Report: Ontario Government To Sell GM Shares To Fund Public Transit

@wmba - it appears that the word GM and recall are being used together or in relation to each other quite often lately ;)

To be fair, it says it's to fund transit in the Greater Toronto Area, not just Toronto - that's an area that represents about half the entire population of Ontario. I know as it stands, the TTC and Metrolinx are working together to extend the University-Spadina line into York Region. On the other hand, what if we just get all of the non-Toronto residents who commute into the city to pay a toll, fund transit that way? I'm sure it'd switch back to coming from our tax dollars real quick.

GM was convicted of conspiring to require transit companies to buy GM buses instead of the buses of other companies. (In other words, GM was trying to monopolize the sale of buses.) It wasn't convicted of conspiring to replace street car lines with buses. Read about it here: http://www.theatlanticcities.com/commute/2013/06/be-careful-how-you-refer-so-called-great-american-streetcar-scandal/5771/ The changeover in Columbus to buses was complete by the late 1940s, and it was because people wanted more flexible routes, according to the Columbus Dispatch: "There wasn't much sentimentality on Sept. 5, 1948, when the last two streetcars finished their routes on the Main and Neil line between Bexley and Ohio State. "'The conversion of the Columbus transportation system from streetcar to motorbus or trolley coach has now been accomplished on all lines,' The Dispatch dryly noted, 'and there yet remains only the task of removing rails and repaving on a few streets.' "People's fondness for streetcars grew later, said Alex Campbell, a rail buff whose collection of photos and history resides online at www. columbusrailroads.com. "'Of course, the kids loved it," he said. 'I'm sure if you were a commuter on one -- day in, day out -- you'd be just as happy with the bus.'" I spoke too broadly about the effect of the 1935 act. It didn't completely bar a utility from owning a non-related business. The act did, however, give the federal government the ability to veto ownership of an unrelated business by a utility company. Under the act, a utility had to receive approval from the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to do so, and said business had to be kept entirely separate from the regulated portion of the utility's business. Even more importantly, the act completely barred electric utilities from using the losses racked up by street car lines (and other businesses) as an excuse to raise prices for residential and business customers. Even if the SEC did approve the ownership of a street car line by a utility, the act still prevented the utility from using it to justify price increases for electricity sold to business or residential customers. Which, of course, greatly diminished the reason for owing a transit company in the first place. That had nothing to do with GM.