with this. But what was really striking was the number of people who said, it was around 45%, 42% I think it was, who said, I visit shops less than I used to. I go to entertainment events less than I used to. I visit family and friends less than I used to. So the congestion having a really constraining effect on people's desire to get, as you said, to get out of their home and to go and do the things they used to do, which add to the economic vitality of the city, obviously. That's quite constrained right now. And that is the telling story out there, if you really do the analytics and stuff like that. But again, many of these people have invested in life savings, and they will take it on the chin. They will continue to move forward on that. But look, I see this and a couple of other factors as the next pandemic. It might not be a medical pandemic, but for the City of Toronto, for the region of Toronto, congestion is one of them. And the other thing that I see out there that we need to support is cybersecurity. On these small businesses specifically. So it's a combination of things that Main Street is really, really facing. But congestion, let's get that solved. Let's get that one solved. And the next podcast we'll do will be on cybersecurity. There we are. So thank you very much, John. Really appreciate it. To learn more about our congestion action plan, visit bot.com. Thanks for listening to Toronto Talks. Make sure you subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen. And don't forget to keep talking Toronto. Our voice drives meaningful change.